Mount Isolation attempt on 1/26/08

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Great Pumpkin

Member
Joined
Jul 12, 2004
Messages
57
Reaction score
16
Location
Mr. Snotsicle on Mt. Hale
Trail name:Rocky Branch Trail from Rte. 16

Trail conditions:Well-consolidated and easily barebootable up to and just beyond the Dry River Wilderness boundary sign at 2.3 miles. Thereafter, we encountered some difficult going through a half-buried stream, and deeper snow because we missed the point where Mike Foster took his bearing of 290 degrees (see earlier post) :eek: .

Special Required Equipment: Snowshoes for sure. A better sense of direction. The ability to keep up with/follow someone who knows the bushwhack route well.

Comments:"Rocky Branch, Rocky Branch, Rocky Branch - Rocky Branch messed with me...." (Sorry, Crystal Gale and any U of T fans). Our day started with a bad omen -a big moose that had been struck on Route 302, and was dying on the side of the road. Very inauspicious. We left the parking lot at about 7:45, and meandered up to the wilderness boundary in about two (2) hours, roughly twice the time it apparently took Mike to catch us on a pair of MSR Lightnings. As noted above, we missed the point where he angled off to the right, and wound up thrashing around for awhile in wet, mucky stuff, with deep snow, finally getting down to the east side of the Rocky Branch by about 11 a.m. At this point, we were uncertain of our position - we spent some time going N. along the side of the Rocky Branch, following the tracks that must have been made by Raven and/or Mike, but eventually decided that we were going to turn around and save this one for another day. Followed Mike's far better route back to where we had screwed up initially, and we were leisurely strolling out when caught from behind once again by Mike (yeesh!) who had successfully tagged Isolation, and made the entire RT in about 6 hours. Ah, youth. Creaky Knees, Spaderman and your humble correspondent will be petitioning the 4K Committee for a "free drop" ruling, i.e., on our next trip, we are going to get a big ol' helicopter to dump us up near the end of the Rocky Branch Trail, since we had already hiked it before we went "out of bounds" :D Winter No. 43 will have to come at a later date.
 
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