Life of Megan: Highest I've Ever Been

Hey guys! Sorry it's been a little while since I posted! Between working and climbing, I don't have a ton of down time to write to y'all. I am also in the middle of a really good book and it is so hard for me to put it down. So two weekends ago, Aaron, Jim, and I made the trip back out to Leavenworth to do a full-day adventure climb. I'm just going to toss some names out at you and see what you think of our day. Serpentine Ridge, Dragontail Peak, Aasgard Pass. Makes us sound pretty hardcore, right? You know, maybe my high school classmates were onto something when they voted me "Most Likely To Climb Mount Everest." I love mountains.

Mountains are the cathedrals where I practice my religion. -Anatouli Boukreev

So that Friday night, instead of driving out to Leavenworth, we hung out with my Starbucks coworkers at Ron's house. Ron has been going to our Starbucks for quite some time and he is always a smiling face and talks with us. So he invited us to his house for a Santa Maria style BBQ cooked by Sydney, her boyfriend, Derek, and Sam. First of all, it was absolutely delicious. Secondly, Ron has a beautiful house and an even more beautiful view of Mount Rainier, Lake Union, and the city. Thirdly, Ron is the smartest person I've ever met. He has a M.D. and a Ph.D. So we all hung out, had a few drinks, ate yummy food, and played Cards Against Humanity. Unfortunately, I had opened that morning and wasn't able to nap so we left rather early so I could sleep for almost 10 hours.

Saturday, we met up with Jim and drove out to Leavenworth. We did a short bouldering session at the Sword Boulders. Jim and I worked on a V2 (I <3 Jugs) with a "delicate top-out." From the ground, I was like, "Dude. Those holds are huge. The top-out won't be a problem." I'll cut to the chase and just tell you: I will never underestimate a top-out again. It was slightly overhung and tilted sideways so gravity was pulling a strange way so the big holds weren't very good! Also, there was one pretty big move for me and I wasn't sticking it consistently. So, Aaron "worked" it with us and came up with a heel-hook which turned out to be crucial for me easily sticking that move. **Did you notice that on two of my climbs heel hooks were key?** Anyways, then came the top-out. I got up there and discovered it was indeed delicate. My hands were sweating so I started to downclimb a bit and Aaron shouted at me to not give up (which I was just trying to get into a stable position to wipe my hands off) and then I did some magical thing with my left foot to propel me to the top of the boulder and crawl over the lip. Apparently yelling at me makes me send problems. I'll have to make sure he does it more often.

Delicate top-out indeed I <3 Jugs.

Then we moved to a V7, Off the Couch, for Aaron to work. After figuring out the beta - and using liquid chalk - he sent it! The boys played around on some scary looking slab stuff for awhile and then we went to The Sword (V3). Let me put the height of this climb into perspective: "An old-school 5.11 toprope climb that is now a highball classic." I made it a few hard moves off the ground but I didn't have to worry about topping out the highball because the crux shut. me. down. Then we set up camp, ate, prepared our packs, and crashed early.

Off the Couch (V7)

Sunday at 4 am came very quickly. We ate breakfast, drank some desperately need caffeine, and drove to the trailhead. We started the 5 mile, 2000 ft gain hike to Colchuck Lake at 5 am. We ditched some stuff at the lake and then started the adventure to the base of Serpentine Ridge. We gained a lot more elevation (yay rest step!) before we got to the climb. We roped up, tossed our climbing shoes on, and started the 4th class scramble simul-climbing. Most of the route was low 5th class, 4th class, and then 3rd class stuff to the summit. There were 3 true pitches: 1 5.8 and 2 5.7 pitches which we cruised through pretty easily. Jim ended up taking a lead fall but fared with only a few good scratches and maybe some bruises. Thankfully he was okay and we were able to finish the climb. Awhile later, we reached the summit!!! From the summit of Dragontail Peak, we had a pretty view of the Enchantments, Colchuck Lake, Mount Stuart, and Mount Rainier. It was the highest I've ever been: 8,842 feet :)

Colchuck Lake as seen from nearing the bass of Serpentine Ridge.

The descent was a little more involved since it involved a snowfield to cross. As many of you may remember, I don't do so well going down in the snow... BUT this time I didn't even wipe out once on the hardest part of the descent! Yes, I was slow but I don't even care. Later on the descent as we were closing in on Aasgard, I totally wiped out hard on flat snow (does it count if Jim or Aaron didn't see it?). Anyways, we made it to Aasgard Pass and hiked down the knee torturer. We descended 2000 feet in 0.5 mile. I'm very glad we didn't hike up that pass. Very glad. We grabbed our stuff from the lake and made the quickest beeline to the truck as we were capable of. It was officially the longest day of hiking/climbing/adventuring I have been on. It was 14ish hours I believe. The second longest was Snake Dike on Half Dome in Yosemite. Both were incredible days.

Partway up Serpentine Ridge! Looking beautiful Washington!

Almost to the summit! Just a long third class ways away!

We were only a little tired when we got home. I mean, my legs were only a little sore the next day. I was only slightly tempted to drive the 4 blocks to work but I didn't. I walked on the most beautiful flat, even ground ever. Anyways, I'll write soon to tell y'all about this past weekend. Guess where I was this time? You'll never guess!