The Cascade Range marches down the west coast of North America, from southern British Columbia to Northern California. Huge volcanoes rising above the coastal plains, covered in heavy snow and imposing glaciers from the region’s cool, wet climate. My old friend Baker, in northern Washington. Mt Adams, a similiar-looking volcano in southern Washington reminiscent of Fuji. Mt St Helens, famous for blowing its top off in a massive eruption in 1980. Mt Hood in central Oregon; a pointed spire in contrast to its squatter northern neighbours. Massive Shasta in California; the southern anchor of the range.

All those mountains offer excellent mountaineering. But there’s one which is the prime target for any mountaineer in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The highest of the Cascades, Mt Rainier. 14,411 feet, or 4,392 metres, of imposing rock, snow and glacier near Tacoma in south-central Washington. It dominates the Seattle skyline to the extent that even in that mountainous part of the world, it is ‘the mountain’. It is the highest peak on the west coast of North America between Northern British Columbia and central California, and one of the five highest peaks in the lower 48 states.

Rainier has been a dream of mine since I got here. And in particular, since I first saw it clearly from Baker. I had organised a trip through the British Columbia Mountaineering Club in March, and it was going to be the grand finale of my stay in this part of the world. 11 of us went down there last weekend to give it a shot.

I spent Thursday night sleeping on the floor of Richmond in the Vancouver area, and at six on Friday morning we left for the long drive down to Paradise, Washington, the staging point for the southern routes on the mountain. It was a fine, hot, day and we t some spectacular views of our target on the approach.

We reached Paradise at 5,400’ at midday, and began the hike up to Camp Muir at 10,000’ at about one. The route was in great condition and well-marked, but extremely crowded. As we got higher, we began to feel the altitude and the weight of our 50-lb packs, so that the final slope up to the camp was taken at a virtual crawl. The day was fine, hot and sunny, and the mountain was in perfect view. Rainier has a reputation for brutal and changeable weather, but this weekend it seemed to be in a benign mood. It just sat there and let us admire it. Mt Adams was brilliantly clear, as was the infamous Mt St Helens, a little to the south. Mt Hood in central Oregon drifted in and out of view, and at one stage a similiar mountain even further south. Conditions were perfect.

We set up camp. It was still warm and first, but temperatures plunged close to freezing as soon as the sun went down. Overnight, the laces on my boots and the water in my pot iced up - the forecast of a freezing line at 15’000’ seemed a little optimistic.

I didn’t get a very restful night - some 130 people were making for the summit that day, and from ten in the evening onwards I was troubled by yelled instructions, the clatter of crampons on rock, flashing headlights and the steady crunching or groups starting off to the summit.

I got up at 2:45am, and my rope team moved off not long after 4:00am. We made the long, steady march around the head of the Clowlitz Glacier, known as the Beehive, in the dark, and climbed Cathedral Rocks to watch the sunrise over little Tahoma Peak from the top of the ridge. Coming down in the daylight there was a significant rock-fall danger from the cliffs above, but in the cool of the night with the snow still hard all was still.

We crossed the Ingraham Glacier at 11,000’, passing the high camp on the Ingraham Flats. Earlier in the year, the route to the summit runs straight up the Glacier, but by July it’s usually impassable from crevasses. The glacier itself is notorious for being the site of the worst mountaineering accident in American history - on Father’s Day, 1981, an icefall killed 11 climbers. Their bodies were never recovered. The broken glacier and huge seracs loomed ominously above us in the early morning sun.

Our route led up a rocky spine called the Dissapointment Cleaver, which divides the Ingraham from the Emmons Glaciers. We were on the Cleaver by about seven in the morning, took up coils of rope to shorten the rope between us, and began the climb. It was fairly easy, but made much harder by the altitude, being roped together and wearing crampons.

Conditions were still perfect, but Rainier has weapons to use on climbers besides avalanches and icefalls, strong winds, snowstorms, white-outs and temperatures twenty degrees below freezing. I saw one climber coming down in really bad shape - he was being virtually dragged by his companions. And higher up, people began to forget each others’ names or how to tie basic knots. I saw one woman on another rope team panic for now apparent reason.

As we continued to climb the Cleaver, it was becoming increasingly clear that I was not well. I was unable to eat, almost nodded off when I stopped, and began to be troubled by bouts of diarrhoea (no small problem when you’re on the glacier and need to abide by the rule of carrying out all human waste in bags). The hot sun and strain of the exercise was certainly a factor, but I knew enough about mountaineering to know that I almost certainly had altitude sickness (Acute Mountain Sickness - AMS).

The Cleaver gave way to the final snow slope to the summit a little above 12,500’. The slope went for about a mile, then it was another half-mile or so around the crater to the true summit at Columbia Crest. That final slope worried me the most on the map - I knew it would be a gruelling trek at that altitude and with us already tired. By now it was clear that I probably wouldn’t get to the top, but we decided to make for the crater rim at 14,000’.

Finally, at around 13,500’, I decided that it was too dangerous to continue. I was willing to put up with discomfort or take a few risks with myself, but once I became dizzy and uncoordinated it was clear that I was becmong a danger to the rest of my rope team. I let them know that I couldn’t continue, and they decided that they’d had enough as well. We descended to Camp Muir.

My condition improved a bit, particularly after I had a chance to rest, but I still had no appetite and was unwilling to risk another night at 10,000’. The three of us broke camp and hiked down. Below 8,000’, as I anticipated, my symptoms dissapeared. I was able to eat a large dinner on the way back to Vancouver.

I had gotten within about 900 vertical feet, and about a straight mile, from the summit. I don’t feel frustrated, though, nor do I doubt that I made the best decision. The final 2,000’ feet from the top of the Cleaver to the summit took many groups some three to four hours. Even the easy half-mile walk around the crater rim took our other rope teams an hour. I think that the other people on my rope team would have made it without me, which is my one regret at going on the trip. Nonetheless, eight people from the trip reached the top and returned on Monday. My trip got eight people to the summit of Rainier in near-perfect conditions, and it was a first time for all of them. They had a great time, and I’m very satisfied about that.

On Sunday I bought a book on the effects of altitude from the MEC, and we had a chance to talk and think about how it worked out.

I was on scheduled trips to Baker and Adams, but both ended up getting cancelled. Had they gone ahead, I would have probably had the acclimatisation to deal with Rainier. Also, in future, I would definately stay the night closer to the mountain. I didn’t sleep too well on the floor of my friend’s house, and getting up at five, driving five hours and then hiking up to Camp Muir in the afternoon heat took its toll. I noticed that a lot of people arrived in Muir before lunch for their summit attempts - they had all afternoon to rest and acclimatise. Also, staying at a campground in Paradise or somewhere at similiar altitude would have cut down the elevation gain. I went from sea level to 10,000 feet in about seven hours, then began climbing again nine hours later. And staying somewhere closer and higher would have left us make for the Ingraham Flats campsite at 11,000 feet, reducing the stress of the summit day.

I think that the people who left camp around midnight had the right idea - the climb would have been far easier in the cool and on hard snow. That, of course, would have required an earlier arrival at Camp. And my layering system could have used some work. And I would have coped better had I been fitter at sea level - I found it difficult to work a high-intensity exercise schedule around my physical job, and I’d only been driving and training fairly hard for a couple of months before the trip. I think I’d also prefer a quieter route,

I don’t regret organising or going on the trip for a minute, though. As always with BCMC trips, it was a fantastic learning experience. My enthusiasm for mountaineering did waver a little on the descent (those bouts of diarrhoea might have had something to do with it) but I’m resolved to try the mountain again, sometime. It might be years, but I’ll get there. As some people remarked to me on the way down, it isn’t like it’s going anywhere.