Scenic picture thread

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by MooMoo2

Baldy's still a nice hike, though. I went there on a weekday and reached the top just before 6 PM, so the trail was completely deserted except for one other trail runner going in the opposite direction. It's a strange feeling when you consider that there are around 10 million people living within 50 or so miles (as the crow flies) of Baldy's summit.

Baldy is currently off-limits:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE...eprd720172.pdf

[MooMoo2]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

Baldy is currently off-limits:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE...eprd720172.pdf

The ski lifts are open, though:
https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/l...rdino/2350656/

edit: In case anyone's curious, I took those pictures in late summer/early fall 2018.

[VBCurtis]

Originally Posted by MooMoo2

"Boys go to Baldy. Men go to Whitney."

Baldy's still a nice hike, though. I went there on a weekday and reached the top just before 6 PM, so the trail was completely deserted except for one other trail runner going in the opposite direction. It's a strange feeling when you consider that there are around 10 million people living within 50 or so miles (as the crow flies) of Baldy's summit.

Nice! Thanks for the photos. I grew up at the base of Mt Baldy (like, a mile from where the road begins in Claremont), and while in HS I used to ride my bike up to Baldy village. About 2 hours up, 12 minutes down!

Never been to the summit, though. Some friends dragged me hiking to a ski hut (? day hut? something like 6-9 miles roundtrip) a few years back, and the return descent illuminated my lack of conditioning for such hikes.

[MooMoo2]

Originally Posted by VBCurtis

Nice! Thanks for the photos. I grew up at the base of Mt Baldy (like, a mile from where the road begins in Claremont), and while in HS I used to ride my bike up to Baldy village. About 2 hours up, 12 minutes down!

Never been to the summit, though. Some friends dragged me hiking to a ski hut (? day hut? something like 6-9 miles roundtrip) a few years back, and the return descent illuminated my lack of conditioning for such hikes.

Interesting! I definitely understand what you mean by lack of conditioning.

Last summer, I decided to hike Mt. Whitney out of the blue. To my surprise, permits were available that same weekend, so I decided to go for it with no prior preparation and minimal altitude acclimation. 22 miles in one day, with over 6000' of vertical gain and a maximum elevation of 14,500' / ~4400m? No problem, it's mind over matter.

I was unfamiliar with the trail and had to start the hike in the dark in order to get back by sunset, so I decided to tag along with the slowest looking group I could find. The first part was easy, but I started to feel tired at 10,000', about 3 miles into the hike. An hour later, my pace and that of some of my companions had slowed considerably, and our rest breaks became longer and longer. A few of the people in the group with me then said that they were going to take a naked picture of themselves at the summit. I don't know whether that was true or whether they just said that to motivate everyone, but I was too exhausted to care either way.

At 12,000', I was nothing but a disembodied gasping lung and spirit floating up the mountain. I had no appetite, no sense of time or direction, no desire to do anything besides making it to the top. I somehow willed myself to ~13400' / 4100m when someone noticed that I looked unsteady and had purple lips. It's the great paradox of mountain climbing. You can't succeed unless you're dedicated, but too much dedication can turn into dangerous summit fever. I'm glad that someone warned me, because I probably would have stumbled and fallen off a cliff if I went much further. So after 8 miles of hiking, I turned around, leaving 8 miles of downhill to go.

I may have been above treeline, but as that saying goes, I wasn't out of the woods yet. At one point, I got lost and spent 15-20 minutes trying to find the trail, which felt like an eternity. Further down, I saw what appeared to be log cabins. That seemed odd since I didn't see any cabins on my way up, but perhaps I had missed them while hiking up in the dark. But wouldn't there be a road going to those cabins and not just a trail? Well, the "cabins" turned out to be nothing more than tree branches when I got closer.

Towards the end of the trail, I experienced something similar to the Third Man Factor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Man_factor). I felt that there was someone near me, who told me to stop for water. He later said, "The trail turns right after this. You're almost there." The trail did in fact turn right, but there was no one there when I turned around. And I was indeed close to civilization. About half a mile later, after 16 hours of hiking, I had finally made it back to the parking lot.

There were plenty of awesome sights along the way, so it was definitely worth it even though I was out of shape and didn't make it to the summit. Take a look at the pictures below and enjoy!

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by MooMoo2

At 12,000', I was nothing but a disembodied gasping lung and spirit floating up the mountain. I had no appetite, no sense of time or direction, no desire to do anything besides making it to the top. I somehow willed myself to ~13400' / 4100m when someone noticed that I looked unsteady and had purple lips. It's the great paradox of mountain climbing. You can't succeed unless you're dedicated, but too much dedication can turn into dangerous summit fever.

Reinhold Messner you are not. When I was on top of Pike's Peak and the drive down, I was very careful to not go as hard as I normally would. I knew that it was a potential issue. I had spent some of the previous week in Colorado and Wyoming. So It was not like I went there straight from New Orleans of the like.

[Dr Sardonicus]

When I was young and invincible, I hiked up Barr Trail to the summit of Pikes Peak on the last day of a week-long visit to Colorado Springs. The four days before the last day were cloudy and rainy, and I didn't want to try on those days. I hiked up to Barr Camp (around 10,000 feet) and back down a couple of days before the last day, in the fog. I did some hiking the day before. The last day, I woke up -- kind of late for starting a hike to the summit -- and saw clear skies. Never mind "late." I got some things together (water, extra clothes, some rain gear, some food), left a note with someone, and headed out.

I made the A-frame at tree line in about 3 hours. That's about 9 miles up the trail. I felt fine. Four miles to go. I reckoned this was going to be easier than I thought. Wrong! Those last four miles took me four hours. As I got further up, I slowed down. And, I repeatedly had to stop. It was the darnedest sensation. I wasn't gasping for breath or anything like that. I just couldn't move. I'd sit down until I felt like I could move again, then get up and totter a bit further. I remember seeing the sign for the "16 golden stairs," a series of switchbacks ending at the summit. I figured I'd count them. I figured wrong.

I finally made the summit, went into the summit house, got coffee and a donut, and felt much better. Then I realized I had no idea how I was going to get down. It was late afternoon. The cog railway was not an option. I finally hitchhiked down. Somebody driving back to the Springs let me ride in the back of his pickup truck, and dropped me off near where I was staying.

[xilman]

Perhaps I'm weird but I don't seem to get altitude sickness at relatively low altitudes.

At the the top of Roque de los Muchachos (only 2600m) I felt as comfortable as I did at sea level a couple of hours earlier but SWMBO and the astronomer friends giving us a tour claimed to be noticeably short of breath.

A few years later I attended a workshop in Vail, Colorado. The vilklage itself is at 2500m and, again, I felt no less uncomfortable than at 30m a day earlier. A couple of days into the stay I hiked up the nearby mountain, adding another 500-700m (guessed) in altitude. Leg muscles felt the exercise but my breathing was no more difficult than if I'd exerted similar effort at sea level.

Perhaps I need to go > 4000m to feel the effect.

Incidentally, during one of the evening get-togethers lightning struck about 20m from where we were standing. By chance I was facing away so wasn't dazzled like many others present. All the village's fire and security alarms went off, the fire truck arrived at the scene a few minutes later and the hotel lost its entire IT and telephone equipment. Luckily my laptop was powered down and unharmed but I needed to estimate how long I'd spent on the phone to the UK so that the hotel owner could be compensated to some extent.

[rogue]

Originally Posted by xilman

Incidentally, during one of the evening get-togethers lightning struck about 20m from where we were standing. By chance I was facing away so wasn't dazzled like many others present. All the village's fire and security alarms went off, the fire truck arrived at the scene a few minutes later and the hotel lost its entire IT and telephone equipment. Luckily my laptop was powered down and unharmed but I needed to estimate how long I'd spent on the phone to the UK so that the hotel owner could be compensated to some extent.

That reminds me of an incident a few years ago when we were in Utah after leaving a quarry where we were hunting for trilobite fossils. Our minivan was the tallest thing around within 5 miles as the landscape was flat with no trees. We had left the quarry early due to an incoming storm, which hit us on our way back to the main road. We were concerned with both the potential of getting another flat (we got a flat our our way to the quarry as the road was unpaved and had only one spare) and of a flash flood. While driving (as fast as reasonable given the conditions), lightning struck the ground a short distance from our van. All of us thought it was within 25 feet (8m) of our vehicle and I swear that I saw part of the lightning come off the ground, possibly a ball, but I really can't say for certain as it happened so quickly. Fortunately it missed the van as there was no cell service or any vehicles within sigh. We half expected to see a scorch mark on the van when we got to the nearest town 32 miles (20 km) away. There was none.

Attached is an image of a couple of our finds from that trip. The larger one is about 2 inches (5 cm) in length.

[kladner]

Great fossils! Glad the lightning missed.

[paulunderwood]

Originally Posted by rogue

...the nearest town 32 miles (20 km) away...

51km?

[rogue]

Originally Posted by paulunderwood

51km?

Converted the wrong way. Thanks for pointing that out.