Sam just ranting, reviewing

Man, I haven’t written in a while! Whenever I think about writing things, I always get hung up on “will it be useful?” type questions. But that’s dumb! Very few people actually read this, and I get the most pleasure from this blog when I go back and read about the details of my favorite days in the mountains that I forgot years later. I also find writing clears my head and sharpens my focus. So with that spirit in mind, I’m gonna write some stuff. Maybe you’ll like it, maybe not. But as authors often say, the first step to writing something good is to start writing something, even if it is shitty.

My ankle and my son no longer look like they do in this picture.

Clyde Minaret was also the climb that immediately preceded a major ankle injury for me. I had gotten into bouldering, as a way of enjoying my local rocks more, and I made the mistake of falling too far with too little padding. I blew my ankle into smithereens and compounded the injury by refusing the visit the doctor! If I had to guess, I believe I had a grade 2-3 sprain on my right ankle and some kinda terrible bruised heel on my left. Without going into the long saga of injuries and being an IPOS (Injured Piece of Shit), I did a decent job of making lemonade and took up some hobbies that don’t require running 50ish miles per week.

Looking Back:

One of the themes of my favorite days from 2022 was that I had the most fun when I was with people I like. I do go solo occasionally, but I prefer some company. My favorite day last year was skiing Waterhouse Peak, a mellow forested hump that’s safe & fun even when avalanche danger is high, with my wife. And it wasn’t close.

Another “ascent” in the same vein that stands out was Mori Point, a scenic view point overlooking the town of Pacifica. My wife and I got off work, picked up the kid, bought some beers at the 7-Eleven, poured them into water bottles and just walked around taking in the views on one of those “shorts in February” days in California that people call a “delightmare“. She’s the person I like to have fun with the most. And as we do a lot of “type 2 fun” with each other already (house cleaning, children, ect.) so I find myself gravitating towards more “type 1 fun” experiences with her. I’m not really a New Year’s resolution kinda guy, but I did resolve to finally hire a baby sitter this year and actually enjoy more time together.

Fading light on Darwin & Mendel from Lamarck col.

The hiking in Hawaii National Park is mostly easy & short, good for kids.

Rock climbing is fun 🙂

I also still crave big, remote mountain experiences. By the numbers, Mt Whitney should’ve been my peakbagging highlight of 2022, and it was what I included on my Christmas card. But my climb of Mt Darwin stands out in my mind much more. On Mt Whitney, I followed a well beaten trail, to a well beaten path through the snow, to a rock scramble that I had seen many pictures of. It was a fabulous, underrated route that we ripped out without any real difficulties. But when you’re following in the footsteps of so many people, it doesn’t feel like you’re thinking for yourself. Mt Darwin was completely different. It felt remote, imposing, and challenging. There was about an inch of fresh snow on many features, and we were the first tracks up the standard route. It took 18h50m car to car, my longest day out. It hit that perfect balance between being hard, feeling like we may not make it, yet always feeling safe & manageable. Mountaineering is a game of matching the abilities of a team to an objective, and I feel like we nailed it that day (even if it did take 5 hours longer than I thought it would!).

The peakbagging mindset also ruined a few experiences for me. Peakbagging makes all other activities seem sorta pointless if you’re not “accomplishing” something. My trip to Hawaii with my family is the quintessential example of this. As you might expect, when we planned the trip I was originally focused on tagging the two 13’ers on the Big Island. Mauna Loa was closed due to earthquakes on the summit (and then it erupted later that year), so that feels like part of the game. I had hastily researched Mauna Kea, getting some outdated information that allowed me to dismiss it as a drive up. However, as Craig Barlow put it, Mauna Kea is the “most over-regulated drive up on the planet.” I could rant for a whole article on why Mauna Kea is dumb. Ultimately, I had two choices: ditch my family for a full day on a family vacation to summit a peak that I ultimately don’t care that much about, or sulk and mope around Hawaii in a funk because I couldn’t climb a stupid peak I ultimately didn’t care about. I chose the 2nd option. I moped, whined, and was generally a poor vacation companion because I was *only* spending quality time with my family, rather than ticking off a state high point. It ruined half the vacation.

I’m a lucky guy. I travel a lot, I see cool stuff. I suffer from some serious greed wanting more good stuff. Half my weekends, I feel like I’m just laying around the house, doing nothing. And then I look back and I wonder how I fit it all in.