non-RTS Training Hike - Saddle Mountain

April 2nd, 2010


Today's training hike to Saddle Mountain was postponed to 4/5 (Mon) due to hazardous weather in the area.

Stay tuned!!

April 5th, 2010

WOW, what a hike we had today!!! I was really itching to do something since I had not had a chance to hike at all for the past couple of weeks due a series of family events. On top of that, our postponing this hike due to the storm this past Friday had added to my itch like poison oak rubbing on already a raw spot.

Geoff, Charles and I met up at Target at the usual time this morning to hike Saddle Mountain. It was raining lightly when we left the Target's parking lot about 8am or so. The trail head was located about 10 miles inland from the coast near the highway 26 that ran westward from Portland. We started to see some traces of snow on the ground just as I made a remark about how we were lucky that we did not to see any snow when we were passing the 1,000' elevation marker. After driving for about an hour, we turned off onto a paved road that took us north for about another 7 miles to the trail head. After about a half way into this road, an awesome view of Saddle Mountain all of sudden appeared through the beautiful evergreen trees as we came around a curve in the road. We were the only ones in the parking lot.

So the plan was sort of to follow the regular regiment, i.e. to take a gear check break after the first 20 minutes and a break every 45 minutes or so thereafter. All three of us were dressed in layers with full rain garments that gave us protections from the elements. The trail on Saddle Mountain stretched only about 2.5 miles to the top but it gained respectable 1,700' in elevation altogether.

It was amazing how much I could go out of shape in a matter of a couple weeks though. I struggled to maintain a decent pace until we took our gear check break. But then it got much easier from there on. I guess my body needed a little jump start to get going again.

We started to see gradual increase in snow accumulation as we ascended through the wood. Little did we know that we were about to walk into a blizzard and near white out condition as we got above the tree line. The wind was blowing furiously up the side of the mountain and the trail had completely disappeared under two feet of snow in front of us. We could barely make out where it used to be.

We were at the decision point. After few minutes of observing and discussing, we decided to proceed another few hundred feet or so to see if the condition on the other side of this section would be better, or at least good enough to go further. Don't ask us why but there we went.

Where were the goggles when we needed them anyway?? We might as well have stuck our heads in front of a sand blaster actually. The wind mercilessly drove ice pellets into us like machine guns. Any exposed portion of our skin got thoroughly exfoliated in the process and, by the time we got to the other side of this section and took refuge behind a lone evergreen tree, there was no doubt in our minds that we were at the end of our little adventure for the day. Not to mention the fact that we were starting to follow a false trail (right) that led off a cliff. Great!!

After a few Kodak moments taking pictures of each other for the record, we turned around and reversed our direction to trace our foot prints back to the beginning of this section where the trees would give us some protection. To our amazement, our foot prints were almost completely gone. They had been blown over by the wind and snow to the point where we could barely see them in a matter of five to ten minutes. We proceeded step by step VERY CAREFULLY so as not to end up sliding down into an oblivion.

Even after we were back under the trees' protection, snow had accumulated as much as about a foot or so on the trail and we had to be very cautious about our footings on our descent. But the sights were gorgeous in sort of surreal ways. On one of the sections, the snow covered tree branches formed a tunnel like path for us to walk through. I had always loved hiking in snow despite its unique challenges. About a half way down the mountain, we saw another set of foot prints leading down the trail. There must have been somebody set off on a hike but decided to turn around and go back. Smart!

I had always wanted to check out Camp 18 Restaurant on highway 26 which had a lot of memorabilia from the old days in the logging industry on display in a log cabin style structure. I finally got my chance on our way back when we stopped there for a lunch. We were in awe of the purely enormous sizes of everything, such as the chain saws that were at least 10 feet in length with handles on both ends, the bar counter downstairs made of a wood slab at least two feet thick and twenty feet long, and the front register carved out of a tree stump several feet in diameter. Pretty cool.