Mount Adams Hike

It's Sunday morning and as I look outside I see the rising sun burning through the tree tops, creating an electric zoo of flash dancing, brightly lit creatures all across the starboard side of my apartment complex. I am drinking my brain kicker coffee (organic dark roast+Kerrygold unsalted grass fed butter+coconut oil+cinnamon+honey+blender) and writing this morning blog while watching god turn sun slivers into marionettes for my amusement. Speaking of god... yesterday I wrote a short story where I played the puppeteer, and in doing so I fabricated the lives of three young American kids and in turn, completely destroyed them, all in an effort to drive home a political point. After having written that, it dawned on me that writers get to "play god" every time they write. We envision, we create, we conduct, we conclude; and during that process we choose all of the emotions and every outcome, which now that I think about it, is actually bigger than god. Politicians can't even do that. Hmm, no wonder the religious texts that exist on planet earth have led so many millions of humans in certain directions. The power of the written word... is it the greatest force known to humanity?

This is your Captain speaking, that is all.

Okay, now that my opening thoughts are out of the way, let me tell you about an awesome hike I got to be part of last weekend! A group of seven guys, mixture of friends and coworkers, decided to hike up Mount Adams in Washington state. We drove up first thing Saturday morning, stopped in at the Ranger Station to obtain our passes, and then began our hike at the South Climb #183 trailhead parking lot. It was a gorgeous day and pretty good good workout to reach the lunch counter where we spent the night. My total pack weight was 34 pounds, including crampons. After a fun, relaxing night around base camp, morning came and three of us (myself included) decided to hike to the summit. Again, it was a beautiful day (at 9,400') but the higher we hiked the colder it got, and eventually we found ourselves right in the midst of a completely different environment. I think it was somewhere around the second false summit when the weather really took a turn. I can't say for sure, but I think the wind gusts were around 150,000mph and the temperature dipped to well below freezing. In other words, it was FUCKING COLD, man! I wasn't exactly prepared for that type of weather; my gloves were nothing more than two stitched dish rags and didn't do much in keeping my mitts warm. Same goes for the rest of my clothing... way too thin for freezing temps. But, needless to say, we marched forth and made it to the summit (12,276') and I am here to share the pictures and video of our journey! Okay, I will shut up now and let the pics tell the rest of the story, enjoy: