HOT SUMMER , COOL WATER

 THE BASICS: Mount Bachelor Academy’s River Classroom trips are offered four times per year during our Alternative Curriculum Weeks.  These academic/adventure trips are led by Charyn McDonnell and assisted by Mike Zielaskowski; both are certified American Canoe Association Instructors.  Trips are four to six days in length and are conducted on the Deschutes River.  River Classroom trips are a complete instructional course that teaches paddle rafting, rowing, river rescue, boat repair, river camping, cooking and etiquette. Students who successfully complete the course receive a course completion card and certificate from the American Canoe Association and .25 credit of high school PE or elective credit.  MBA also conducts Friday raft rips on the Deschutes River which are recreational in nature and one day only.

In July , several rafting trip took place:

TO THE TOP !!!!

Living in the moment, is hard when there are mountains to summit.  Two Thursdays prior to the Mount Hood experience my head was still racing with different scenarios that could happen or go wrong on this trip. Maybe we’ll forget our headlamps, or there will be a huge rockslide, or the weather will be too warm or too stormy for us to summit. Maybe all of this hype we were creating will be for nothing, maybe we wont summit. With our packs full of chocolate and supplies on our back, and our ice axes in hand we arrived at the Timberline Mountain Guides little section of the Timberline at Hood lodge. Our guides were Jeff and John; we introduced ourselves and went through a short safety seminar before signing a waiver. Both of our guides had impressive resumes, one with over 60 summits of Hood, the other with a variety of 14,000 foot plus peaks in the lower 48 and even Nepal. They definitely knew what they were doing. We quickly were outfitted with surprisingly comfortable mountaineering boots, harnesses, helmets, ropes and crampons. We loaded up and hit the trail around 7 or so in the morning. With a dominating peak teasing us to our front and a parking lot that grew smaller with every step to our backs, we set a fast pace and entertained each other with riddles and jokes along the way. Our guides kept bragging to us about how fast our pace was and how we were going to summit earlier than they ever had before. Around noon we arrived at our 9000-foot high camp, already having covered close to 3000 feet from the start of our hike. We set up our tents and started snow school. In snow school we learned about different steps, belaying, knots, how to self arrest and how to glissade, all important things to know for our next day’s summit attempt. After watching Niggeman failing in an attempt to stop himself from sliding, with his ice axe (self-arresting), it was kind of an intimidating thing to try.  After finishing snow school we hung out around camp in our shorts and T-shirts while our guides melted water and began to cook our dinner. Jeff and John made a great pot of cuscus and stir-fry, even vegan stir-fry for Tyler. Steve gave us dinner and a show while we watched him attempt to down a plate of stir-fry with nearly half a bottle of Tabasco on it. We hit the sack early and I soon found it was too hot to sleep in a tent so we all slept outside under the stars. 1 am came quite quickly; we woke up and ate bagels and oatmeal before lightening our packs and heading out. A group ahead of us had an early start but to our guides surprise we soon caught up to them. We continued to hike up the massive peak with only our headlamps for security and often heard large rock falls and potential disasters in the dark and cold distance. We reached our last break area before summit and roped up for a more difficult climb. For what seemed like hours we climbed using our ice axes as support up the long steep face between the summit and us. When we got to the last chute our guides climbed up free and belayed us as we ascended to the top. Walking across the summit ridge at sunrise was probably the most beautiful thing I have ever experienced. It was finally happening and on a perfect day. We summitted and proceeded in congratulating each other and giving high-fives. At the top we took a series of epic pictures until the wind began to pick up again and we needed to head down. We glissaded most of the way back down to the parking lot and packed up to go home. On our way out we were still all in awe of the giant’s sheer mass and power. What a gnarly couple of days, in 24 hours or so we covered close to 12,000 feet up and down in total. I will never forget this trip or the friends that I had with me on it.  Mike O.

Tyler, Mike, Steven, Greg and Vito on top of Mount Hood, Oregon

FOR MORE PICTURES FROM SUMMER 2006 CLICK HERE

FOR MORE PICTURES FROM SPRING 2006 CLICK HERE