| Moondance Leadership log (2005-07-17 -> 2005-08-06)
Leaders: Abby Bullock and Anderson Heagy
Students: Patten Bruce, Huntley Chapman, Bill Eakin, Patrick Fink, Eileen Fitzgerald, Simone Kastner, Taylor Kronn, Mary Anna Lynch, Trey Miller and Ariel Tellatin
July 22, 2005
What an all star crew! We are having so much fun up here in the Olympics! After only five days we are one big family. It is great experiencing a Moondance trip with so many veteran students. They bring so much knowledge and energy to the group. Our first section of the trip began on the Olympic coast. Anderson and I were a bit nervous with only a half day to prepare, but this crew is so experienced that it was no problem. Our first day on trail was our longest. We hiked 7 miles to Toleak point. Logistic are a bit crazy when backpacking on the beach because you have to factor in tides. And to make it more exciting it was almost a full moon. This means that high tide is even higher then normal. The trail was amazing though. It wound through huge conifer trees that were so big that it took five people with their arms stretched out to get around them. We also saw two snakes and a ton of slugs, banana slugs to be exact. They are huge and bright yellow. The trail is also unique in that to get from the beach back up to the woods you have to climb up huge ladders. The days that followed the first were a bit shorter in length which allowed for some frisbee playing, swimming, and sand castle building. Patten, Trey, Patrick, and Bill tried to build a surf board and surf down mosquito creek. It worked for a little while. The food has been absolutely amazing! The boys cooked up a mean batch of mac n' cheese the first night while the girls countered their culinary skills with some burritos the next night. Simone brought along her ukulele which provided us with the proper beach music! This has set us up for an amazing section 2, where we will be backpacking on the interior of the Olympic National Park. We will be camping two nights fairly close to a glacier and are so excited. Each student wanted to express their excitement about the trip; so here it is!
Ariel-We are all getting along well. We have had a lot of fun chillin out together on the beach. The tides have made camping interesting and exciting.
Mary Anna- This backpacking section was awesome! "Chillaxing" on the beach was the best. I loved getting rerouted off the island. Wicked!
Trey- Backpacking on the beach was awesome, except for the sand. Swimming under the waterfall was awesome. Everyone is really cool and we are having a great time.
Huntley- The weather has been perfect and sleeping on the beach is awesome. We have seen a lot of wildlife. We even saw a shark! There have been eagles, seals, otters, deer, starfish, and mosquitoes! Our group is amazing!
Taylor- Everyone in our group is really great and so much fun! The beach was so beautiful; we just had to work with the tides. But it was still awesome!
Bill- Every time we came out of the woods and saw the Pacific there were amazing views. The entire group is functioning great as a whole.
Patrick- The group has never before has seen such a laid back and relaxing backpacking trip. Between frisbee, yoga, dead sharks, and tides, we've covered the whole spectrum of chillaxin!
Eileen- This was the most chill and amazing backpacking section. All 10 of us have bonded into an amazing group.
Simone- This backpacking section was great to start off this trip. It was so much fun and everyone really bonded during it!
Patten- Beach backpacking is the best! The waves we stumbled upon were really good. It just kills me I don't have a board. Good food! Great group! Beautiful weather! Throw in a frisbee and you are set!
Sunday, July 31
This year’s Leadership trip has returned from another great backpacking section. We just got back from the Olympic National Park, which was stunningly beautiful. We spent eight days exploring some spectacular country; experiencing everything from dense temperate rainforest to high mountain glaciers. The backpacking was strenuous, but everyone finished each day in good style, taking the hard work in stride. All in all, it was an amazing backpacking trip. Here's what everyone had to say about it:
Ariel, who was one of our speed demon hikers, really enjoyed our toughest day of hiking. It was a super long day, all up hill, and she just cruised it! Mary Anna is psyched because she knows that all of the backpacking has whipped our team into shape for Mt. Rainier. She is feeling really confident going into our next big adventure. For Taylor, one of the highlights of the trip was seeing some wildlife. So far she has seen two bears and an elk! Bill also enjoyed the wildlife, though he would have liked to have been closer! Still, he found our midnight hike to be exceptional, and the subsequent sunrise beautiful. Huntley said all of the hard work was well worth it. She had a great time in the backcountry, and she especially liked hiking up the moraine to view Blue glacier. Patten was also psyched on the glaciers, and he can't wait to get on Mt. Rainier. As he put it, "Rainier is gonna go Down!" Patrick, who claims this backpacking section was the best he's experienced in his four years with Moondance, wishes it had lasted just a bit longer. Another night on the Hoh River would have been great, but he too can't wait for a chance at Rainier's summit. Despite having his Gorp raided by small furry creatures of some sort, Trey found this section to be more than enjoyable. He kept the group in stitches with his impressions and spontaneous dance parties. Simone really appreciated the lack of cars and noise in the Hoh Valley. When compared to some of the places we go in the frontcountry, this area was about as peaceful and quite as it gets. A great time was had by all. And we think Eileen summed it up best when she said, "This backpacking section was epic; from nighttime 10 mile hikes, to relaxing on the Hoh River.
Rainier, here we come!
We have just received confirmation that all of the members from the Moondance Leadership group summitted Mt. Rainier!! We will post a trip log as soon as we can but we did find out that all 10 students and both leaders made the top! Congratulations to everyone!
100% to the top of Mt. Rainier! Every single person on 2005's Leadership course made it to the summit of one of the toughest endurance climbs in North America! We couldn't be more excited. Here's the play by play on our climb.
Our fist day with Rainier Mountaineering Inc. (RMI) was a day of school. We woke up early and drove a
ways up the mountain, and then hike out towards the Paradise glacier. Once there, our guides taught us
all of the climbing techniques necessary for a safe and successful assent of the mountain. Patrick, who
has participated in two other climbing schools with other Moondance courses, was very quick to pick up on the new skills. Mary Anna, who also has participated in some climbing schools, taught the group the rest step and the butterfly knot.
The next day was a rest day so we slept in. Much needed! In the afternoon we visited a sculpture park
made of recycled materials. Patten was inspired by the artists' process of collecting the materials and
then figuring our where they would fit in the sculpture. (Shazam!) This was followed by a cook out of hamburgers and hot dogs, and a watermelon! We then drove to an overlook with a great view of Rainier, getting us excited for the next day!
Climbing day! - We split up into two groups and headed up to camp Muir. The students in group A were
Patrick, Huntley, Simone, Bill, and Eileen. In group B there was Mary Anna, Taylor, Trey, Patten, and Ariel. Two very strong teams! Group A headed off first up the trail. The hike began at 5,400 ft. in the parking lot of Paradise Inn. We began our ascent to camp Muir which tops out at 10,280. One our guides Lindsey, who is a former Moondance student and now RMI guide, was a great inspiration to Ariel; convincing her to apply early decision to Dartmouth (Lindsey's alma mater), and to possibly do some guide work in the future! There were two breaks in our hike before we put our plastic boots on and began putting our snow walking techniques to use. Huntley felt it was inspiring to see the top of the crater rim, the summit of Rainier, as we were hiking up the snow fields to Muir. We kept trekking and arrived at Muir at 2:00pm. This was much earlier than most groups get to Muir so we had some extra time before dinner at 4:00. Anderson and I pulled out a surprise for the students for doing such a great job. Pineapple!! Fresh fruit at high altitude tastes so good! We followed that up with some ramen and then went to bed. Well..... we tried to get some rest. Only Patrick and Taylor really got some sleep. The rest of us laid there in anticipation of the wake up call form our guides. And it came at 11:00 pm.
Eileen and Try were the first two up! They were so excited! The hot water was brought in for us to gobble up some oatmeal and hot chocolate. Team A was given a ten minute warning. We quickly put our crampons on and we were off. The time of night didn't matter because the stars were so beautiful! It was a warm clear night. Bill was in awe at the stillness of the atmosphere that surrounds you when you hike at night by the light of your headlamp. All you hear is the crunching of the snow between your crampons.
The climb was divided into four sections. The first took us from camp Muir at 10,280 to Ingraham flats at 11,400. Here, we crossed the Cowlitz glacier and moved through the Cathedral Gap, a very rocky and
steep section. After a fifteen minute break we were walking again. This took us a little way up the Ingraham glacier and traversed over to Disappointment Cleaver, which separates the Ingraham and Emmons Glaciers. We then ascended the Cleaver itself. This is the most difficult portion of the climb. Our whole team styled it! Once we had Disappointment Cleaver behind us we were standing at 12,200, and only two more sections ahead of us. Following our fifteen minute "cleaver break," we traversed a long way toward the Emmons Glacier and then started switching back to our high break at 13,700. We took ten minutes there and then headed for the summit. At this point the sun began to show itself as a red stripe across the horizon, which was below us. It was hard to stay focused on the climb. It was so amazing seeing the sun rise from such a high elevation. It was cold and windy, but without any difficulty our team reached the crater rim. At that point we dipped down in the crater, dropped our packs in the middle and trekked to the real summit at 14,411 on the other side of the crater. In Simone's words; “The sunrise was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. It gave me inspiration to hike the rest of the way to the top. I am so glad we all were able to make it. It was awesome!"
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