Table Mt: another fun failure looking for east cliff edge
Posted: December 3rd, 2017, 8:22 pm
From Carpenters "Lake" (end of Dick Thomas trail) followed abandoned road to Greenleaf Creek. From there, to get to the cliffs above me to the northwest, I walked southwest. Well, sure, why not? I didn't mean to go so far SW. Severely misjudged due to virtually zero visibility and failure to carefully study map before departing.
Dropped below the road/trail to explore mossy rocky scenery, then back up to road, and followed a bonus road, in very good shape, through a rockslide zone. Lots of work went into this road, but it goes nowhere. There's almost no logging opportunities, and the road has to dead end because of terrain. Sure enough, it ended abruptly. Unable to see where I was going, I followed clearings, generally headed NE, and was surprised to find another road laboriously built through the rocky slope. Followed it, because, you know, had to. Dead end both ways. Again, ascended with a route based on best scenery and apparent best opportunity to get somewhere interesting. Came to a mossy rocky lightly-forested dome. Hmm. Thought I knew where I was headed, but this dome didn't look right.
Clouds parted for a minute, and I could see I was below cliffs. My heart sank. What now? because of poor visibility, I had to walk along base of cliffs to get a better look. Only possibility was to follow the only apparent lower-angle escape, where trees were actually growing. Would that route get me to the top of the cliffs? No way to know, can't see more than a hundred yards. Time to assess situation: never been here before, can't see where I'm at or where I'm going, starting to snow, I can see snow accumulated above (suspected as much, which is why I aborted my plan to drive up to Greenleaf for a higher start in known terrain), snow depth above unknown, wind, rain (hasn't stopped since I left the car), six hours til sunset, fighting a respiratory infection. Okay, time to accept failure before this turns into a SAR situation.
Walk back was nice, got to see the scenery I missed out on when I was walking up in the dark. Rain finally stopped when I came to the pipeline road (bottom of Dick Thomas trail). Walked up to the powerline road and sat down on a concrete footing. First chance to sit all day, first time out of rain all day. Nice views over to Beacon and up the gorge to the east. No snow up on Munra or Wauna Point (the higher one).
Poked around a bit, but rain started again, and it was less than an hour to sunset, so I walked back to my car.
I carried a couple ropes (ballast) and an axe (brush snagger). If I had left them behind, I could have carried my smaller lighter simpler pack, which is better for rainy days.
Really disappointed and frustrated this didn't work out, but not as much as you might imagine. It's December, weather happens. And it was fun looking at the map when I got home. Shocking how far off I was. And funny that the route I was considering taking up the cliffs would have put me at the saddle north of the two chiefs. Imagine the state I'd be in when I got up there and realized where I was, way over on the other cliff edge!
Dropped below the road/trail to explore mossy rocky scenery, then back up to road, and followed a bonus road, in very good shape, through a rockslide zone. Lots of work went into this road, but it goes nowhere. There's almost no logging opportunities, and the road has to dead end because of terrain. Sure enough, it ended abruptly. Unable to see where I was going, I followed clearings, generally headed NE, and was surprised to find another road laboriously built through the rocky slope. Followed it, because, you know, had to. Dead end both ways. Again, ascended with a route based on best scenery and apparent best opportunity to get somewhere interesting. Came to a mossy rocky lightly-forested dome. Hmm. Thought I knew where I was headed, but this dome didn't look right.
Clouds parted for a minute, and I could see I was below cliffs. My heart sank. What now? because of poor visibility, I had to walk along base of cliffs to get a better look. Only possibility was to follow the only apparent lower-angle escape, where trees were actually growing. Would that route get me to the top of the cliffs? No way to know, can't see more than a hundred yards. Time to assess situation: never been here before, can't see where I'm at or where I'm going, starting to snow, I can see snow accumulated above (suspected as much, which is why I aborted my plan to drive up to Greenleaf for a higher start in known terrain), snow depth above unknown, wind, rain (hasn't stopped since I left the car), six hours til sunset, fighting a respiratory infection. Okay, time to accept failure before this turns into a SAR situation.
Walk back was nice, got to see the scenery I missed out on when I was walking up in the dark. Rain finally stopped when I came to the pipeline road (bottom of Dick Thomas trail). Walked up to the powerline road and sat down on a concrete footing. First chance to sit all day, first time out of rain all day. Nice views over to Beacon and up the gorge to the east. No snow up on Munra or Wauna Point (the higher one).
Poked around a bit, but rain started again, and it was less than an hour to sunset, so I walked back to my car.
I carried a couple ropes (ballast) and an axe (brush snagger). If I had left them behind, I could have carried my smaller lighter simpler pack, which is better for rainy days.
Really disappointed and frustrated this didn't work out, but not as much as you might imagine. It's December, weather happens. And it was fun looking at the map when I got home. Shocking how far off I was. And funny that the route I was considering taking up the cliffs would have put me at the saddle north of the two chiefs. Imagine the state I'd be in when I got up there and realized where I was, way over on the other cliff edge!