Took advantage of a beautiful day to schlep up Register Ridge to Mt. Baldy. Finally took the time to tag Harwood too.
Register Ridge is no trail for a fat old man, but I did it anyway. It wasn't fast. And it wasn't pretty, well pretty steep and pretty picturesque, but my effort wasn't pretty. But by God I got up there. And I can confidently say that I have the slowest time up that route and that I am still the slowest man on the mountain.
Took a little detour and went up to Harwood. I'd never done that and now I have. Not sure that I'll do it too often though.
Then I headed up to the summit. Ran into Carlos Torres and Tim from Climb for Heroes. Always inspiring to see them.
Got up to the summit and as I was coming down ran into Carla from 52 Hike Challenge. She recognized my beard. If you see a far old guy with a white beard on Baldy it's either me or Santa Claus on his vacation. Apparently I took a break up there next to Phillip, but didn't realize it.
Because I'm lazy I decided to go down the Devil's Backbone. There was more snow there then at the summit, and in all the wrong places. It was sloppy and dicey and I didn't like it, but pushed on nonetheless.
Ended up at the Notch where I took the lift down and I ain't ashamed. It ain't like I took it up and I hate walking down that road.
All in all a great day.
Responses
How were the snow conditions on Register Ridge, @mr-jcharvey?
No snow at all on Register Ridge. Some on the way up to Harwood. Patches on the trail to the summit. Snow all the way up from the saddle to the summit, but no need for microspikes on Sunday. Snow on the Devil’s Backbone and seeing people go over it without a clue made me nervous. They might be oblivious to what could happen, but I knew. Made it fine, but I’m not going that way again until spring.