An Adventure With the Elements By: Charles A. Petersen My friend Joe Perry and I decided to climb Granite Peak this summer. In case you don’t know, Granite Peak is the highest mountain in Montana at 12,799 feet. It is located in the Beartooths, which are just north of Yellowstone National Park. You start at about 6,500 feet and then backpack in 10.5 miles and 4,000 feet of elevation gain to the base camp at Goose Lake. We had to pack in a lot of more varied clothing because we were gaining over 4,000 feet of elevation which can mean very gusty winds and huge temperature fluctuations. Along with different temperature, the weather is very variable from perfectly clear to blizzarding in a matter of hours. In order to become acclimated to the thinner air at the high altitude, Joe and I did shorter six mile hikes for two days before we started the real project. We spent these nights wherever we pleased for the Beartooths are a national treasure, not a national park, which means you can camp anywhere. Finally the first big day had come. We put the finishing touches on our packs and drove off to the trailhead at East Rosebud Lake. We had to make sure to bring plenty of water bottles for there was only one place in the middle of the first hike where we would be able to get water. Once we got to the trail head, around 9:00 A.M., we put on our packs and headed off up the trail. After about an hour of rigorous hiking we got to Mystic Lake. Here we purified all of the water we would be using for the next two days. After a small snack of PowerBars, we started on our way again. Now the trail started to steepen a good deal and our party was forced to slow down. As we got higher we finally got above the tree line and left the horrendous black flies behind. This made both of us feel a good deal better. Every so often I would stop and look back at the gorgeous view. On one glance behind me, I noticed a definite difference in the picture; a huge storm front was moving in and I could hear the sporadic thunder even from this distance. We both picked up the pace so that when we got to the saddle it wouldn’t be to windy too set up our tent. No matter how fast we had gone there was no way we could have possibly out raced that storm. After going only a couple more miles it had caught up with us and forced us to stop. We quickly set up the tent and built a rock wind break to protect it from the high gusts that were starting to blow up the mountain. I discovered that the place we had stopped at was aptly named Froze-to- Death pass. Obviously this was not helping my morale at all. After we got the shelter set up, Joe and I ate the cheese and crackers out of our M.R.E.’s. Following the mornings hard work those sure did taste good. After we had finished we both got into our sleeping bags to stay warm and, lacking nothing better to do, read our books. Of course, this was rather difficult to do considering the howling of the wind and the flapping of the tent against the wind and the rain. As time went on and the afternoon started leaning towards evening the rain seemed to stop. The wind hadn’t stopped and the sun was still blotted out by clouds but there was no longer the familiar pitter-patter of rainfall and the water that had previously been flowing under us had ceased to a trickle. I opened the tent door a tad and discovered that the precipitation had not stopped but had simply changed forms, from rain to snow. Now I knew that the elements had defeated us and it would be far to dangerous to proceed up the trail to the peak. We also didn’t want to try trekking down the trail we had just come down in such a veritable blizzard. So after conferring with Joe we decided to try to wait out the storm in our shelter and trying going back tomorrow. We both finished off our M.R.E.’s and went to sleep to the shrill howl of the wind. When I woke in the morning I discovered that the sleeping bag next to me was empty and, upon looking out, there were fresh boot tracks in the snow. I decided to go out and investigate, so I laced up my boots, threw on my coat and jumped outside to a waiting snowball in the back of the head. As I jumped around and groped down towards the snow, another snowball just barely missed my head. I grabbed two big handfuls of snow and charged at Joe, whitewashing and throwing him down before he could react. I then pulled him up and we both agreed to a truce until we started on our way down. For breakfast we had instant oatmeal and more PowerBars. After finishing breakfast, we packed up the shelter, knocked down the wind break (so as to leave no trace) and started back. Going down was even more fun than I had expected for now we could boot ski down. By the time we would have stopped for lunch we had already made it to our waiting cars and were on our way back home. Even though we hadn’t made it to the top, our adventure was still a heck of a lot of fun and maybe next year the elements will cooperate. 1 Charles A. Petersen 9/14/97 A-1