After months of anticipation, much training and a bit of uncertainty with injuries, I made it to the top of Mt. Rainier on August 1st. Yippee! It was incredible and my mind is still processing how amazing the climb was. After the trip up Rainier, Doug and I traveled around the Pacific Northwest and spent time with family and friends. I have to catch up on a lot of things after being away for so long, but I will write more about the adventure soon. For all those who have written comments or have emailed me, I promise to get back to you. It may just take me a little time. The whirlwind pace of the climb made it a bit hard to get cameras out to shoot photos and video, but we did manage to get some pictures and footage and hope to put together a short film on the experience shortly. Stay tuned!
Ostomy Outdoors 
Hello Heidi…
Congrats on your accent of Rainier … We might have laid eyes on you since we were staying overnight at Paradise Aug 1…if not for the fog that it looks like you climbed above… We also were on Mt Evans near the time of your training …with rocks and bags of water!…reminds me of my young days growing up in Colo…
Keep it up!
Another native Coloradin’ ostomate Doug….now living in Seattle
Hi Doug,
That is so cool that you were at Paradise that day! It sure was foggy and misty. We were soaked by the time we got back down. It was a crazy 24 hours of weather. We got stuck in one of the most intense thunderstorms I have ever experienced in the mountains while we were at the high camp around 11,000 ft. on the evening of July 31st. Lightning was striking the ridges all around us constantly and about 4 inches of graupel dumped in about 20 minutes. Fortunately, we had arrived in camp and had already eaten dinner when that happened, so we just had to hunker down in our tents and hope that the lightning aimed for the high points and not us. The weather forecast for the next day wasn’t looking great either and we went to bed thinking we wouldn’t be able to attempt the summit. However, by midnight the skies had surprisingly cleared and we left camp. By the time we reached the top in the morning, ominous clouds were building again so the guides really kept us moving… though those clouds never materialized into much over the next hours and it ended up being a fairly sunny, blue sky descent. The whole time we could look down and see that the lower elevations were completely socked in with thick clouds. About two miles above Paradise, we said goodby to the gorgeous views of Rainier and entered the fog. We made it back to the trailhead around 4 p.m.
We spent a few days visiting friends in Seattle after the climb too so looks like our paths could have crossed numerous times this summer:)
Thanks for writing and enjoy the remaining weeks of summer!
Cheers,
Heidi
Wonderful! I did email you about things! I am so glad you got to go on your adventure!!!!
I’m so very, very proud of you!!!!!!
Les Cherow Flagstaff urostomy guy
Sent from my iPhone
Hi Les,
Thanks so much for all your well wishes. Sorry I wasn’t able to answer your message from the road. I don’t own a smartphone and didn’t have my laptop with me. I have an Ipod Touch but that only worked in few places along the way where there was reliable Wi-Fi and I usually wasn’t in those areas for more than a few minutes. The trip was amazing!!! I just sorted through all my video footage and photos last weekend so I should be able to get a post up sometime soon. Hope you are getting some great hikes in!
Take Care,
Heidi