Despite Cindy's insistence that we leave at a more ridiculous hour than necessary, i stood firm at 6:15-she was only five minutes early this time.
This was not an official group hike, just meeting with some other climbers. Unfortunately about 20 steps into the hike, i lost the bite valve off my platypus. I had to tie off my cord and drink off extra water bottles.
I felt good throughout the climb. Cindy said she wasnt eating enough as we went along and was tired. I took on some of her weight, which is only fair since she is the overly prepared one that takes care of me when i am missing something (ie water).
We got to about 8550 ft. Visibility had been questionable the whole way, but then the wind kicked up and it got worse. We decided to turn around because we had a time line anyhow.
We glisaded down the chutes, but i was not wearing thick enough pants and it felt like sliding on razors (I do have some marks to prove it). Coming down was the hard part as we were punching in to about our knees the whole way. There also was some indecision about which way to go at one point, but we figured it out. Overall i had a great climb.