Mount Dickerman 10.4.13

After spending the previous two weekends at home, I was anxious to take advantage of the sun I saw in the forecast for Friday. Sara's cousin Laura was flying in to do the Tough Mudder with us over the weekend, so I invited myself along on their mountain adventure on Friday. It had already snowed in the mountains the weekend before so I read through recent trip reports, trying to get an idea of where the snow level was. We figured we'd have to hike through some so we wanted to avoid any boulder hopping or scrambling with the light layer of snow over the rocks, and settled on Mount Dickerman, a popular hike that was on my list to do. I haven't done a lot of climbing off of the Mountain Loop highway so I was excited to head back and take in those mountain vistas. Matt and Blake also took the day off so we all piled into Matt's car about 8am on Friday and headed for the trailhead.

Beautiful day in the mountains, a view of Glacier Peak from the summit of Mount Dickerman

I hadn't really done any hiking since our Tatoosh summit tagging weekend, so I was glad to be out in the mountains again. After the horrible blisters I got from my hiking boots during our Enchantments trip, I decided it was time for new boots. I love my Kayland mountaineering boots. They regularly leave me blister free, unless I'm heading up a steep dirt trail before we reach the snow, so I decided to find some Kayland hiking boots. Unfortunately they are no longer distributed in the US but luckily I found a pair in my size still left at Marmot Works in Bellevue so I picked those up. I put my old super feet in my boots to start hiking, but I brought the original footbeds as well as my approach shoes. We grabbed our stuff and left the parking lot about 10:30am.

Sara started out ahead, setting the pace for the crew as we left the parking lot and entered the old growth forest - big trees and lots of green everywhere. I always enjoy walking through that section at the lower elevation of hikes, before you break out to the mountain views. It’s quite the contrast coming down from the upper snowy parts too. The trail wound its way up the mountain through the trees for a couple miles. On the way down, the crew counted 53 switchbacks between the parking lot and the waterfall, which is basically the point where you break out of the trees and get more into the meadows on the upper portion of the mountain. I was trying to pay attention to my heels and they were starting to bother me a little in the new boots, but I was trying to wait until we got at least the first 1000’ of elevation out of the way before I stopped. I was starting to slow down, altering my step so we stopped just shy so I could duct tape my heels. A few more switchbacks and they still weren’t great so I switched out my superfeet for the footbeds they came with. Several more switchbacks and my heels still weren’t awesome so I stopped and changed into my approach shoes for the rest of the hike. It’s amazing how they feel like slippers after wearing hiking boots.

Quick view of the peaks to the south of us through the trees

We passed the waterfall and started up through the meadows. Without the tree cover, I wanted to stop and sunscreen – the super fair skinned one always slowing the group down. There were a couple inches of snow around and the trail was super wet with small streams running down it in some parts. There were a few other people on the trail as well, which we expected given its popularity. The snow got deeper the higher we went, and we were treated to some awesome views of the mountains close by.

Lots of snow up high

It was my first winter wonderland experience of the season. As much as I like rock climbing, ski season will be fun and hopefully my shoulder can finish healing without carrying large weekend/volcano packs. There was already a distinct boot pack up through the snow so we followed that up. One of the ladies we passed on her way down suggested we continue past the summit to another sub summit, which in her opinion, had better views. I was out front when we reached the summit so I decided to follow her advice as it seemed like it would put us beyond a stand of trees near the summit, providing us better views to the south.

View to the northwest with Mount Baker

View to the northeast with Glacier Peak

View to the south

I was so glad to take the day off and be out in the mountains. With the recent rainy weather, a sunny day in the mountains was quite the treat. I could just make out Mount Rainier to the south, but Mount Baker and Glacier Peak mostly dominated our view. I still need to learn the peaks in the area a little better as I was trying to figure out where Del Campo, Gothic, Sperry, and Vesper were on the horizon. Snow covered mountains are definitely my favorite ones to look at. I brought up some laffy taffy for summit treats so after we read all of the bad jokes, grabbed some lunch and a group summit shot, we headed back down.

Group summit shot on Mount Dickerman

I was glad to have my poles for the sloppy snow walk down. I even managed to avoid getting my approach shoes too wet. After the jarring decent through the snow my shoulder was bugging me a little so I just carried my poles down with me once we got back on the dirt trail. The descent was pretty uneventful other than the crew’s game of count the switchbacks. I think everyone was glad when we got back to the flat part and were down with the never ending switchbacks. It never seems as bad on the way up. It was a great hike to take advantage of a sunny Fall day, and another hike/mountain to check off my list.

View Mount Dickerman 10.4.13 in a larger map Map for this adventure

Hike off the Mountain Loop Highway

Trail up Mount Dickerman, lots of switchbacks