Return to Castle Rock

Current Conditions
Temperature: -33F
Wind Chill: -56F

The light has really started to make a return in the past week. At lunchtime it seems like regular daylight out there. I'm certain this is an illusion to eyes that have grown so accustomed to the dark, though, and true daylight will be a blinding curse when it comes. And come it will. Every day brings a noticeable increase in lumens and an extension of their time spent here. It is fortunate that I finally hiked up to Castle Rock two weeks ago, before the sudden onset of dawn. I wanted to climb it in the winter, in the dark. I guess that may not make sense to many of you, but then again, most of what I like to do seems to fall into that category.

Brody and I set out on a beautiful, calm, clear day. Clear from town, anyway; the northern horizon was a bit cloudy, and Erebus was obscured. But that's OK, because clouds make for a much more interesting horizon:

The hike out was the standard 3.5 mile uphill trek on styrofoam snow. Castle Rock itself was a little different this time, though. Having been without radiant heat from the sun, the exposed rock was covered in frost of varying thickness.

We took the standard route, the only route really, around to the back side, picking our way along increasingly precarious ledges trying to find the elusive rope. I began to wonder if they had taken it down, since we're not supposed to climb the rock in the winter. I have to admit that I was a little bit nervous at one point. Wearing nearly 15 pounds of clothing with 10 more on my back, mobility was considerably less than ideal, and I just didn't trust the purchase of my "trusty Vibram soles" at -20F. At least the wind was light.

Not to be deterred, we eventually found the bottom of a snow chute that we knew the rope crossed above, so after some backtracking and routefinding, we were safely along the ropeline. From this point the climb was much as before, except that we were climbing toward a field of twinkling stars instead of a blanket of fluffy clouds. We lingered at the top long enough to capture the pink light of pre-dawn illuminating our secluded ice world:

Soon our fingers and toes were numbing, so we had to get moving again. We scrambled back down the ropeline and realized our initial mistake in route; we should have started climbing immediately to find the rope, instead of traversing around so far. From here the trek home was eventless, and Brody snapped this one of my crusted face at the finish:

The following Sunday we hiked up Hut Ridge with RaJa. This time the weather was not so cooperative; the temperature was -30F and the windchill below -50F. We enjoyed nice views of the horizon, but only lingered shortly on this wind-sheltered hillside:

You can see the increase in light over just a week. Only 7 more days until sunrise!