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Taming my Dragon

finally ascending Hood

Hood Next

Hood is of course famous here in America. Everyone in the US climbing community knows of it. And, for sure, Hood is the most important mountain in the state of Oregon. Nearly every few years we are treated to a helicopter rescue off of it. In addition, every decade there are multiple fatality accidents. Grizzly stuff. With all that TV and print coverage Hood has become known as a killer peak. I mean, man, it is the stuff adventure is made of, right? The more people killed, the more carnage on a mountain, the more respect and desire to prove oneself on it. That is how I felt and I wanted to prove I was good enough to do it.

I took the above photo of Mt. Hood coming off of Mt. Adams, another Cascade Range volcano north another fifty miles or so and across the state line in neighboring Washington State. It was late in a twelve-hour day of Adams mountaineering and I had stopped on my descent just near timber line to search for my headlamp. Before resuming the hike out, I grabbed the shot, tantalizing isn't it. It was a special moment for me because Mt. Hood had been on my list for decades and I knew then that I was dialing it in. Three or four years later I would finally summit Mt. Hood.

After all, I had a history with Hood. On an expedition from Colorado with climbing buddies Dan and Jack in the late 90’s I had pioneered an effort to try our hand climbing the volcanoes in the Cascades. We had meekly tried Mount Baker and tentatively looked at Rainier, but the weather had been so bad we had been completely shut out so far. A few days later we were snowed off Adams. Thus far skunked, we had worked our way south to Mount Hood and given our luck so far knew our odds on it were low. We camped for a day at a nearby RV resort and tried to rest up for what we knew would be a tough grizzly bear of a climb on Hood.

To prepare ourselves we moved in late to the parking lot for the ski area there and did a bivy-like camp all crammed in my pickup camper. At about 4 AM, we awoke to heavy rain and prepared with scant optimism that it would stop. After our breakfast we suited up in our best rain gear and stepped out of the camper. It was still dark and raining heavily. It looked absolutely hopeless with rain water madly running downhill off the parking lot. Although I suggested we push up as far as we could, Jack and Dan wisely declined. We had thus made the call as a team to abort.

Our successful climb of Mount Hood

So there you have it, my first attempt on Mt. Hood climbing attempt didn’t even leave the parking lot! One could only imagine what it would have been like, up higher on Hood that day. Stuck up on the mountain in those with heavy rain/snow conditions? No thanks! Even descent would be nearly impossible. But for us, the wise but disapointed mountaineers, we just took off our wet gear, put on our street clothes and left for our next target of that trip: Mt. Shasta.

I was determined to come back, and I did 15 or so years later. The ascent was perfect on my second try. I partnered with Bala and Sonya and the video tells the tale.

So now you know the history I had with this mountain. I had to bide my time and I recommend anyone that tries to climb this mountain to bide their time. Because Mount Hood is fickle, and it will kill.