With summer largely over and with my compressed JMT trip looming I wanted to fit in  trip or two with a little more relaxed party bent to them.

But of course I still wanted peaks!  To that end Neal Robbins and I planned a max permit size outing to the Saddlebag Lake area to grab the 3rd-class-if-you-really-want-them-to-be peaks North & Conness aimed at WTC students for the weekend before I was set to start the JMT.

September 6th to 8th, 2013

North Peak (12,242')

Mount Conness (12,590')

Day 1: 4.3 miles, 2,300'

Day 2: 8.3 miles 2,900' (Conness)

Day 3: 9.2 miles, 2,100' (North & Out)

[Pics] [Map]

Seven Gables was one of the trips I'd planned last summer only to have it derailed by the mystery illness that took me out for a good chunk of the season.

The trailhead at Lake Thomas Edison is a bit of a drive from OC but after hearing repeatedly how spectacular it was camping back there I was determined that the trip was going to happen this summer.

This time I decided as long as we were doing the long haul (the drive + 13 miles hiking in) I might as well add nearby Gemini and push it out from 3 days to 4 making it a relatively laid back affair as they go.

August 31st to September 3rd, 2013

Seven Gables (13,080')

Gemini (12,880')

[Pics] [Map]

What:
  Chocolate Peak (11,682')
  Mount Goode (13,085')
  Mount Agassiz (13,893')
When: June 1st & 2nd, 2013
Where: Sierra Nevada, South Lake TH
Who: Matthew Hengst, Jen Blackie, Stephanie Gylden
Pictures: [Matt]
GPS Track: [Track]

The initial thought for this weekend was to do an easy recovery trip after the previous weekends Memorial Day Massacre.

In 2012 the 100 miles and 20k gain over 5 days Massacre had gone fairly well until the last day where 26 miles with bad blisters and sore feet made things somewhat...memorable.  The following weekend on the thankfully gentle Excelsior and Dunderburg was so painful I had to drop back from the group and limp back on my own.

This year the Massacre went much smoother and I was pretty much back to normal after the three short days back in Orange County working.  All the better to enjoy an easy two day trip with east side resident Stephanie Gylden to grab the (relatively) easy Goode and Agassiz from Bishop Pass.

It's been a fun start to the year with the occasional desert trip snuck in between the always awesome 10 week Wilderness Travel Course and the spring session of the Advanced Mountaineering Program but at long bloody last it's time to kick off the Sierra season.

This particular weekend along with the Alabama Hills rock climbing trip a few weeks back were planned as private outings to give the WTC students of Kaweah group the opportunity to learn some more advanced skills beyond what we teach in the course.  (WTC used to be called BMTC and included rock climbing and ice axe and crampons but these days we are limited to rock scrambling and winter backpacking)

The original plan had been more along the lines of a car camp with a day of ice axe and crampon practice followed by a easier but non trivial peak climb to put the new skills to use.  Unfortunately this seasons rather apathetic snow levels meant that there wasn't much that was easily accessible.  So instead we changed it to a backpack with the plan of hopefully finding some decent snow up high.

After some last minute debate I settled on Julius Caesar out of Pine Creek.  It had spectacular views, the approach was a trailhead I'd never used before, and at 13,220 ft I figured we'd probably be able to manage some amount of snow.

May 18th & 19th, 2013

Mount Julius Caesar (13,200')

[Pics] [Map]

July 15th, 2011

Alta Peak (11,204')

Panther Peak (9,046')

[Pics] [Map]