Goat Rocks 2015 – Good views.. of the tent.
When Katy’s brother, Mitch, let us know he was visiting for Labor Day Weekend, we started asking “which thing should we do?”
However, before we know it, we ended up asking “which thing can we do?”
By late August, the dry winter and hot summer temps lit our state up like a matchbox.
The fires have been historic — both in size and damage. For anyone that wants to help or donate, this link is a good resource: http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/northwest/how-to-help-and-9-other-things-to-know-about-the-wildfires-2/
One (relatively minor) consequence of our state’s fires has been limits on where we can recreate. Trails and forests near the flames were closed, and air quality at many of the state’s finest alpine playgrounds was really poor. In the few weeks leading up to Labor Day, our options were limited by fire.
Then, in the days leading up to the weekend, the weather (finally) shifted. We welcomed some chilly and wet days and hoped the rain would help put out the fires and clean out the air.
However, with rain (and snow, in higher elevations), again, we started asking ourselves “which thing can we do?”
After some option-shuffling and attempting to match best-chances-of-weather with shortest-drive, we opted to try Goat Rocks Wilderness. We knew it was a mellow hike with some fun scrambling, and the weather called for a rainy Friday, followed by a sunny and clear Saturday, and a ~40-50% chance of rain for Sunday.
We left Seattle in the early afternoon, making it to Berry Patch TH at about 6pm under chilly showers and crappy visibility. A couple hikers had just wrapped up a loop of the area and arrived at the trailhead with some interesting beta: they awoke to 6″ of snow at their campsite.
Our gear and food was still not packed up, so we spent a bit of time getting our stuff together in the cold drizzle. We were finally hiking out at about 7pm, just as the rain started to wane and the sky was darkening. Aiming for Snowgrass Flats, we ultimately set up camp for the night at Bypass Camp, around 5500′. The sky was clear as we settled in for a chilly night, and we had high hopes for good weather and a fun day of scrambling around the area’s high points the next day.
Saturday morning we awoke to cool temps and a fast moving, low cloud layer above us. We figured this was a good sign of clearing weather, and packed up camp and continued towards Snowgrass Flats. The goal was find a new basecamp for the weekend a bit higher up, and then try and tick off Old Snowy Mountain, Ives Peak, and possibly Gilbert Peak.
About an hour and 1000′ feet later, we were hiking through a grey, cold, mist-soaked Snowgrass Flats, looking for the driest and most protected campsite we could grab. We settled for a pretty awesome spot off of the PCT at about 6,800′, and just as we finished setting up the tent, the rain kicked up again. We took shelter inside the tent and had the first of many conversations of what we should do, given the weather.
Katy and Mitch. Expecting better weather!
Snow at ~6000′. A sign of things to come?
Cold and misty Snowgrass Flats
The forecast of “sunny and in the 50’s” was far from reality by around 11am. It was in the low 40’s, with a heavy drizzle and the type of fog and humidity that penetrates your layers and leaves you shivering. Occasional cloud breaks looking towards the higher elevations saw the start of snow a few hundred feet above us.
After some time in the tent, the raindrops sounded heavier. Looking at the sliver of ground beyond the tent fly, we saw something familiar — snow! It was snowing on the tent! We continued to laugh at our luck and hung around, waiting for the weather to get even remotely better.
A few minutes after this point, I decide to step out of the tent to take a look around and see if anything was improving.
The bad news: no change. The drizzly fog mixed with rain/snow/wintry-mix was still status quo.
The good news: turns out it wasn’t really snowing everywhere… it only seemed to snow on the tent. We have photo proof! It was weird!!
Fun times inside the tent
Seriously — snowed just on us!
After some more time sheltered in the tent, we came to a decision point. The weather wasn’t clearing up, we were starting to get cold, wet, and demotivated. We were choosing between retreating to the car or finding some more water and waiting out the weather in hope for a dry evening.
During this discussion we took a short walk beyond our campsite, and on the other side of a dry creek bed, about 100′ from our tent, we found a way more protected, awesome tent spot within a huge split boulder. We made the call to move our tent, which would hopefully give us an advantage against the weather. We then planned to venture to higher elevations and collect some snow to melt for water. We were staying — weather be damned!
Epic Camp Spot
After moving the tent, we donned our rain jackets and started heading north on the PCT towards the higher elevations and snow. We found consistent 2-3 inches of snow above 7000′. Visibility was pretty low and the flurries were picking up again, so we opted to collect the snow we needed for the night and head back, without exploring too much further.
Back at camp, we started melting water with our newly collected snow, still hoping for better weather. Where was that clear-and-sunny we were expecting?
We had some false hope for about an hour around 4pm, in which the sun came out for a gracious five minutes, and visibility increased. Unfortunately, it was short-lived. The rain returned around 5pm, and while our campsite was protected, it was still pretty miserable to be outside of the tent.
Around 6pm, the weather eased again. We took advantage of the break to walk around a bit and avoid cabin fever. Exploring the other side of our huge ‘home’ boulder, we found what looked like awesome, juggy holds on an overhanging face. We had no bouldering or climbing gear, but humored ourselves with feeling out the various holds and formations on the face.
Barely a few feet above the ground, right above another flat rock, I decided to see what a specific set of holds really felt like. I set my hands, placed my feet on the rock and transferred my weight and trust onto the holds.
Bad Idea.
I barely said “Hey Katy, spot me!” before one of the hand holds ripped off the boulder and I fell some 2-3 feet onto my back and elbow on the flat rock below. The fall wasn’t far, and I immediately got up, but my elbow was hurting pretty badly.
The timing was great as well, because just as I had fallen, the weather started moving in again. My arm ultimately swelled up and was hurting quite a bit, and our day was essentially over. We holed up in the tent, with warm Mountain House meals in our belly, passing around some whiskey and stories and settling in to sleep under more rain/sleet/wintry-mix.
The next morning we awoke to, yet again, more rain. We slept in until it sounded like it was easing up, and then packed up and headed back down towards the trail.
Ultimately, the trip was a bust. We couldn’t do any of the scrambles we were aiming for, there were no views, and we spent the majority of our waking time waiting out bad weather.
Even the resident marmots were grumbling about the weather.
Likely the best visibiltiy we had all day.
Fast moving clouds in Goat Rocks
Lessons Learned: when you’re 2 hours from your car and have a chance to salvage the weekend, there’s really not too many reasons to ‘wait out’ crappy weather. We should have headed back down on Saturday and found some other adventures elsewhere. We weren’t stranded anywhere — our weather-induced-tent-arrest was entire self-imposed, and in many ways, avoidable.
Lessons Learned: We did have the option of going to explore around the lower elevations regardless of rain. For example, we considered heading over to Goat Lake. Though we may have gotten wet, it may have been more fun than just hanging around waiting for the weather to clear up. On the flip side, with how poor visibility was, we wouldn’t have seen anything or really experienced much other than hiking in fog along a trail.
Lessons Learned: ‘bouldering’ on that rock, even just putting weight on the rock, was dumb. Now I have a potential nagging elbow injury. No fun. That was dumb. The rock was chossy. I should’ve seen that coming.
– Arm update post trip: My arm stayed swollen for about 4 days, and now I have a steadily-shrinking pocket of swelling/cyst like bump on my elbow. Not doing any climbing until it full heals. At least I can run!