The experience of a lifetime...

...and one I don't think I ever want to do again!! Of course, not backpacking. I would love to try that again, but I don't think I ever want to climb Mt. Askom again. That was one grueling hike--both up and down. So this is the story...

We got off late to start with so we didn't start hiking until about 2:30pm. When we got to the "trailhead" (ya, right, there was no trail! It was authentic bush whacking and making your own trail!), I stared at it in disbelief. We had to scale hundreds of yards up the side of the mountain (which was nearly vertical) until we got onto the ridge and into the treeline. Climbing up that ledge was treacherous. We were using all fours to make our way up the side and had to grab onto bushes and shrubs to keep from sliding all the way down. With a 30 pound pack on your back, it makes it quite interesting. Here, my student Karen is looking back toward the way we just came. The picture doesn't do it justice, but right in front of her was the steep part we had to climb.

Once we made it into the tree line, things were better, but it was straight up the side of the mountain (at least we could stand on our feet though and not use all fours!). There were quite a few downed trees in the forest, so we were scrambling over logs and branches as we creeped along. Here Karen and Stephanie are tackling the mountain.

Our group of five (myself, Stephanie, Karen, Sondra Smith and Danny Houghten) got separated from the rest of the group so we trudged on alone for nearly 2 hours. I was leading the group and was doing my best to follow the footprints of those before us since there was no trail to follow and I wasn't too sure where we were going. At one point, the trail seem to split and both looked like they had been followed. We turned down one path but after about 30 feet, it disappeared. So we retraced our steps and proceeded up the other path. I yelled down to Sondra and Danny who had fallen way behind. Sondra had twisted her ankle and was having to go very slow. We put an ace bandage on it and proceeded on. After several hundreds of yards, we lost the trail again so we were on our own. We forged our own trail for a while, but I was growing more concerned that I really didn't know where we were going, so I was hestitant to keep going. We thought there was one group still behind us so we waited for them to catch up. Now with a group of 10 we continued on. With Sondra's ankle and our extreme tiredness, the going was slow. We came out of the tree line and faced a looming shale face right above us. It was a long hard hike and we kept dreaming about the top. Just when we crested one slope, we saw another in front of us. It was tough going. The view was spectacular though. If you look through the trees into the valley, you can see Fountainview way below. In the second photo, it is off to the left.


Along the way, my left eye clouded over and I couldn't see. I wiped my eye on my sleeve and saw blood. I couldn't tell exactly where the blood was coming from nor could I even figure our what had happened. I wasn't sure if a bug bit me or a tree branch scraped me, but I didn't feel any pain or itchiness or anything. It was weird. It took a while for it to stop bleeding but finally it did and we were able to move on. Karen, Stephanie, and myself paused for a picture before we moved on.

We were fast running out of daylight and were still about 4 hours from our destination. (They told us the hike would only be 3 hours long. Right! We had already hiked for 5 1/2 and had another 4 to go!) Sondra's ankle was getting more sore and we were all exhausted. We made it almost to the top of the first peak (still another 45 minutes to the summit) and decided to pitch camp. It was a precarious place to camp considering we were on a very steep part of the mountain, it was covered in slick shale, and the wind blasted across the top. But with no choice, we found the most level spot around and laid out our tarps and sleeping bags. We were all grateful for really warm clothes and the tarps which we wrapped around our bags. The gusts of wind that hit us that night were so strong and we kept rolling since we were on the slope. One person thankfully had put huge rocks along his bag and several times they prevented him from rolling down the slope. I do have to admit though that the view was spectacular. Here we were almost at the very top of the peak and all you could see was a panoramic view of a clear night sky. We saw the moon creep up over the mountain range on the other side of the valley and it was blood red. It was amazing. Here we were breaking camp in the morning. In the second photo, the black area is really way below us though the picture doesn't really show it.


The next morning I woke up with my left eye so swollen and crusty from drainage all night. I looked hideous! I still could detect no bite or scratch. Some in our group wondered if I was having a sensitivity to the altitude that was causing pressure behind my eye. I was sure it was related to the bleeding from the day before, but still wasn't sure of the cause. Not risking it, I decided to make my way down the mountain with Danny and Sondra and go to the hospital to get it checked out. If you look closely at the second picture, you can see my left eye is quite swollen. (The doctor who checked my eye was rather perplexed by my symptoms. He detected no severe problem. His best guess was that some weird bug must have bit me but left no bite mark and my body reacted to it later.)


The three of us left right after breakfast and were confident the trip down would only take about 2 hours. It ended up taking us as long to get down as it did up. Since we hadn't eaten much food, our packs were still enormously heavy. All that weight on our backs put a lot of pressure on our knees. After a while, we felt like our knees where jelly and it was hard to balance. We got to some severely steep inclines that were only passible by rear--meaning you sat on your rear and slid on the way down. We had to dig our heels into the slope and grab plants and bushes on the way down just to prevent sliding off the ledge. At other times, we had to walk sideways and lean into the slope to prevent a head over heel tumble down the mountain side. It was insane! All we could think about was getting back to the car! This is a view on the way down.

At one point, we could actually see the cars way below along the logging road. While we were dreaming about being there, we looked way up the road and saw this huge bear lumbering his way down to the car. We kept musing to ourselves that we would probably make it to the car the same time he did and after all our effort on the mountain would just become bear meat. Thankfully that didn't happen!

Sabbath evening we were so grateful to be back at home esp. when it started raining and snowing on the mountain. The rest of the group on the mountain had a very snowy, chilly night. (One students thermometer registered -10C or 14F.) Most of them made it back by 5pm Sunday evening except for one group of 10 that got disoriented in the thick fog. They proceeded down the wrong ridge and found themselves all turned around. By Sunday evening, helicopters started searching for them, but saw no trace of them. Several search and rescue ground teams were dispatched Monday morning including two helicopters and a surveillance airplane. At noon, one of the helicopters spotted the group and they were airvaced to the hospital. All of us here on campus were fervently praying for them knowing that the weather was getting colder (it snowed again Sunday night) and their food and water supply was small. Thankfully, they had been able to start a fire Sunday night, but with all their belongings and their clothes being completely soaked from the snow and rain, they were one cold group. We were concerned about hypothermia and dehydration. Thankfully, we only had one student that had dehydration.

Last night, we had a session of prayer and praise after the group arrived back from the hospital. Through the whole ordeal, they held up well, but upon arriving back to school and being able to finally mentally process the whole experience, the group broke down and cried. It was quite the experience for them all. Individuals got up and share what blessings they had experienced while stranded out there. They shared how the felt so sure that God would send help to them by noon. Miraculously, it was at 12:15, the helicopter spotted them. Another experience they related was that they kept praying that God would stop it from snowing. But instead, it snowed even more. They couldn't figure out why God kept letting it snow. When they were finally picked up in the helicopter, the pilot told them that if it hadn't been for the snow, she would have had a more difficult time finding them. As she was flying, she noticed a melted area and that alerted her of their possible location. (Due to the fire and the group staying in that one spot, the snow was more melted there than anywhere else.)

And looking back on the event, I have a blessing of my own. On the way up, Stephanie and Karen and I stayed together the whole time. I most likely would have decided to hike back with them down the mountain. And they were a part of the group that got stranded. If it hadn't been for an unknown issue with my eye, I would probably have to be recalling a rescue story myself... Maybe God send a bug to bite me to get me off the mountain!

Here is one last picture just to put the mountain in perspective... It is the one in the center.

If you want to read what the media had to say about the ordeal, you can go to these two sites...

Hikers rescued from Askom Mountain

Lost campers rescued from mountain near Lillooet