A Tribute

I'm dedicating this post to my dad.  You see, when I was young, really young, he started taking me camping, hiking, fishing, backpacking, off roading, and the like.  And I mostly enjoyed doing these things mainly because my dad really enjoyed these activities.  And I loved being with my dad, so where he went, I was happy to follow.  

Fast forward twenty years and I am more grateful than ever that my dad helped me to experience the great outdoors on a very regular basis with all of its grandeur and rigor.  So, about a year ago, I asked Kalen if he wanted to climb Mount Whitney.  I climbed this mountain with my dad when I was about eleven years old.  Mount Whitney is the tallest peak in the western hemisphere, besides Alaska's Mount McKinley.  He said yes, and I made it happen.  Of course my dad came along and my brother in law, Sean Foster, joined us too.

Base camp.  This is real camping, for sure.  I was so impressed with Kalen.  He had our camp set up, tent up, things in order and my food made with that Jet Boil.  It looks like a big black cup and it prepared our food within ten minutes.  The first night we had Mountain House, Beef Stew.  It tasted great.

We chose to use this spot as our base camp.  This way we climbed about half way.  From here we broke our heavy packs down and climbed the rest of the way with lighter weight packs.  Mount Whitney is 14, 505 feet high.  Our base camp was only at about 9000 feet.  Nonetheless, they say this is one of the most strenuous climbs because you start at 3000 feet and ascend 6000 feet in only five miles.  This base camp was the mark of the first 5 miles up. We still had another 6-7 miles to climb.  The whole climb is about 23 miles round trip.

 The valley floor below is Death Valley.  Mount Whitney is located in the Sierra Nevadas, but it's on the Eastern side.  Most people are more familiar with the beautiful Yosemite Valley, which is located on the Western side of the Sierra Nevadas.

 This was no easy feat.  After we set up camp and went to sleep the first night, Kalen said he didn't want to keep going.  It was the first time I had really seen him challenged by the outdoors.  I told him he could do it and to remember that we were breaking down our 42 pound packs.  We would be carrying much lighter packs for the next days challenge.  He rose to the challenge.

If you look closely, you will see a beautiful lake tucked in this picture below.  It's frozen over.

Behind the lone climber in this picture is the infamous snow shoot that you climb to get to the top of Mount Whitney.

During parts of the climb we came across snow fields where the trail was lost.  We had to use our compass once.  We were able to get back on track successfully.  Here the snow is about 6 feet deep.  We had to be really careful where we stepped, to make sure it was packed snow.  

As we were coming down the mountain on the last day, I realized something I had never realized before.  Whether my dad intended it or not, my young life spent with him in the outdoors had made me in large part, the person I am today.  He made me do hard things.  I know exactly how Kalen felt when he didn't want to go to the top of this mountain, because when I was young and on this mountain, I didn't want to go any further either.  But, all of these experiences I had with my dad helped me to know that I could do hard things.  And the epiphany for me, coming down this mountain twenty years later, was that these experiences translated into so many other areas of my life.  

In the car ride home, I told Kalen that doing hard things in the outdoors and knowing that I could accomplish them had helped me to get through other hard things in life.  It was on the way down this mountain that I realized that when my mom died too soon, it was just one more mountain to climb, and I could do it.  I could do hard things and because of this I could also face hard things.  

I'll never forget this three days I had with my son.  Seeing him here was like looking back in time, watching myself.  It was a very special experience.  Just me and him and the very raw outdoors, far away.   So as a tribute to my special dad, thank you for taking me on all of the many adventures we went on, and for loving me and helping me to be the person I am today.