aka: 50ft to 10,188ft in 6 hours. aka: Your last chance to donate!
This past Saturday, I did a training hike halfway up Rainier to Camp Muir in preparation for my coming attempt to summit Mt. Rainier on August 5-7. I figured it’d be good to have some idea of what to expect. I awoke at a moderately early 4am in my apartment in Seattle. After making some (what would be) delicious PB&J sandwiches for lunch, my colleague and I left the city and its near-sealevel altitude behind and embarked on the three hour drive to Paradise, in Mt. Rainier National Park.
Paradise is at approximately 5,000ft elevation and we hiked up to Camp Muir at 10,188ft. The first part of the hike (2.3 miles) is through subalpine meadows and on a well-established path. It’s steep, but no great challenge. After that, is the Muir snowfield - 2.2 miles, and 2,800 ft of elevation gain. Needless to say, that’s a bit of an incline…all on snow. It was a good hike, though, and I can’t wait to do it again in a couple weeks.
On the way back down, I partook in glissading, which is basically just sliding down the mountain. Makes the descent quite a bit easier!