max delta h

Nice Trip Report! You wrote: "One thing I noticed about the forest service road leading up to the campground is that it's in way better condition now than when I climbed Adams in 2002. Back then only a 4 wheeler with high ground clearance could have made it up; now I think just about anything with at least 6 inches of ground clearance could get there." Yes the road is much better now than it used to be, but you must not have noticed all the 2 wheel drive passenger cars in the parking lot back in 2002. I've driven a Honda Civic there every year since 1991. In the old days you had to go very slow, keeping your tires on the high points in places so you would not high center and you had to negotiate big rocks and roots carefully but it was doable in a 2 wheel drive. A civic has about as little ground clearance as any car except maybe a low rider. I did see exhaust pipes on the ground once or twice from folks that did not know how to drive. I've had to get my shovel out to dig out people in 4 wheel drives who got in the ditch and couldn't get out. On Hwy 35 around Mt. Hood I've also passed many 4 wheel drives tits up on the side of the road after the first snow of the season. One year when you could only drive to Morrison Creek CG due to snow there was one dude in a small lightweight Toyota pickup that had reduced the air in his fat tires. Because of the big tires and the light vehicle he was able to drive all the way to Cold Springs CG on top of the snow! His pickup was the only vehicle that did that. Everyone else used muscle power those last 3 miles. There's more to driving than just the type of vehicle you drive. I do appreciate the improved road. Those butterflies you mentioned are also on Mt. Shasta this year and last year I saw them on Shasta and South Sister. It seemed as if there were millions of them on Shasta last year. About that fire, I was on the route when it started. The ranger women were near where the creek crosses the trail at appx 6800 or 7000 feet on Saturday evening watching the smoke and talking on their radios. The smoke looked like campfire smoke - small. By Sunday AM it was a little bigger but still not big. There was very little wind Saturday night or early Sunday AM. By 10:30 or so Sunday AM the fire was a raging inferno. All the TV news reports reported the lightning strike that caused the fire that weekend as if it happened that weekend. There wasn't a cloud in the sky anywhere near there Friday, Saturday or Sunday. The FS claimed the lightning occurred a week or two earlier and smoldered until that weekend. Maybe. I have my doubts. I suspect human causes.

I summited Shasta via Clear Creek route on Wed, Aug 13. Only one other person was on that route - a very tan blonde female. Only one other person from one other route had signed the summit register that day by about 2:30 when I left. The Clear Creek route was all scree which was no surprise. The only snow was on the summit plateau and it was ice. I walked around that. As I went around it I noticed what looked like an old piece of approximately 24 inch diameter exhaust duct about 12 feet long. That's roughly what I remember about it - didn't take any actual measurements. Does anyone know why that thing is up there? Was there a mine or something?

Join the Seattle Mountaineers and take their Snowshoe classes and their winter camping classes. They'll take you out on field trips and then you'll know where to go and you'll be able to do it safely. http://www.mountaineers.org/seattle/snowshoe/