Monday, July 19, 2021

When I woke up about 5:30, it was drizzling a little, so we stayed in the tent until it stopped. Although cloudy, there didn't seem to be any threat of thunderstorms, so we ate a quick breakfast, shouldered our day packs and headed up the ridge. As we topped out on the first steep stretch of trail, we could look back to Kennedy Point and see our camp in the saddle below.

Looking forward along the Ridge toward Boundary Peak

Looking back at our Camp from the Ridge

The trail continues uphill at a mostly-moderate rate, contouring along the ridge between Kennedy Point and Trail Canyon. Although the view from the ridge past Trail Canyon Saddle looks like there is quite a bit of drop, this is a trick of perspective and there is very little "down" to lose and have to re-gain along the way.

From the Trail Canyon Saddle, the view shows how steep and rocky the rest of the climb will be. There is a second saddle around the near ridge and the trail continues to contour upward through increasingly annoying scree and rock slabs. Clouds were intermittently blowing in over the summit but still nothing threatening, so we continued.

The Final Stretch up to the Summit of Boundary Peak

Nathan was a bit ahead of me on the final ridge. The clouds closed in briefly as I took his photo at the top of Nevada. I joined him shortly thereafter, bringing to a conclusion a 26-year oddyssey to finish the highpoints of the lower 48 states. Boundary Peak had taken us just shy of 5 hours from camp to summit, quite a bit slower than I would have estimated based on distance and altitude gained. Its reputation as a scree slog is well-deserved and that sort of gravelly climbing slowed us down.

Summit Selfie on Boundary Peak

Nathan on the Summit of Boundary Peak

It being the 21st Century, we naturally took a summit selfie to post as soon as we had decent cell coverage. We signed the summit log book, noting Boundary was my 49th highpoint and the completion of the lower 48. Nathan now has 42, so he has some catching up to do.

With no one else in sight, we shared summit photo duties to document our success at reaching Nevada's highest point. We looked around the summit area and found a benchmark plus another reference mark. There isn't a sign, save the handwritten cardboard one someone thoughtfully left in the ammo box with the summit log book.

Alan Finishes the Lower 48 atop Boundary Peak

Nathan Improves his Highpoint Total to 42 atop Boundary Peak

Reference Mark in the Summit Area

View from the Summit back along the Ridge

Having successfully reached the summit of Boundary Peak, it was time to head back to camp. I've often said that "the summit is only halfway" and Boundary Peak was about to demonstrate that in spades. Not long after leaving the summit and well before we reached any semblance of a trail, I hit a patch of ball-bearing scree on a flat rock. I spun, tucked and fell onto my back on top of my summit pack. Something hard in the pack ended up between my back and the rock. Ouch. Since both Nathan and I have been trained in wilderness first aid over the years, we did a careful inventory. No damage to limbs. That's good. A little scrape on one knuckle from the rock. That'll heal. But...where I landed on my back, I could tell I had cracked a rib. No difficulty breathing but moving my right arm caused significant pain in my ribcage. Nathan asked if he needed to call in help (we did have some cell coverage at that spot), but I declined. As long as I was careful not to move my right side too much, I could walk without much discomfort. Having cracked a rib in a skiing incident several decades ago, I was pretty sure of the general extent of my injury and wasn't worried about walking back to camp and then to the car.

As we headed down, we began to hear thunder out in the valley to our left. Fortunately, it was a good distance away and the clouds were moving away from us, so we continued down from the peak. We took a break at the Trail Canyon saddle. From there, the quality of the trail improved significantly so we made more or less decent time back to camp. As we arrived, the rain began and shortly became quite heavy. I wasn't of much use at that point, so Nathan had to break camp and pack things into our two main packs. We were both glad our campsite was well below the ridgeline as there were lightning strikes on both ridges above us as Nathan packed up camp.

When we first started our backpacking and highpointing escapades, I ended up carrying most of the weight and Nathan had a small pack suited to his stature of the era. He has now officially paid that back, with interest, as he carried his pack down to the car on the first trip, then made the five-mile round-trip to camp and back to the car to carry the rest of our gear down. I knew I had raised a useful pack horse for a reason!

When we got back to Mammoth Lakes, a visit to the ER there confirmed the field diagnosis (and then some). I had broken not one, but two, ribs. No wonder it hurt. The ER physician said they'd usually have kept me overnight for observation but since I was with Nathan, she trusted him to monitor me and get me back to the ER if anything changed for the worse. She also insisted that I come back for follow-up x-rays in the morning to verify that the breaks had not dislocated and I wasn't at risk of pneumothorax. A pizza, a couple of beers and 3 Ibuprofen later, I tried (with mixed success) to sleep.

The second set of x-rays showed both breaks well aligned so the ER physician said it was ok to head for home. Nathan offered to drive back with me instead of flying from Reno back to Chicago and I took him up on his offer. Mt. Ritter and my tour of Arches and Canyonlands in Utah will have to wait for another trip. The trip home was uneventful, although we had to detour through the southern part of Colorado due to mudslides on I-70 and construction on U.S. Highway 50.