Sat, Aug 3 2013 - McPartland Mountain (View Original Event Details) Coordinator(s): Tim Anderson Participants: Tim Anderson, Greg Notess, Cecelia Notess, David Steele, Rodney Falkenberg

What a wonderfully miserable day. We started the day at dawn in a heavy overcast foggy drizzle and forded McDonald Creek. For the next two hours we fought our way uphill through wet brush, soaked to the skin, boots full of water squishing as we went, occasionally the drizzle switching to a full rain. Until we finally broke out in to the open shelves about half way up the wall. Rodney had the misfortune of stepping on a Yellow Jacket nest and took a few stings so we had to stop for some first aid. The fog level kept rising with us always staying about 100 ft ahead, teasing us in to thinking it could clear but never letting us see our destination, so we just kept saying let’s just go a little further. We continued up the wet moss covered class three shelves for a couple more hours until we were over the wall and in the basin below McPartland. Still the fog kept rising so we kept going. But without a visual reference it was easy to miss-read the topo on the GPS and we ended up on the wrong side of a ridge and started ascending Mt. Vaught. After a while we realized our mistake, backtracked and crossed the ridge over to where we should be where we found a huge bolder field we had to cross, many larger than cars. We ended at a beautiful little oasis with grass and wild flowers, a little ponds and a babbling brook, it was a wonderful place to rest. Still we had no visual on McPartland. At this point I realized we had lost too much time with our little detour, that it would be difficult to complete the remaining 1300 feet and still make it down before dark, so I called the climb. We decided to sit here a while and take some photos after about a half hour the clouds finally parted and we could see McPartland looming over us, so close you could just about touch it. It was so tempting to try, but I was sure the time it would take would cause us to have to down climb that awful bushwhack in the dark. So we left McPartland for another day, it will be easier next time now that we have the route laid out. Saddest part was the trip down was a little faster than expected; we probably could have made it before dark, just barely.