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Didn't climb anything, but went up to Mildred Lakes to fish with my son and his friend, who are both in college...and of course Kiba came too. Actually, I hiked up there Friday night, fished Saturday, and then hiked down Saturday afternoon to meet them at the trailhead, and we hiked up that night and fished Sunday morning and then hiked out. The trail in is steep in parts, I've been going up fisherman paths in the Olympics all summer, but this one is stout in parts. All the hikes up were done in the dark, got up there Friday night at 11:30 pm, and with the boys we got to camp just after midnight. Good times. I saw a bear in a tree Friday night. The vistas on the way in gave me some great memories. The views of peaks in the area: Climbing Pershing with @OlympicMtnBoy   Climbing Bretheron: Climbing Mt Stone with my friend Steve I think I've climbed Mt Stone at least 3-4 times. One of my favorite scrambles in the Olympics. Climbing Cruiser in "winter" with @Alpinfox the latter being a little laughable that we might think we were the first to get up there in winter, but hey, it was fun non-the-less. I never said I was the sharpest tool and if you know Pax you know he ain't either . See the entry about Cruiser here...I just ordered this book, I have never read it! Lots of interesting info there. "The Bremerton Ski Cruisers" being the name source for Mt Cruiser is one tidbit I learned. I wonder how many times the couloir on the north east side of Lincoln has been skied? See it to the right of the main peak here?: Great success. Thanks for allowing me take my little trip down memory lane. It was a great time up there with the boys. Oh and very cool to see Mildred upper and middle lakes from @JonParker climb of Cruiser this past Friday....the first pic I can see our camp and fishing spot right there.

Trip: Mt. Jupiter - da ridge Trip Date: 07/16/2022 Trip Report: Kiba and I checked out Mt Jupiter, and it was a fine time. I had a boat ride a little while back that reminded me that I needed to get up there, the pic I took above inspired me to get off my ass. Rolled up Friday night and slept in the truck outside the locked gate. Got a few hours sleep and then couldn't get back to sleep, so we headed up at around 4am. Hike the road in the dark, we were in a cloud so it felt like rain. Visibility was pretty much zero, but I could smell the pungent odor of freshly harvested fir trees. I don't currently own a bike, so had none such modern contraption to aid my trip up and down. Anyways, that wouldn't have been fair to Kiba unless I got him a bike too. We reached the old trailhead sign which is a little worse for wear, and then headed up the trail through the reprod which was loaded from moisture from the cloud we were in and got soaked to the bone head to toe. Could have just wrung out my clothes and had enough water for the hike which has no running water the whole hike. As I expected a hot exposed hike I brought 6 liters of water, but I ended up dumping 4 liters on the summit so as to not carry it back down. Instead it is a hike up through the forest along an undulating ridge filled with rhododendrons pretty much the whole way. Was worried we would just be in the clouds the whole way, but we popped out into the blue sky at about 3500 feet, and we were treated to a view of the Brothers floating in a bed of clouds. It is a long hike up there, 10 miles from the locked gate to the summit. I pretended that Kiba and I were Buddhist monks traveling to a monastery the floating in the clouds, though I am neither a practicing Buddhist, nor a monk of any sort in real life. I can't speak for Kiba though. He was my guide, leading the charge, looking back every 15 seconds to make sure I was getting along ok. The summit seemed to be elusive, every time I checked Gaia GPS, I seemed closer, yet still just as far away as the map zoomed in. Finally we reached it and it wasn't till then that we saw the long ridge of Mt Constance floating its own bed of clouds to the north, and the Brothers floating to the south. I've visited both places in the past, so it was nice to see them and remember those trips. I could see the Finger Traverse and the final ridge to the summit boulder on Constance. Could not see any of the volcanoes at all. The Sound below was never visible the whole hike, always a bed of clouds. Just us and those peaks floating up in the clouds. Felt like a rich man dumping 4 liters of water up there, and Kiba and I drank most of the 2 liters that remained. We stayed at the summit till clouds swirled up and both the Brothers and Constance ridge disappeared into the white. The show was over for the time, so we headed back down. Back at the truck there was a note on my truck that I had been reported to the Washington State Patrol for trespassing, but nothing could kill my vibe. Kiba fell fast asleep, his work done for the day and we drove back to Southworth. I think this is a great hike and while some might call it just a foothill, the walk up through the rhodies was beautiful, and once you break out into the alpine it is simply gorgeous. I'm not sure if I will be back, but if I do I may spend the night on the summit. There is a snow field just below that could be used to boil water from. The position right there with the Brother and Constance....and seeing them float above us in the clouds, like higher monasteries.... I hope the access is sorted soon. Gear Notes: water, hope and dreams Approach Notes: trespassers beware

The OPC, yeah you know me. Who's down with the (O)lympic (P)eninsula ©rew? Got a late start and wasn't on the Edmonds-Kingston ferry till 11 o'clock. I've always enjoyed riding the ferries. Its a chauffeured trip where you can do whatever you want--get out in the fresh air and watch the organized chaos of the wake or sit inside and check out the people. If you make an effort, you can corner one of the couch style seats and let the vibration and humming of the engine lull you into a short nap. You get to turn over responsibility for your travel and become a willing captive for an hour or so. Unlike a bus or a plane, though, there is none of the stale air and claustrophobia. Generally on a ferry you can be as alone as you want or you can relate to people without being stuck in a situation where either is compelled. When we were young, our dad the captain told us the fire axes attached to the walls around the ferry were for fighting off huge sea serpents. Though rare, he said the sea serpents would occasionally wrap their coils around the whole ferry and try to drag it under. The axes were for chopping off the tentacles. For a long time, I believed this and repeated it as gospel to my friends, who also became believers in the serpents of Puget Sound. At some point I realized that there weren't such things as huge sea serpents and I was disappointed. Any less use for axes seemed mundane by comparison. One by one the mythical mysteries of childhood are revealed to us and magic leaves the world. True in one way, but at the same time there is no shortage of the mysterious, wondrous and awe-inspiring in the world here and now. Its just that we lose the sight to see it, our imaginations repressed by the scientific method, a culture of cool calculated contempt for that which falls outside the bounds of our understanding. We are resigned to not knowing and lack the child-like audacity to make it up. But what the fuck am I talking about the ferries for? The engine slowed and I returned from my reverie to the lower deck. The unloading began--always a good spectator sport. First, the bicyclists are freed and they sprint for safety like spooked deer. Having given the poor peddlers a sporting lead, the deckhands let loose the snarling pack of hawgs, ninjas, phantoms and other rice-burning crotch rockets, which blast up the ramp in hot pursuit of the terrified cyclists. Lastly, the four-wheeled superpredators of the pavement rumble off the ferry: the Ford Super Duties, Peterbilts, Komfort Kampers, etc. Each piloted by a twitching, traffic-twisted, caffeine-crazed commuter. And thus carnage commences! Blacktop Darwinism in action! I hurtle westward into the foggy forest and smell the smell of wet wood burning from the few unseen shacks tucked back in the dark caves beneath the trees. The further westward you go, the more you get a sort of creepy feeling unique to the Olympic peninsula. Remote, wild, shrouded in rain and fog, the Olympic Peninsula is haunted. Its more than just the edge of a continent--it’s the edge of reality, a border of sanity. I pass through a portal of dark towering trees and oppressive gray sky and I entered a world tweaked in some fundamental way. The sound of a forest: respiration. Rural poverty, the drip of water, angry loggers, alcoholism, guns, stumps, the ghosts of Indians dead, the smell of wood smoke, rot and rain. A while ago I met a girl in Forks who collected mushrooms and moss in the forests of the Olympic peninsula. She would spend days at a time wandering alone in remote areas of the peninsula forests. She says there were many times that she could feel somebody watching her. She said there were many people who lived way out in the woods, even whole families who would live for months at a time without contact with the outside. You occasionally spot the "tree people" as they were called walking along a deserted road. If you turned around, they are gone, vanished into the darkness of the trees. Don't believe in Sasquatches? Evidently you haven't been to the Hang Up Tavern in Forks, WA on a Saturday night. I witnessed a charming act of kindness at that particular establishment: After beating a uniformed military officer silly, a huge hairy cranked-out logger was kind enough to put the guys missing teeth into his front pocket of his bloodstained dress whites so that when consciousness found him, he would find his teeth. Thus the stage was set for our climb that weekend. A climb which turned out to be every bit of a vicious, knockdown, dragout street brawl like the one we witnessed in Forks. More coming later...