The Tooth, uh, I mean Kaleetan Peak

Where: Washington Cascades near Snoqualmie Pass
When: June 2009
Partners: DB & a bunch of other people

Chair Peak from the summit of Kaleetan Peak
We set out to climb The Tooth one morning but somehow ended up getting tossed into a group of Seattle Mountaineers climbing some peak I'd never heard of before. I'll save the ridiculous details for some campfire story sometime, but suffice it to say, the group's piss-poor leadership (not me, mind you, but some pompous ego-maniac) led to a Search and Rescue call-out for one of the Mountaineers members after he got separated from the group. Regardless, it was a fine peak. And the missing Mountaineer was fine.

Little Si in the Clouds

Where: Cascade Range, Washington
When: July 2008
Partners: Solo

When it comes to bang for you buck (especially when you're in an essentially urban area), it's hard to beat the bargain price of Little Si.

Lying at the foot of the famous and uber-popular Mount Si, Little Si is a fun, little mountain with a varied landscape to explore on your way to the rocky top. From urban trail to flattish jungle to dripping, old growth canopy to pine forest to the cloud-shrouded top, it's all good on Little Si.

Setting out solo one morning, I jogged to the top in quick time, only to find the top buried in a gray soup and a single empty beer can sitting on the very summit. Still, a fine few minutes out in the wilds of urban Washington.

Seattle's Mount Si

Where: Cascade Range, Washington
When: July 2008
Partners: DB
Route: Mount Si Trail w/Direct Finish (Class 4)
Mileage/Gain: 9/3,200
Topo: Mount Si

Mount Si from I-90
Mentioning a hike up Mount Si always seems to earn a laugh. With so many "real" mountains in the Cascades, why Mount Si? My answer: "'Cause it's there."

DB and I headed up the trail one morning after touristing around Seattle the day before. Before long, we found ourselves at a flattish, bouldery area below the summit "Haystack", a large rock outcropping that houses the true summit of the mountain. Requiring a few class 3 moves to surmount, few people, it would seem, actually take the final steps to "summit" the mountain. And this would explain the dozens of people sitting amongst the lower boulders below what we found to be an empty summit.
The real summit of Mount Si
Moving through the throng, DB and I made our way to the east side of the Haystack. Instead of working right and heading up in the usual manner, we headed directly up. What followed was a fair amount of class 3-4 scrambling that eventually intersected with the standard scrambling route just below the final, exposed class 3 moves to the highpoint.
On the summit
South to Mount Rainier