Mountaineering

California Fourteeners

"Fourteeners" are mountains over 14,000 feet tall. There are twelve 14ers in California with at least 300 feet of topographic prominence, including the highest mountain in the continental United States, Mt. Whitney, which is 14,505 feet tall. I've climbed eight of these peaks so far.

Split Mountain

I climbed Split in July 2008. As my first fourteener, I didn't really know what to expect, but I remember a lot of steep, loose, sandy trails leading up to our base camp, and it was foggy and cold during the climb. It even hailed on us, but we summited anyway!

Mt. Russell

Russell is Mt. Whitney's neighbor; they share a trailhead. Russell was terrifying because the final summit approach is very exposed--sheer 3000-foot drops on either side as you walk along a narrow granite ridge. I chickened out for a few minutes but then gathered my mental strength and summited! (July 2008)

Mt. Tyndall

We summited Tyndall and Williamson on the same trip since they're pretty close to each other. Tyndall was a big pile of talus (small broken boulders), and I chickened out briefly before reaching the summit because of the exposure. That black dot near the top center of the photo on the right is me descending!

Mt. Williamson

Williamson went perfectly. It was the first time my partner and I were successfully able to get going before dawn, and we summited by noon. The hardest part (besides getting up so early in the cold!) was ascending a steep frozen chute. We really should have worn helmets because we had to dodge some small rockfall as the chute warmed up and rocks melted out. (July 2009)

Middle Palisade

Don't let my smile fool you; this was the worst climb ever. It seemed to go on forever, I was tired from start to finish, and on the descent my previously-twisted ankle started hurting. Even still, I was glad to have done it! (July 2009)

White Mountain

White is one of only two California 14ers that isn't part of the Sierra mountain range (it's part of the White Mountains, and Mt. Shasta is in the Cascades). I've summited it twice, in August of 2011 and July of 2014, and I came down with a bad case of altitude sickness in 2014 on the way down. It's a good mountain for acclimating to high hikes because you can drive all the way up to 11,300 feet and camp overnight. The trail from there to the summit is a graded road--so it's long, but not steep.

Mt. Sill

Sill is one of the four 14ers in the Palisades. It's one of the more technical 14ers; even when I climbed it in August 2011 (late season), there was still a large snow chute to ascend, which required the use of crampons and an ice axe for safety. The view from the summit is the best I've ever seen--mountains to infinity. My partner and I got back to camp quite late--after 9:00--and I had bonked so badly late in the hike that I had to rely on his trailfinding to get back to the tent.

Mt. Langley

I first tried to climb My. Langley in 2016 and made it within a quarter mile of the summit but was forced to stop because of altitude sickness. The top-most point in the photo below is the summit. I returned in August 2018 after several days of acclimating and easily summited. I ended up summiting, descending, and hiking out on the same day--a 16+-mile day that left me with the biggest blister I've ever had!

Other Mountaineering

Right: This was an attempt to climb summits in the Palisades in the California Sierra in August 2010. That's me in front of the Palisade glacier with the Palisades on the horizon. My climbing partner experienced altitude sickness, and we had to descend.

Below: August 2011 acclimation climb: Mt. Dana in Yosemite National Park. Dana is a great acclimation hike because the trailhead is easily accessible by car at the east entrance to the park and has only 3,100 feet of elevation gain from the trailhead to a summit of 13,061 feet. The view to the east (photo, left) is of Mono Lake, and the view to the west (photo, right) is of Yosemite and the Sierra.

Below: Attempt to climb Thunderbolt Peak in the Palisade range, June 2012. Sunrise on attempted summit day (left), and a view from camp up the climbing route (right).

Report abuse