WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Off the Trails: The Shasta Trilogy

Episode Date: April 9, 2025

Join Nicole Sighiartau and Storm Drexler as they discuss their wildest experiences in the great outdoors! This week they discuss the saga of trials Nicole went through on her climbs up Mt. Shasta.

You're listening to Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. Welcome to Off the Trails. Howdy there, partner? I'm Storm Drexler. And I'm going to talk with his accent the whole episode. And I'm Nicole Sigriardow and we'll be your adventure buddies every week as we discuss some of our wildest stories from our outdoor endeavors. Do we have to say that every time? Let's not talk in Southern accents.

I won't. I was kidding. Anyway, this episode is going to be a little bit of. of, it could be a series, but I think we're going to fit it all into one episode. And we're calling it the Shasta saga. Yippie Kae. Yeah. So it's my stories from Mount Shasta.

But before we dive into that. Guys, it's trail marker time. Oh, yeah. Can I do mine first? Sure. Too bad. You got to go first. Okay.

My trail marker is the storms that we've been having the past couple of days. The me? The you, yes. Sorry, guys. I'm in a goofy mood today if you couldn't tell, but I want to hear about the, I want to hear of those storms. It's spring in the Midwest, and you know what that means? The temperature changes from like 30 degrees one day to 60 degrees the other day, which means storms happen. And so we had a really big thunderstorm last night.

Explode me now. It was crazy. I was just lying on my bed, looking outside, watching the lightning for hours. You know in a comic book panel where there's like a big giant word that fills the whole panel? Yes. That happened lots of times. It was like, Krakum. Yeah, yeah.

With the lightning and thunder. And in Southern California, we don't get thunderstorms very often. So for me, it's a very exciting event. This is not common happening. Wait, I thought you guys had like crazy weather. No, we don't. The desert, if you go to the desert, yeah, they have big thunderstorms there. Dude, desert storms are wild.

They're crazy. But we're so coastal. Wait, you're telling me you don't live in the middle of a desert? I, okay, we live in a Mediterranean climate. At least the coast where I live. We're like coastal enough that we don't get that crazy weather. But if you go inland like an hour, yeah, you get desert thunderstorms. Do you like tumbleweeds?

Do you just have tumbleweeds? Not where I live, but yeah, if you go inland. Do those actually exist? They do actually exist. Wow. Yeah. That's cool. The more you know, guys.

Wild Wild West. Is that all? That is all. What's your trail marker? My trail marker is I saw a crazy thing outside that was not supposed to be there. Well, it was supposed to be there, but it wasn't put there by God. It was put there by man. and it was a large giant square piece of wood

and then on top of it there was like this big cushion thing and then there was pillars on the side and roasting those pillars and it was a wrestling ring oh it was outside and it was sitting there and there was people working on it and building it and making it cooler guys my tromarker is a shameless plug

for Simpson's Backdown which actually with this errors has already happened so if you went to Simpson's Backdown and supported us thank you if you didn't Shame on you. Stop listening. No, I'm kidding. But there's going to be a wrestling event.

But when we're recording this, it'll be tomorrow. But when this comes out, it'll already happen. But I'm excited. Yeah, I went last year. It was pretty cool. But I'll just say when you first started your trail marker, I was like, where is he going with this? That was the point, yeah. For those who don't know if you didn't see the news, Simpson did a kind of for the second

year in a row, an outdoor wrestling kind of event, which is kind of off the trailsy, right? We're outdoors and we're fighting each other. Tell yourself that. Yeah, so that's my true marker. Maybe if you were like wrestling a bear, it would count. So next year. Maybe you should just go to Simpsons back down. Okay.

Well, anyway, today's episode is about Mount Shasta. The Shasta Saga. Dun, dun, dun, dun. Yeah, so Mount Shasta is in northern California. It is a 14er. and when I was nine years old, my parents were like, Nicole, it's your time to climb Shasta. Is that the Sigurata right of passage? No, I don't think we really have a right of passage.

Okay. But Mount Shasta is a real mountain. Like, I have done hikes. I have hiked 14ers in the past, okay? Maybe some scrambling here or there, but Mount Shasta requires crampons. Ice axes being roped together. You're climbing on snow for over half the mountain. So you're not just following a trail.

You have to carry way more clothes because it's colder. You have to carry more equipment, rope, et cetera, more food. It's a real challenge. Good gracious. Wait, do you have to actually climb up ice faces and stuff? So we're not on vertical sheets of ice, if that's what you're asking. No. I was scared for your past safety for a moment.

No, but there's a couple different routes on Mount Shasta and the first attempt, because there were multiple. The first attempt, my parents decided to take me up the North Face, which is technically one of the harder routes. But for some reason, they're like, Nicole could do this. After the 99 switchbacks, then you had it in you. Exactly. So we did this probably the first time in you. June. Yeah, it was around Father's Day. We did it in June. We had to rent, like, actual climbing boots for me because I had light trail runners that I would wear for our other 14 or hikes. But for crampons,

you need a very sturdy base to a boot for them to actually get strapped onto so you're secure and steady. And now I was a fit kid. Like, I swam, and I was good with hiking. I had proven myself in the past, but this was the most weight, most amount of weight I've ever carried on my back at once. And I felt it. It, it was rough, like the first day. I was a little fat kid. Okay. I don't believe that. I'm not even kidding, actually. You're serious? Nicole's looking right now and seeing I'm a pretty skinny guy, but I promise you, you look at my, like, child pictures. I was like a little chubby toddler. I was, I probably weighed as much as your backpack. Yeah, my backpack, I believe my dad said, no.

he could have been exaggerating to make me feel better. But I think he said it was like 15 to 18 pounds. And, you know, when you're nine years old. That was like my birth weight. Okay. When you're nine years old and you're a little girl. Like I was still a little girl at the time. It was very heavy. And I hadn't really trained without amount of weight. So we hike up to like the base camp area. And that first day was my first time actually hiking up on snow with crampons. And I did really well. Like I was cruising along. My parents were really proud of me. They were surprised at how while I was doing. We spent the night over. We didn't sleep on snow that night because the camp spots, they're not really camp spots, but like the places where you can put your tent on the north space,

they're kind of sandy. And so it was actually really nice because we took our shoes off and we walked barefoot on the sand. And Shasta is a volcanic mountain. So it's like, yo, that's cool. So it's like broken up pumice. So it feels really good on your feet. Oh my gosh. Volcanoes or elite? Volcanoes are really cool. We actually have a lot up in Northern California. But we had a beautiful sunset. These clouds kind of formed like a dragon shape. Oh, Lord. It was just, it was a great night. And so I was feeling really good. And I was like, tomorrow we're going to make it to the top of another 14er, like a real serious mountain, not one with a trail. And we woke up the next morning probably at like 3 a.m.

And it had erupted. No. But that would be, that would be interesting. But we started up and now yesterday when we were hiking on snow, it was like afternoon. So it had softened from the sun. And it was pretty easy to step into. This was pitch black in the middle of the night. And it was ice.

Oh, no. It was so hard. to get my crampons to like stick and grab the snow that I just felt really unstable on my feet. And like I was kicking my feet as hard as I could. But again, little legs. There's only so much you can stomp your foot into the ground. And my dad was in front of me. We're all roped together, by the way. It's like if one, if you slip and you start going down that ice, remind me what a crampon is. A crampon. Is that a stick? No, no, no. So an ice axe is the stick that you're thinking of. Yep.

where it has like the poiny thing and you stick it in the ice and that helps you get your grip yeah yeah yeah crampons are like spikes that you attach to your shoes yeah so they have straps and you basically put it on and they go around with like plastic and then you tighten the straps and that's what you want to like portrayed as like chains and movies usually right those things uh they're so there's microspikes and those are the chains that you're thinking of oh got but real crampons are like teeth and they that's like shark teeth and they like shark teeth. Are they more like better for like like the ice than snow shoes would be because those shoes are just snow? Yeah. If you want to if you want to grip ice and not just slide down, you need crampons. What I I've never, I don't think I've ever seen a snow shoe. So every time what

they were talking about last week, I was just thinking about I was referring to our guests last week. In a great episode you should go listen to where we had the Baldwin sisters on talk about their epic trip. I was thinking about just like people wearing tennis rackets glued to their feet. Oh. That's what I picture when I picture snow shoes. Yeah. So those are snow shoes. shoes. We were not using that because we're going up like. Wait, was that accurate? Is that actually what they look like? Yeah. Okay. That's what snow shoes are. All right. So you guys were there wearing crapp-ons, hiking. Yes, climbing. Climbing. Oh, yeah, yeah. We're climbing. We're not, we're not a trail. And so I'm following my dad and he's really trying to make steps for me to walk in.

But we were moving so slow. And the sun had risen and we were still like on the first snow face going up, this like the upper part of the mountain. And collectively, we were like, you know what, it wasn't, it wasn't the trip. And so we had to turn around. Oh, no. Honestly, I wasn't too disappointed. It was really physically exhausting on me. And so I think when my parents were like, we get to turn around. I was like, yay. Thank goodness. This was really hard. But we packed up tent and actually a story I told last week then happened. We were going down a snowfield. And this is when I was glissating. Oh, you slipped. Lost control, started sliding to the rocks and thank goodness, my dad caught me.

Yeah. But anyway, the rest of the way down was great. I discovered my new favorite snack, which is avocados and goldfish. Dude, avocados are so good. Oh, yeah. And like with goldfish, it's an amazing combination. Nicole, have I made you guacamole before? No, you haven't.

I'm going to make you my special guacamole some time. I say that like I've had it for years. I just recently started making guacamole. You know, after I run my marathon, I would have. appreciate that. Yeah. You're listening to Off the Trails on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. And we're going to get back to my Shasta stories. Gwock the trails. Yes, Gwack the trails. Revenge, Gwock. Sorry, that's from the new Sonic 3 movie. Anyway, your story. So that was the first attempt. It was a fail, but I was determined and we came back the very next summer. So I'm 10 years old.

However, we decided to go up a different route. We were going up the Aval. Lance Gulch. Oh my God. This is plot progression. It is plot progression. And this is also called the John Muir approach, I'm pretty sure. And this is the easiest route up the mountain. Who's John Muir? John Muir is one of the founders of the Sierra Club, I believe. He did a lot of hiking and climbing in the Sierra Nevada Mountains a long time ago. I don't know years. But he also founded the Sierra Club. And there's the John Muir Trail in Yosemite. So you guys are taking this new route. So we're taking the new route. It's supposed to be easier. We broke it up a little, well, we didn't really break it up more. The trail is just shorter over there and

supposedly less steep, but we were doing it a little later in the year. So I think we were doing it like end of June. And it had been a big snow year that year. So we're going up. We set camp below Lake Helen, which was lower than we wanted to be. We wanted to camp a little higher. But I was stronger. I was 10 years old now. Could handle the weight a little bit more. The big one-oh. Yeah, I was more used to carrying that I'm a lot. a weight on my back. So overall, I just felt better about that. But the avalanche Gulch is called avalanche Gulch for a reason. I feel like you've mentioned avalanche Gulch before. In another episode? Because I feel like you said that one time and I was like, sounds dangerous or something.

Maybe I talked about skiing. Maybe one of the Baldwin sisters was like something about avalanche area. And I was like, maybe don't go there. Every time like when you name the place after the cataclysm, maybe not a good idea. Maybe not a good idea. Yeah. But anyway. But nevertheless, it's where Nicole quested this day. That's where we were.

And we were below Lake Helen and Lake Helen is the place that climbers typically stop at. And they sleep for the night before going up the next day. And we're on snow. So this is the first time I ever camped on snow. So that was pretty exciting. Wait, late June? Oh, yeah. No, the whole thing, it's a glacier.

So glaciers are year-round. There is always snow. The picture is formulating in my brain. I'm seeing it now. Yeah, yeah. So there's always snow. And we're in a valley, a gulch, you could say. And in this gulch, there's snow on either side.

And the snow is coming down in many little avalanches. Oh, my gosh. Because it's end of June. And all the snow's melting from the sun because it's warm. It's like 50, 60 degrees. And so the snow's like, wait, time to slide. No, that sounds bad.

Yeah, so all around us, there were actively little avalanche slides happening as we were hiking up. So we spend the night there, and I think there were like a couple more while we were sleeping. But the next morning... Was there like a chance you could get buried?

Not where we were. Okay. Not where we were at that moment. But we made it up to Lake Hell on the following morning, just as it was starting to kind of get light. And we were talking to a lot of hikers over there. And there were some who had summited the previous day. And they were saying that this, this Golch that renter gets narrower as you go

up. So we were heading towards the narrow part. And that was where more avalanche slides were happening. And so ultimately, we turned back because it was a safety thing where it's like, we could have gotten stuck in a mini avalanche. Probably wouldn't have died. But like, also, it's mother nature. You don't know what can happen. Avalanche Gulch. So. We gotta get out of here. Yeah.

So that was when I was 10, turned around, and once more. So you did not make it. Failed to climb Mount Shasta. Wow. This was depressing. I had never failed twice at a mountain. Yeah. I'm sorry to hear that.

Does that stick with you to this day? Well, I overcame it. Because when I was 11 years old, we went back. The next year. Wow. The next summer, we went back. and we went back to the North Face. The one that you did when you were nine.

Yeah, the harder route because it's less popular and I don't know. We were just like, let's go do that one. And so we went back in August. So even later in the year, still snow because it's a glacier. But the water, the weather was a lot warmer because it's August. And I'm even stronger now. We broke the climb up into even more days. So instead of hiking all the way,

up to where we camped the first time we did it, we, like, stopped below the first snowfield. Okay. So we slept there one night. That helped us acclimate a little bit more. Then the next day, we made it up that next snow field, which the distance between where we camp the first night and the second night was not far at all. But I'm really glad we broke it up that way because it just made it so much easier. Yeah, for sure.

And so we make it up next day. We have a long, nice relaxing day at the camp, rest our legs, eat a little. lot of food, go to bed early, and then woke up and it was summit day. And it was a glorious summit day. Like the stars were out as we were hiking up the first snow field. We were making really good progress because it was dark. So you don't really know like how far you're making it up the mountain until you're like, oh my gosh, we're at rocks, which means we've made it up the first entire big snowfield. And so that means we're now like in a smaller goalie than as you were going up this

goalie, the sun was rising. And like the whole sky turned red. It was just so, so beautiful. Things were going well. We make it to the top of this gulch. And I actually just learned this from my dad today. But we kind of got lost. I didn't, I didn't know this at the time because my parents didn't tell me.

Yeah, they're not going to be like, oh my gosh. And you're like a tiny, you're the 11 old who's like, Yeah. But my parents had done this before a while ago. And so they kind of knew where they were going, but apparently we went too far to the left. So we kind of like backtrack a little bit. But then we get to this next boulder field up to the shark fin, which is like this big rock that sticks out. It looks like a shark fin. No. And once you make it to the shark fin, you're basically there. Like, it's pretty easy the rest of the way. So you make it over the shark fin hill. And then we got down. down into like this valley between two peaks. And this is really funny. My parents had done this mountain supposedly three times before we did it together as a family. And but every time they'd been up there had been really cloudy. So they've only ever seen one peak. So getting up there and seeing two peaks are like, oh, which is taller? Oh yeah. And we were like, we think the right

one's taller. That's the south peak. So we go up to the top of the south peak and we're like, woohoo, we did it. My parents are like, congratulations, Nicole. And we're sitting there and we're looking to our left and we're like, gosh. That other peak is a little taller. That other peak looks a bit taller than the one we're on. And like, I will just say something fell off when we were at the top of the mountain. I was like, I really don't think we're on the right summit. And so now it's like, okay, do we go do the other summit. We're like, yeah, we have to. So we go down, summit the other peak. And my parents, that was the first time they ever actually summited the real Mount Shasta. Wow. Every other time they had summited the false summit. And so it was kind of cool because we did that

mountain together for the first time. So that's the first mountain I ever summited with my parents. Where it was the first time for all of us. That's so sweet. I love that. Officially at the top. How wholesome. Third time's the charm, too. Absolutely. And for them, it was like six times the charm. Yeah. But yeah, that was, those are the Shasta Trilogies. The Shasta Trilogy. Hmm. I wonder if you would come up on the second side again. Is that a

weirder way to do it? Like, would that take you up to that same choice we can choose between the two summits? Or that one only picked you out somewhere? Because, so the other route, it's actually broken into many different segments. Like there's famous names for them. So like horse can't. and then you get up to, I don't know, there's like another hill leading up to Lake Helen. That's called something else. Then you're at Lake Helen and then you're going up something to the red banks. I have a shirt where it like lists out these things.

Yeah, yeah. So you get to the red banks and then you have Misery Hill. And Misery Hill is like the last hill up to the summit. So I think if we had done the other route, it would have sped us right at the bottom of Missouri Hill, which is the summit. They really name these things like nice and sweet. You're going through like sunflower meadow, butterfly hill, misery peak or whatever. It's like all of a sudden it's just horrendous. Yeah.

That's what happened to me when I was skiing recently. I was going and it was like all these like nice little names. They were like blues. Pumpkin. Yeah, whatever. Roller or whatever. And then I get over there and it's like death trap. And you're like, what?

I think I'll turn back actually. I think I won't go down. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, it was it was definitely a lesson in perseverance. I'm really proud of that climb now. I do want to go back and do it again, but this time skinning up on skis.

Yo. You know, like, you know when you put the skins on the bottom of ski so you can slide up? And step, yeah. And then step. And then you get to the top and you take the skins off and you can ski down. I've always wondered if one of people don't like just put the skis on their back somehow and like just walk. And climb up. You can do that when it gets really steep.

That seems so much easier. But objectively, it's a lot easier to skin up because if you're walking in ski boots is hard. Then also put the skis in your backpack. The ski boots? Do you know how heavy ski boots and skis are? That's heavy. It's so much easier just skin up.

I saw people doing that when I was out in Colorado recently. Yeah, I want to do that. It looked unfathomably inefficient. It's hard, but it's... I'm riding the lift up and you're just looking goofy down there. Yeah, but they're getting in a better workout. So like really who's winning? They are.

I don't know. I feel like I got to ski more that day. And I feel like there's a, skiing is like a crazy workout. Right? Kind of. Kind of. I don't know. Depends how fast you're going. Depends on the moguls.

Yeah. I felt like my like legs were burning by the end of the day. Yeah. I'm feeling the burn. That's fair. Not the 2016 burn. Remember Bernie Sanders is 2016? Oh yeah.

Feel the burn. Yeah, yeah. Not that burn. Anyway, thank you for listening to Off the Trails on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.1.7. FM. We hope you have a great week and make time to go outside and enjoy the great outdoors. We'll see you out there. Happy trails. Third time's the charm champs. Bye guys.