Mount Shasta -

Mount Shasta simply dominates northern California. When I was moving to Reno in August 2005 I drove Highway 97 through Central Oregon and noticed a massive white mountain off in the distance. That vantage was from north of Klammath Lake over 50 miles away. Mount Shasta is big, beautiful, and covered with real glaciers. It is truly impressive. Naturally, I wanted to climb the mountain as soon as possible.

The first opportunity came during New Years 2005/2006 when Sean Bemis, Chris "Cri" Boratenski, and myself planned a winter ski trip to the mountain. Chris's fiancee Julia joined us, as did Jarrod and Sam Decker. On this first trip we were weathered out in a big way. Several feet of snow fell on the mountain. Julia, Sam, and Jarrod had to leave early and ended up getting stuck on the drive down the mountain. Meanwhile, Sean, Cri, and myself were sitting by the heater in Sean's van drying out before returning to Horse Camp. We did end up enjoying some good skiing on that and the trip that followed in March, however, the summit continued to beckon.

With Sean off doing geology fieldwork over the summer, Cri and I planned a summit attempt of our own in June. This would be my third attempt and Cri's fourth. We met up in San Fran on a Friday and drove up to the mountain during the evening only to find the parking lot packed. At about 9:30 pm we showed up at Horse Camp, pitched our tent, cooked dinner, and prepared for the 1:00 am start. Both of us forgot cameras so we took photos with Cri's cell phone.

That morning we awoke to several other parties with loud voices and loud footsteps within a few feet of our tent. We quickly mobilized by strapping on the skis and heading up the mountain in the dark. Dawn hit as we were ascending the headwall of the Avalanche Gulch route with a hundred other people. We stashed the skis and continued up past the Red Bank and up Misery Hill. Eventually we reached the summit just in time for the clouds to clear out and the winds to die down. Fortunately for me I felt no effects of altitude on this climb as I had on Mt. Whitney. We took it easy on the summit and on the descent we even caught a brief snooze on the lee side of a rock bank.

The ski descent down the lower mountain was simply amazing. The snow was perfect powder. We were happy that we had brought the skis, but at the same time we were glad that we hadn't hauled our skis to the summit where the snow was boilerplate crust. Everything on this trip had worked out quite well.

Hopefully, some future trips to the mountain will include ascents of the West Face route and the north side routes. Shasta is the perfect halfway point for Sean, Cri, and myself, since Sean is living in Eugene, Cri in San Francisco, and I'm living in Reno.

-Tom

Link to SummitPost for route info:
http://www.summitpost.org/mountain/rock/150188/mount-shasta.html