It's Icy At The Top...

I have to give all three of us some accolades for this morning… with daylight savings we very easily could have done an easier hike or something faster. Instead we met up at 7:30am this morning at Johns in Issaquah (which felt like the middle of the night) to attack Mount Si just outside of North bend.

I haven’t tackled this trail in a couple of years and reading up on it we realized a couple of quick details… one, it’s the most heavily hiked trail in Washington. Two, it’s more or less straight up the mountain. Starting at just over 1000 feet of elevation it tops out over 4000 feet in a steady, well maintained 4 mile hike. And three; Snoqualmie pass is only at 3000 feet of elevation; thus when you’re throwing on your ski boots in the parking lot of Snoqualmie you’re 1000 feet below the top of Mount Si. Knowing that the pass had been receiving steady snow fall over the last few days we wondered if we could even get to the top.

Sean, John, and I arrived in the parking lot just after 8:00am with Duke and started the assent. Even at 8:00am, and with a temperature of 30 degrees, the parking lot was moderately alive with backpackers carrying ice axes and larger bags. The first two miles were good… legs stretched out and we worked the switch backs with three or four other groups… they’d pass us, we’d pass them and so on. We needed to be off this trail by noon so we pushed a pretty good pace.

Just before the 3 mile marker we started seeing our first signs of snow. As we went up, others (who must have left really early) were coming down. Everyone does the ‘Morning’ or ‘how’s everyone doing’ general trail pleasantries. Duke gets a lot of attention as we pass other hikers and sometimes their four legged companions. In many of these exchanges we kept hearing, ‘it’s really icy at the top’. Of course we thought they were weak and obviously didn’t have the hiking skills of three of us.

As mile marker 3 came and went the trail, already very muddy, became more and more snow covered. Quickly we were hiking up the trail on snow and soon ice. Many of the ‘hard core’ hikers that we had been seeing started to turn around. ‘It’s too icy’ they’d say. ‘We don’t have poles’ or ‘we didn’t bring any traction for our boots’. With that said, wind howling, bundled in gloves, hats, and long johns, we slowly crept up the ‘Vancouver Bobsled’ trail eventually hitting the summit at around 10:30am (4 miles, in snow, 2.5 hours). I think the three rookies (I having forgotten Dukes leash, collar, and food; John having forgotten his new trekking poles and Sean having forgotten his gloves) conquered said mountain and felt damn good doing it.

Of course the icy trail was still there for the descent and took a little skill, and a few falls (all of us at least once), and the passing of 1000 new hikers. Back down below the 3 mile marker it seemed like bus loads of bored Seattleites had decided to attack Mount Si and we were amazed by the sheer number of hikers an amazing number of which seemed to be solo women. Duke and I might to make Mount Si a more regular weekend hike. Week 5 and I think we are progressing well and feeling better each hike.

Cheers,

Joe