News from Jules | 05.16.2023 | Hood or Bust
Last Thursday, I woke up at 5:30 a.m. and immediately started packing all of my gear for my second attempt of Mount Hood. By 8:30 a.m. I was ready for my first nap of the day. Before I headed to work around noon, I made a big tea. I had a big day and a long night ahead of me.
I paused to read the tea bag before I filled the travel mug with hot water:
“Be fearless; know that all will be provided at the right time.”
I savored the quote as if the Universe was speaking directly to me. The adventure had already begun.
I had reached a Zen-like calm in the days leading up to this attempt. Coming into May—primetime for climbing Mount Hood—I had no prospects which only added to my performance anxiety. Could I do this? Would I even get the chance to try?
Within a week, multiple options arose. Phew!
I seized the first opportunity to climb alongside a seasoned leader and her climbing partner, plus five students from my Mazamas’ Basic Climbing Education Program (BCEP) teams in 2021 (me), in 2022, and our most recent graduates in 2023.
It was like a pressure relief valve released.
The concern immediately faded into calm which soon turned into curiosity.
What was about to happen?
After work on Thursday, May 11, I drove from Sisters to Bend to meet up with one of my climbing partners, who coincidentally transplanted from Portland to Central Oregon recently. Then we had a two-hour drive up to the mountain where we could grab dinner in Government Camp and a few hours of sleep in the car if we were lucky.
The team set out from the Timberline Lodge parking lot at 1:15 a.m. on Friday morning. Only lit by a rising blood orange half-moon to the east and our small headlamps, the dark night sky was overflowing with stars. Looking up, the mountain itself was hard to see except for several headlamps moving up the south side. It looked as if The Big Dipper was swooping down to pick up fallen stars.
Watch this YouTube video of “Mt. Hood || Climbing the Pearly Gates” to see the whole climb or read “A Beginner’s Guide to Climbing Mt. Hood” to learn more about the south route.
There wasn’t a lot of time for awe as we followed our own headlamps, swiftly ascending to the top of the Palmer ski lift (8,540 feet) by 3:15 a.m.—2,500 feet of elevation gain in two miles—where we stopped to put on our crampons before it got steeper.
Essentially metal claws for your feet, the first time I put on my brother’s crampons in 2020 I felt invincible like Wolverine or Spiderman like I could climb anything. He’d climbed Mount Hood many times with them already, and I used them on Mount Hood, Unicorn Peak, and Mount Adams in 2021; and most recently Mount Saint Helens in January, 2022.
As I pulled out my crampons, something fell into my hand. It was a bolt. Uh oh.
Hood or bust indeed!
I saw that the nut was missing from my right crampon where a nut and bolt secure the back straps to hold my heel in place. A teammate tried to fix it with a metal tie but it wouldn’t fit through the holes. The webbing strap around my ankle and through the toe loop seemed like it was sufficient, so we all proceeded.
But, I realized within 10 minutes that the adjustable crampon would contract underneath my boot when I kicked my front points into the icy incline creating a three-inch gap between the crampon and my heel.
There was no way this would work in the Pearly Gates. It was not safe to proceed.
I knew: Game over.
After a teammate climbed ahead to relay the message, my climbing partner ran down from above to give me the car keys and I started to descend. Seeking answers, my mind immediately wondered: Was this destined? Was this why my training hadn’t gone to plan?
But, I remembered to pause and take it all in. This is when the nearly 3,000 minutes of meditation during the past year kicked in. See things the way they are. I started to cry. The moon, the stars, the Milky Way. So much beauty and sadness too.
Out of the darkness, I heard another question.
What did I need to let go of?
My ego.
Since my first attempt two years ago, I continued to wonder: Why am I doing this?
Summiting Mount Hood was no longer a goal or a dream. No box to check, nothing to prove, not even for closure. It was simply an experience of being fully alive. A calling. To live deeply, breathe deeply, love deeply. And oh my gosh, those breathgiving views!
And so tonight I travel
the back roads of self
to a place with no shovel,
no spoon, no pen,
no wheel, no stick,
and find there
the peace that arrives
when the idea of traveler
dissolves. And then the
road. And then the self.
— Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, For a Moment
The peace that arrives when the idea of climber dissolves. And then the mountain. And then the self.
And so, with each climber I passed, I heard myself ask them if they had a zip tie. Deep down inside I just wanted more of this awesome experience.
Nope, one replied.
What’s a zip tie? asked the next one.
The third person I asked was skinning up on skis and paused to ask: “Why, what’s the problem?”
“Oh, I can help you with that! You just need a ski strap,” he said as he pulled a Clark Kent becomes Superman—seemingly taking off a ski, kneeling down, pulling a red strap out of his backpack, and looping it tightly around my crampon and boot in one swift move.
As he zoomed off, I called after him: “Thank you!”
“You’re really welcome,” he replied. As if it made his day, not mine.
I grunted my way back up, feeling grateful for all the abs work at water aerobics this spring, as I counted my steps up the steep terrain—25 side steps up on the left, then 25 steps on the right, then 25 steps waddling up with duck feet—different muscles aching with each type of step.
By 5:30 a.m. I caught up with my team at the Devil’s Kitchen (~10,000 feet), named for the sulfuric stench of rotten eggs emitting with the volcanic gasses (210-1,800° Fahrenheit) of the 500,000-year-old, long-dormant but still alive volcano. Only our second break so far, it was time to put away the trekking poles and get out our ice axes. Now, we were really climbing.
Skirting around the gaseous vents, we made our way up to the Hogsback—a snow bank connecting Crater Rock to the steep rock walls surrounding the crater of a 1780 eruption that imploded the former summit—and our only bit of relatively flat travel. I almost forgot to turn around and catch a glimpse of the massive mountain shadow spreading across the forest below as the sun rose from behind the summit.
The clock was ticking.
I was still digesting a Lara bar from our break and noticed the blood rushing to my stomach. I could barely feel my fingers and wondered if I could keep a grip on my tools. I took the ten-second pause to ball up my fingers and made a mental note to use mittens next time.
The slope became snowy steps up to and over the Bergshund—an one-inch crack in the boot-packed snow bridge, but actually a 20-foot deep crevasse beneath—and abruptly ended at a five-inch wide ledge traversing to the Pearly Gates, the aptly named vertical ice tunnel ascending to the heavenly summit.
And where one seems most likely to die.
As I stood there, watching our leader cross first, I knew: Yes, this was my first time ice climbing and using two ice axes, one in each hand. Yes, my boltless crampon was jerry-rigged together. Yes, my hands were freezing. Yes, my calves were so tired. But none of that mattered.
Ted Lasso is right: I just needed to believe.
With ice crystal clarity, I knew how to be fearless: Don’t think, be present. Be cautious, but set the fear aside. Focus on speed, safely. And just keep going. You got this, girl.
I focused on moving my hands and feet in rhythm, one after another. Across the traverse, then up. Just like at the rock gym, moving my feet up to new holds, then reaching as far as I could and jamming my ax into the ice until it hooked. I was grateful for every plank and push-up I’d done this year. This was a total body workout!
Halfway up and so deeply in the zone, I didn’t notice the other-worldly ice formations around us until my climbing partner shouted to look up for a photo.
I may have looked serious, but I was busy having fun.
This is when my Mom came to mind. Or more accurately came to heart. Not so much her spirit—though it did feel like I had extra guardian angels helping out on the climb—but her presence inside me. I felt so deeply connected to all the parts of me that we share—fearless, bold, enthusiastic, speedy, driven, persistent.
Rather than just being proud of me, I could imagine her having fun right there beside me.
I also felt cautious, methodical, patient, and resourceful like my Dad. When he talks about their climbing days, my Dad said that he enjoyed the journey while my Mom was a “peak bagger,” driven more by summiting. I feel like both.
I totally understand how my parents loved climbing so much and why they raised us kids to have such a passion for the outdoors and to find ourselves in nature. This, this is why I’m doing this.
Around 7 a.m. I took my last steps over the ledge of the Pearly Gates and all I could say was: Oh my God. Oh my God.
We weren’t quite to the summit (11,250 feet), but I was exhilarated. My Mom’s climbing shirt was right: “Climbers reach their peak in Oregon. Get high on a mountain.”
It was everything and nothing like what I’d imagined.
The journey and the summit.
Watch the Hood or Bust Highlight on Instagram to see photos of my climb attempts and the whole three-year journey to summit.
There was a long traverse across a ridge to a small mound of snow basically invisible from below. Thirty climbers casually milled about beneath blue skies and puffy clouds framing the 360-degree view of Oregon and southern Washington—all taking pictures, eating “summit treats” and sharing a love of the mountains, of nature, of life.
We still had to descend: down climb the One O’clock Couloir—where I would get more help fixing my broken crampon from a fellow Mazama from another team, glissade past Palmer, and post hole the slushy snow to the parking lot, but I couldn’t wait to come back again and play.
This was the first summit, but not the last time I’d be here.
Feeling the warm sun on my face, I knew it was worth it. All of it.
May you fully believe this week.
Love,
Jules
P.S. The list of supporters, benefactors, and angels on this journey is too long for me to remember and name everyone, but I tried. Thank you for all your support, big and small, during the past 3.5+ years—Gear Sponsors: Bob Williams, Josh Williams, Larry Beck, Bridget Martin; Climb/BCEP leaders: Teresa Dalsinger, Larry Beck, Gary Bishop, Walter Keutel, Ania Wiktorowicz; Climb/BCEP assistants: Laura Guderyahn/Kim Kopowski/Wiz, Rebecca Lewis, Bridget Martin, Kim Edger, Ralph Daub, Ann Marie Caplan, Gary Ballou, Lisa Brady, Ryan Gwilllim, Travis Feracota, Ashley Smithers, Tessa Rough, Amy Brose, Amy Graham, Jamie McGilvray, Derek Jahelka, Joan Wallace, Chris Kruell, Forest Menke-Thielman; BCEP teammates: Olivia Girod, Rocio Herrera, Jonathan Pape, Andy Robbins, Randy Uhde, Austin Wong, Laura Lazorski, Tom Torkelson, David Kreisman, Vivian Ton, Varma Penumetcha, Sydney Bowman, Cat Smith-Vaughan, James Richardson, Derek Markee, Michael Batryn, Jennifer Ching, Jerrid Kimball, Badger Bitter, Kat Miracle, Keith Batryn, Nathan Taylor, Steph Reinwald, Steven Williams, Thuy Le, Zachery Schulte; Climbing partners: Olivia Girod, Austin Wong, Abe Barth/Emily Werb/Lewis, John Douglass; Training buddies: Anne Kramer, Bobby Foley, David Sterlecht, Jeremy Sternlicht, Kanika Metre, Claire Meunier, Diana Bennett, Christine Douglass, Sam Darling, Olivia Raymer/Scott Becker/Arlo, Claire/Evan/Luna Cohan, Becki Chall/Kyle Henning, Nora Blumenstein/Andrew Gerbertz, Victoria Innis, Sheena Raab/Bryan Hall, Kaitlyn Devlin, Jocelyn Furbush, Carter Hubbard, Katie Tibbetts, Kaley Chicoine; Cheerleaders: Cathy Anderson, Kate Haynes, Joan McKenzie, Alex Schramm, Phebe Markley, Kasandra Griffin, Cameron Browne, Caroline Greger, Virginia/Tom Sponsler, Joslyn Erickson, Kristy Hanselman, Mirabai Vogt, Katie Townley, Tiffany/Jesse Temple, Shane Johnson, Diane/Norm/Megan Harris, Jeff/Sara Pietka, Maureen Simmonds, Annette Pronk, Mary Davidson, Marisol Flor, Maggie Starr, Jenn Lawrence, Ryan Reichert-Estes, Sue Brisbois, Vic Smith, Tam Patrick, Francesca Rainieri, Liam Meirow, Zach Kovan, Joe Marquez, Jon/Stacy Hill, Dan/Julia Rickards; and of course, “Ski Strap” Joe & Mazama ICS student saving the day last Friday!