Home > Trip Reports > Jul 31, Aug 1, Muir - Paradise Two-Fer

Jul 31, Aug 1, Muir - Paradise Two-Fer

7/31/15
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
25046
5
Posted by Don Heath on 8/3/15 3:22am
I've never kept track of my trips to Muir, this one was somewhere around #thirty, more or less.  But I am proud of my time - a personal best of 23 1/2 hours from the parking lot to my lunch break.  Punctuated by naps of 1-2 hours and 12 hours, dinner and breakfast.  Ahhh, nothing like acclimating.

Personal Firsts:
  -  Trip to Anvil.  Anybody know the story of the rock and mortar wall and concrete pad up there?  What a view of the Cow!  That is one impressive broken up monster. 

  -  First Solo trip to Muir.  Just me and several hundred of my closest companions.

  -  First solo ski of the Paradise.  Actually - NOT!  But I did do an evening "circumnav" of Little Africa (that rock island about 1/3 of the way down?) 

  -  First aborted solo ski down the Paradise.  Saturday, after going on up to Muir, I planned on skiing down and hiking out 4th crossing.  But a few hundred yards below the rock island, I started to cross crevasses, on skinny bridges, and chickened out when i couldn't see a route through them to the bottom.  I've not seen so many on the Paradise before, and I've skied it late season - twice in August last year.  So I crossed back over to the Pebble creek patch, and went back down the way I came up.
  -  First time yelling at people for meadow stomping.
  -  First time being ignored by meadow stompers.
  -  Second Two-Fer in my 106 months.

I may change my name to Creaky Knees pretty soon.

Thanks for the report!  I've always preferred mellow Anvil over madhouse Muir.

author=Rusty Knees link=topic=34446.msg142096#msg142096 date=1438626162]
...Anybody know the story of the rock and mortar wall and concrete pad up there?   


Anvil Rock was the site of a fire lookout from 1916-42:
http://www.willhiteweb.com/washington/fire_lookouts/anvil_rock_lookout/mount_rainier_245.htm

I couldn't find anything online, but the park photo archives have great shots of spike-shod mule trains carrying firewood up to this lookout, including one of a mule in a crevasse!

Yes!
Pretty straightforward and obvious to switchback to Muir?  Were some Paradise Glacier turns worth the trouble?
Maybe we should pick a Sept. date soon.

What a great report!  I couldn't tell from your FB pics that you had the skis with, but stoked now to learn that you did.

Here's a couple pics of you and crevasse situation Aug 31 '13:

author=vogtski link=topic=34446.msg142098#msg142098 date=1438628507]
I couldn't find anything online, but the park photo archives have great shots of spike-shod mule trains carrying firewood up to this lookout, including one of a mule in a crevasse!


That would definitely be worth a click.  Please share!  :D

author=r1de link=topic=34446.msg142124#msg142124 date=1438922966]
That would definitely be worth a click.  Please share!  :D


Sorry, I spent a fair amount of time searching online, but came up empty.  Decades ago, one could just pop into the park library and spend a rainy day perusing the fascinating historic photo albums, but I suspect that's no longer the case:

"The Mount Rainier archives consist of official park records, manuscript collections, historic images, motion picture films, and other collections. The museum archives are currently in the process of being re-catalogued. For research requests, questions, and other inquiries, please email the park's Museum Curator."

http://www.nps.gov/mora/learn/historyculture/archives.htm

I did find one text reference, tho:

https://books.google.com/books?id=xv4qlIPaSLUC&pg=PA119&lpg=PA119&dq=mules+on+Muir+Snowfield&source=bl&ots=mEK1nLT7Ym&sig=OAyRBf9aq6zIAbupfsUt5ypwLlY&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDwQ6AEwBGoVChMIptO-8qSXxwIVlzGICh31bgJ6#v=onepage&q=mules%20on%20Muir%20Snowfield&f=false

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Don Heath
2015-08-03 10:22:42