Mount Rainier: Mother of Waters
Writing about an experience more than a month removed from it is unwise.
The details that matter — like how avalanche lilies tilt their bright yellow faces framed by a soft white petal crown down toward the snow rather than up toward the sun — start to slide out of your brain and into your bones.
A Rainier adventure is impossible to articulate even when freshly completed. Dozens of days later, it’s more like a feeling you wish others could have.
But I decided to share the gist of it. To document pieces of a 93-mile, 26,000-feet-of-climbing “run” around what the Puyallup Tribe called “Tahoma,” meaning “the mother of waters.”
Rainier is an active volcano. As the most glaciated peak in the U.S., it spawns five major rivers. The volcano is surrounded by subalpine wildflower meadows and an ancient forested wetland sprouting 1,000-year-old fir, cedar, and hemlock trees. You will likely see mountain goats and marmots above the treeline and friendly black bears below.
The Run
“I’ve always wanted to do the Wonderland Trail,” I said to my friends Hollie and Karie over beers at Beer Bar in Salt Lake City. “Should we do it?” was quickly followed by a “Cheers!” and a credit card charge from Aspire Adventure Running. YIKES.
Luckily, I was relocating from Sarasota, FL, to Brevard, NC, with Pisgah National Forest in my backyard. Where the only way to start a run is straight up, and the terrain is the definition of gnarly, with roots, rocks, bees, snakes, spider webs, and water ready to show trail runners a “good time.”
To complete the 93-mile circumnavigation of Rainier, I relied on Karie’s expert coaching and spent lots of time in the woods, something I could pull off given my springtime decision to quit my job and take a little career break. I unexpectedly broke my foot bouldering in December, but after a couple of months in a boot, I kicked training off in March.
Between April and August, I ran three 50ks in NC (Art Loeb in Brevard, Folk Art Center to Mt. Mitchell in Asheville, and the Ridges to Rails 50k race in Old Fort) and one 50-miler in NY (Finger Lakes 50, which I won!). I arrived in Seattle feeling ready for the three-day push.
And this is how I’ll organize this article: by day. Here we go.
I will not agonize over the details. I’m almost 42 and can’t remember them. And I’m not a details kind of girl unless we’re talking about avalanche lilies.
To make a long intro short, Karie, Hollie, and I met up in an extraordinarily shitty hotel on the outskirts of Seattle the day before the run. We got our free beer from the lobby, double-checked our supplies, and, the next morning, made our way to the wrong meetup spot before hiking with our hefty bags to the right one (thank god for GPS).
Our guide, Ryan, and most of the other runners in our group were waiting. A mix of women and men between ages 30 and 50 from all over: Brooklyn, Albuquerque, San Fran, Salt Lake, and Brevard. We hopped in the van and drove to Rainier base camp, where we got to know each other, had a tasty dinner, and got our gear checks done (water filter, phone with digital map, food, base layer, raincoat, gloves, hat, headlamp, emergency blanket, and a few other things).
It was off to bed with our alarms set for 4 am. Day one was our biggest day.
Day 1: 34ish miles, 10kish feet of climbing
It was warmer than usual in Rainier: 60s in the morning, 80s during the day. So all that warm gear we were hauling would be senseless weight. But we’re talking glaciers and unpredictable weather, so the required gear came with us anyway.
We started our ascent from the visitor’s center to our first destination: Mowich Lake. The group let out a few excited but nervous yelps as we entered the ancient woods, a palette of rich green canopy above and rusty red earth below, all wrapped in the golden hues of dawn. We felt like a pack of wolves who’d just been granted permission to run free. We were howling our way up the mountain!
As is often the case with big mountain running adventures, disaster struck. On a descent, Karie rolled her ankle. We huddled around to assess the damage, feeling like she might rally and be OK.
A stunning alpine meadow greeted us a couple hours into the run, reminding us how lucky we were to be here, in this wild place, healthy enough to do this crazy run.
And then the Mother of Waters snapped her fingers at our flower-struck souls with a scorching, sunny, exposed stretch that had us counting down to our first alpine lake and Aspire-proclaimed “excellent swimming opportunity.”
When we arrived, we dropped our packs, poles, and shirts and let the clear, frigid water take our breath away. But our love affair with the water was cut short by swarms of mosquitos and horseflies that wanted to make lunch out of us.
And then disaster struck. Again. Karie fell on a descent, this time re-spraining her ankle and slicing open her knee. Hollie and I knew by Karie’s many “FUCK!”s and tears that this time was more serious.
Halfway through the day, with more than a half marathon to go, we hobbled down, down, down until others in our pack caught up. We sent a radio call for help that would go unanswered. Karie permitted me and Hollie to run the rest of the way to camp at our own pace as she painfully crossed bridges, rivers, and gigantic rocks to our first night’s camp.
Hollie and I decided to stick together from then on. This strength-in-numbers approach felt right, but we couldn’t help but feel sorry for our injured friend.
We rolled into camp to applause, a cooler full of beer, and our guide Tim whipping up dinner. I took a short but hot shower, set up my tent in the middle of the road, and ate an Impossible burger. Karie rolled in as the sun set with a black and blue ankle…and a heavy heart.
One of the runners and our guide, Ray, who was sweeping that day, would not make it to camp that night. They would sleep under the stars and wait until dawn to make their final push up the hill.
Tomorrow would be a more leisurely day…just a marathon (ha!)…so we all went to sleep knowing we could rise with the sun and not a second earlier.
Day 2: 26ish miles, 9kish feet of climbing
Runners are so damn competitive. We were told to “start by 8 am,” but we were wolfing down our breakfast to beat each other to the trail not long after dawn. We’d be ascending through spray park and spending a day crossing raging rivers fed by glacier beasts.
I was surprised at how decent I felt after a 50k+ day. As the picture-taker of the duo, I found myself failing to resist the urge to photograph every aspect of the landscape. There were times when the singletrack was so perfect that I wanted to teleport every trail-running fanatic to join us.
When I first heard a glacier crack, I thought a century-old hemlock was falling down the mountain. Ice quakes make a traveling cracking sound that comes from within the glacier. This sound reminds you how small and insignificant you are — in the most magical way imaginable.
Hollie and I tackled the big climb of the day up Dick Creek quietly, stopping only to filter water, snack, or admire the landscape. One thing I’ll never forget about Rainier is how the water tasted: pure. As if the water touched my lips before anything else. No microplastics to speak of.
SIDE NOTE: The best part of this trip, for me, was crossing the Carbon River. The video doesn’t convey the rush of cold air coming off the glacier, the wobbliness of the bridge or its closeness to the rapids, or ice age-old glaciers cracking like thunder on a Kansas prairie in August.
As we approached White River, Hollie and I wondered about Karie. How was she doing? What if she were to sprain her ankle a third time and have to get airlifted out? This made us nervous. But our worried hearts were soothed by a scraggly black bear on the descent into White River Campground. A distraught couple warned us of the bear ahead, but we knew from our guides that there was nothing to fear so long as we kept our distance.
With two miles to go (both downhill), we felt giddy. We were top runners that day, leading the pack at the end. I told Hollie to let her rip, and we clocked our fastest mile into camp, where a hot shower and cold coke welcomed us. We pitched our tents, slipped on soft, dry clothing, and gathered around with our new runner friends to marvel that we were more than halfway done with our epic run.
We showed each other blisters. Swapped KT tape tips. Laughed at the volume of bug bites and black toenails. Luckily, everyone made it to camp that night.
We fell asleep to the sound of a car alarm that wouldn’t quit. I had trouble falling asleep, thinking about how soon my 4:30 alarm would beep and questioning how I’d run another 50k. I was also amazed at what my body was allowing me to do. Proud of my positive mental attitude on a trek that was as grueling, intimidating, and hard as it was stunning and wondrous.
Day 3: 31ish miles, 7kish feet of climbing
Hollie and I got an early start. Another runner in our group had decided, thanks to her purple knee and about-to-explode blisters, to call it after day two. The rest of us began our third and final leg back toward Longmire, prepared for snow-covered trails and a steep, scree-filled detour that would be more dangerous than we expected.
Hollie and I were focused. We knew that to make the cutoff, we’d have to be smart and steady. We had Summerland to look forward to — the highest point of the Wonderland Trail at almost 6,000 feet. The approach, though straight up, rewarded us with a picture-perfect wildflower meadow.
Hollie and I caught up with “Mountain Goat Melissa,” a nickname she earned with effortless bounding up rocky ascents.
We navigated tricky terrain, giggled like children at a family of mountain goats taking in the sunrise from their snowy beds, and reminded each other of our great fortunes to be experiencing a landscape only those with strong hearts, legs, and minds can get to.
Everyone told us day three was the best day, but I couldn’t help but award day two’s Carbon Glacier and her ravenous river. She could have gulped me up in one big slurp, and I’d have allowed it. I can’t think of a better way to go.
I’m a worry wart, which might surprise you given the places I’ve been and things I’ve done: a fishing expedition in the Himalayas. A solo backpacking trip through most remote parts of Patagonia. Long runs in the woods in the dark alone. But I’m convinced that adventures like this make us feel alive, help us discover and refine our authentic characters, and make us realize how lucky we are to get to live this one wild and precious life (RIP Mary Oliver).
Day three was a reminder (after two pretty uneventful, smooth days of running) that the Wonderland Trail ain’t no joke. We encountered a snowy section of the trail that I was convinced was off-trail. Melissa and Hollie attempted to traverse it, but I was too freaked out by the drop and ran back down to a rockier but less icy section of the trail, ultimately catching up with them. Deathtrap averted.
Hollie and I made the cutoff by hours, and our egos swelled. I switched socks and shoes to avoid collecting more blisters on the final half marathon of the day, downed a Coke, and tempted Hollie with a bag of boba tea jelly beans that we’d get to share after our last big climb up Box Canyon.
We were starting to fade. We were thirsty. Our legs hurt. We couldn’t stop thinking about finishline tacos. We were dreading the detour ahead, which promised bushwhacking and unstable footing. But we quietly forged ahead until we got to the dreaded scree field at the end of our climb at the hottest time of day. Egos properly checked!
I went first. I tried to be efficient but steady, knowing I'd freak out if I paused or lingered. Hollie, a much braver soul, cruised through. We rewarded ourselves with jelly beans as we approached a section of the trail that park visitors could drive to: Reflection Lake.
We were getting desperate for a water source, being able to see these gorgeous turquoise bodies of water that we couldn’t quite access to filter water.
But we finally reached a creek and gulped our favorite-tasting water one last time.
Hollie and I kept whispering, “Don’t trip! Don’t fall,” as we descended the final few miles to where we began this whole thing three days ago. The crew clapped as we jogged it in. Hollie and I hugged, cried a little, and went through the taco line for our celebratory meal.
Almost everyone who started that day finished. Karie was pulled at the cutoff. The fact that she did most of the trail on a severely sprained ankle is incomprehensible to me. After day one, I would have called it and sat around drawing flowers and birds while I cried my eyes out. But Karie is one gritty lady.
We loaded up the van with a pile of stinky, tired runners and made our way to our respective places: airports, hotels, homes. I crawled into the hot shower and then under the Airbnb covers.
The next day, we shuffled around town, drinking beer and eating burritos, in awe at the milestone behind us.
I omitted so much from this recap that I feel ashamed. But I’m telling myself that light documentation is better than none.
I will never forget:
How the Carbon River made me feel like stardust—a small but essential part of the universe.
The taste of fresh-filtered water from Rainier’s rivers.
Hugging Hollie after sharing the highs and lows of almost 100 miles.
Avalanche lilies. Or the way an Impossible burger tastes alongside a hazy IPA at camp.
