| Peak(s): |
Crazy Peak - 11209 White Butte - 3506 Boundary Butte - 2541 Height of Land - 2005 Timms Hill - 1951 Rib Mountain - 1924 Blue Mounds - 1719 Hawkeye Point - 1670 Iowa's ranked peaks - 1570 |
| Date Posted: | 02/18/2014 |
| Modified: | 02/19/2014 |
| Date Climbed: | 07/11/2013 |
| Author: | ChrisinAZ |
| Additional Members: | spiderman |
| Crazy and Crazier: Ultras of the North |
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Click here for part 2... Crazy Peak--The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly -Elev. 11,209', Prom. 5,719' -9.3 mi. RT, 5,000' gain -class 3 scrambling, good dirt road -Most prominent peak in Montana Arising, bleary, it took me several moments to remember where we were. It took us a while to rouse ourselves and pack up, but we were soon on our way back up to the interstate, where we continued east, heading away from Missoula. It was a gorgeous day, and one where we'd rightfully earned the chance to rest! We stopped in the funky mining town of Butte, grabbing lunch at a Thai noodle place in town. Then, onward to Bozeman. After passing over the Continental Divide, the land began to open up further as we entered a different Montana. Here, the forests and mountains were more scarce, the valleys broad and filled with green scrub grass and ranching land...Big Sky country. We finally reached Bozeman, which had a very similar feel to Missoula. I first made a beeline for the local community pool, where I took a much-needed shower (they generally only offer this during the morning to non-members, but luckily the staff were understanding--and it helped I had my own towel). Feeling much refreshed, I spent a few hours catching up with a friend who lived in town, while Doug and Arthur ran errands. I'd highly recommend making the drive up to Hyalite Reservoir, outside of town--it's stunning. All too soon, we left town and continued east, grabbing a quick dinner outside of Livingston, then heading up through Big Timber toward the Crazy Mountains, where our last big peak lay, deep in the heart of what its summitpost page called "this mad clash of windswept ridges"...an apt description. The range itself lies very near, yet decidedly distinct from the Beartooth Mountains to the south, and is a cluster of rugged peaks roughly ten miles across. The road in to the trailhead--which passes through a few ranches--was in excellent condition, yet we somehow managed to get a flat. Doug and I went about changing it, having to take pretty much everything out of the trunk to get at his spare (and discovering some lost gear in the process!). We finally secured the spare donut on his car, but the time it'd taken us blew most of our remaining daylight--unfortunate, since he'd decided we'd try to hike in a ways and camp that evening. The parking lot was large and obvious, and for the last time, I painstakingly went through clothes and gear, deciding what to bring. Above, the forbidding peaks of the Crazy Range loomed, silent and stoic in the gloomy twilight. Crazy Peak, which'd be an otherwise-fairly simple ascent, is complicated by one small detail: the standard route only takes you to a false summit, separated from the true peak by a steep cleft, accessible only by a small, steep gully descent from the false summit (or a spring snow climb up to the notch between the two peaks). This gully had been described as being steep--55 degrees or so--and often snow-filled in early summer, and horrifically loose and dangerous when dry in late summer. This gully had been weighing on my mind all day, and would continue to do so throughout our ascent; I really had no idea which option sounded worse. We set off in the waning twilight up the broad, rocky trail--really more of a 4WD continuation of the road--carrying our overnight packs. We were on the lookout for an impromptu camping spot, preferably farther on, but looking at the terrain around us, I wasn't very optimistic. Soon, total darkness fell, and we crossed the first bridge on the main trail over to the south side of the roaring Big Timber Creek. We were soon keeping our eyes peeled for a camping spot more than ever, since we'd decided to try another route to the summit the following day, one which would require us to leave the trail just before a second bridge crossing. A few tenths of a mile before that bridge, we came upon a sudden impasse: a massive washout on the mountainside that had completely obliterated the road, perhaps 20 feet deep and just as wide. Easy enough to cross on foot, but impassable to horses or any kind of vehicle. We realized the wide, flat trail where we were standing was in fact amazingly free of rocks, and knowing how relatively little traffic this area received and how early we'd be rising, we opted to just set up camp right there. In spite of the relatively easy day, the accumulated efforts of our trip were beginning to wear on me, and once we'd set up our tents I was soon asleep. The next morning, we arose in darkness. Quickly packing up our stuff, we stashed our unnecessary gear in the trees just off the trail, went a bit farther down the trail, and at the bridge, cut left up into the woods. We were following a route I'd read about in one of Petter Bjørstad's trip reports (which, incidentally, were invaluable in the planning for all of these climbs!). This option involved some bushwhacking, but cut off a lot of extraneous distance and ascended a class 3 buttress up to a ridge heading straight to the false summit. Doug and Arthur and I had agreed to take it up, and the standard route down.  The bushwhacking was...well, bushwhacking. Not easy, not insanely difficult. A few hundred vertical feet of effort and we began to break out of the trees. Now with the sun rising, I could clearly see our surroundings for the first time in full daylight. The dramatic peaks surrounding us were, for lack of a better word, ugly--as ugly as the mountains can ever be, anyway! Steep, gritty dark gray, riddled with gullies...picture an entire mountain range just like the west side of Snowmass, and you won't be far off. However, in the early morning light, the view was peaceful and helped to somewhat calm my nerves. I saw only fairly minimal snow. The route ahead for a while would've not been out of place in Colorado. We headed slightly uphill, traversing right over talus and grassy patches. Rounding a bend, we could see the buttress we were to ascend directly ahead, the ridge rising above it to what had to be the summit area of Crazy Peak (decidedly less crazy-looking from this angle). We made tedious, but good progress across the bowl, finding no real obstacles upon our approach to the base of the buttress. As we walked, Doug regaled his son with stories out of Greek mythology, in far more detail than I could've at that early hour! Yes, I'm pretty much the worst Classical Studies major ever.  I'd been dreading the buttress, even though it shouldn't've worried me--I think at that point, the summit area was weighing heavily on my mind, and additional challenges were the last thing I needed! However, the buttress proved to be good, solid, and fairly easy class 3 with lots of grassy ledges, and only some exposure; in a better state of mind, I would've thoroughly enjoyed it! Near the top of the ridge, our attention was captured by a helicopter droning its way up the otherwise-placid Big Timber Canyon from whence we had come. Presumably a S&R chopper, but we never did find out the story behind it. At last topping out on the ridge, the exposure mostly lessened, and so did the grade. We took a rest then continued uphill. The only obstacle ahead appeared to be a sort of gendarme, and we were soon at its base. Again, pretty standard fare for anyone who's done a less-travelled class 3 route in the Colorado high country; it reminded me of the loose crappy jagged stuff on parts of Yale's east ridge. We skirted it on the left, got up a few sketch ledges with loose talus underfoot, and were soon past the sharp rock and back on talus. Ahead, all we could see was more talus, an uphill sea of it rising to meet the sky. Around us, the wild and rugged peaks of the Crazies, the summits of many now at our same level.  Talus--unexposed, but loose and shifting and tedious--was all that remained between us and the false summit. We clambered our way through a short purgatory of shifting rock, gaining elevation bit by bit, until we were only a hundred feet or so below the true summit, and even Iddings Peak to the west was no higher than us. We suddenly ran out of talus as we met the main ridgeline, and in only moments had been funneled onto the ridge to the false summit. The last few steps to the top, and the true summit came into view, huge and dauntingly cliffy and farther away than I'd expected. Hoookay...  We made our way carefully, trying to find the gully that was the key to the route. We spotted one gully on the right, disregarded it, then found a second, narrower gully cutting steeply downhill. Well, here was the moment of truth... Doug scouted out the gully first, Arthur standing at its top, watching him. "How is it?", I yelled. His reply "Good!"...perhaps five minutes later, he was safely at the bottom and out of the way. Yelling back and forth, I found out that there was not one bit of snow in the gully, and it was actually pretty straightforward to descend! Arthur went next, soon at the bottom as well. Then, it was my turn...indeed, the gully ended up being cake. It definitely didn't feel like 55 degrees, there was plenty of bare dirt and relatively solid rock underfoot with little talus or scree, and the rock walls on either side were close by, with plentiful handholds. I couldn't've been more relieved! At the bottom a few minutes later, standing in the notch, I felt good but knew we still had to get to the summit.  This, however, also proved fairly easy, and cairns and climber's trails generally marked the way. We went uphill, then cut right across a steep face, passing through a narrow hidden cleft behind a big slab of rock. Then, a left turn up an unexposed, narrow gully, a bit of class 3 scrambling at its upper end.  Then a brief downclimb on solid class 3 blocks, onto a use trail of scree, also not very exposed. This trail, after only a few minutes, dumped us unceremoniously on the summit. I found myself vaguely disappointed it'd ended up being this easy, but it had certainly been fun! Tired, but happy, we spent a short bit admiring the views, unfortunately fairly limited on this hazy day. Off to the south, we could see the rugged profile of the Beartooths, though I had no idea which jagged peak was Granite. Closer by, there were some distinctively questionable-looking clouds that had rapidly appeared, and in the still, warm weather on the summit, I knew that could mean trouble. We decided not to linger.    Retracing our route without issue, we reconvened on the false summit, then began descending the ridge to the west. It was mostly easy, with stretches of use trail on the north side of the ridge. Doug and Arthur were again lagging, but this time I stayed only slightly ahead, still anxious to get down as the skies above grew a bit more threatening. Continuing down, I realized someone was still heading uphill! He turned out to be a guy about my age, heading up with his black lab. We stopped and chatted a bit...he was a local, and had climbed Crazy many years ago. I warned him about the weather; he gave me some useful information about the route back down to the basin below. He continued up.   At the other climber's advice, we descended the ridge until the crest began to get...well, crazy, then turned right and headed straight down the mountainside toward a big patch of grass in the basin.   The going down the ridges and gullies was steep, loose, and tedious, but manageable. However, near the base, we discovered this mountain was like the west slopes of Snowmass in yet another regard: the slopes ended in a series of cliffs at the bottom! Some careful scrambling and route-finding over and around a rib or two led us to a workable 3rd class way down, and I breathed a sigh of relief, back on safe ground. I was greatly relieved to have the tough stuff behind us--or so I thought. Due south of Blue Lake, I'd figured the route from here would be cake--we'd just head north, find the trail between the lakes, and head back. We soon opted for the broad, treeless ridge extending north toward the lake, but Doug and Arthur decided to drop down the the west of this buttress and contend with the talus. In retrospect, I should've joined them. Instead, I continued on the buttress, at first making very easy progress--but soon realizing I was about to run out of non-vertical ground ahead! Unsure what to do, I opted to cut down to the left to try meeting up with the others again. The way was tricky, with lots of loose rock and steep slopes and small cliff bands. Finally reaching the valley floor, I looked around for Doug and Arthur, but was surprised to see them a bit ahead of me, descending some patches of dirty snowfield partially covering a rushing stream. Sighing, I busted out my ice axe for the first time all day, following them down to the bottom of the slope, finally standing at the lakeshore.   Even here, the way wasn't obvious. There were use trails everywhere, but following them through the woods, up and down steep bits of lakeshore, and over a meandering creek only led us onto a dead-end peninsula jutting into Blue Lake. Luckily, we soon encountered several campers near the lake, and they quickly directed us to the proper trail. First ascending a hundred feet or so to bypass a rocky knob ("REALLY...!?"), the trail headed down the other side, passing a few small ponds and an old mine opening on the left, our progress seeming slower than it should've been. It switchbacked down into the broad valley, finally rejoining the main trail. The weather had held off up to here, and at this point, I was happy enough with that, and didn't really care if we got rained on during the hike out. I was too exhausted to worry, and was certainly exhausted to the point I couldn't've done another big climb after this. Arthur and I plodded ahead, stopping periodically to wait for Doug. Before long, we'd reached the second bridge; shortly beyond was the washout. We gathered our camping supplies and continued down the trail, just wanting the hike to be over with at this point. We crossed the first bridge again, and from there, it was just a matter of counting down the tenths of a mile back to the car. We stumbled back to the parking area, and for the last time of the trip, shed our heavy, bulky packs. By the time we were ready to go, it was nearing 4 PM, and the clock was ticking. We still needed to get our flat repaired, and pulling up the GPS menu, we found there was supposedly a tire repair shop in Big Timber, but we had no idea how late it was open--probably till 5 PM. Driving as quickly as we dared on the spare donut, we retraced our route down the dirt roads back to the highway, nervously watching the clock. With less than fifteen minutes to spare, we rolled into town, soon finding the tire place, which was thankfully still open. We emptied out the trunk, just leaving our gear in the parking lot, so they could get to work right away. For the time being, there was nothing to do but wait and hope. They first tried to repair the tire, but weren't able to. Then they searched their inventory of tires for something, either new or used, that'd fit, but warned us that they were unlikely to have much in the way of Honda tires, in a small town in rural Montana. Sure enough, they soon informed us that they had nothing, and we were effectively stuck in town until they could order a new tire and get it to come in--midday tomorrow at the earliest. Shit...there went our plans for the rest of the trip we'd had planned. My heart sank. Well, at least there was a motel within walking distance, just down the street... Then, the ten-year-old kid who'd been assisting the other mechanics saved the day--he found a used tire that would fit! Sure enough, the tire proved satisfactory, and much relieved, we packed up the car again and paid. Even the price was very reasonable. I don't often plug businesses, but Sweet Grass Tire indeed saved our asses. Giddy at our turn in good fortune, we stopped to refuel--ourselves, and the CR-V--and headed east, five hundred miles of the Great Plains stretching out before us.  ***This concludes the truly mountaineering portion of our journey. What follows is a series of perhaps rather silly state and county highpoints and ranked "peaks" of the Midwest, so some of you may wish to stop reading here. However, if the idea of buttes, 2 AM cornfields, pleasant hills, impenetrable forests, international intrigue, unexpected Midwestern 3rd class, and cheese curds captures your imagination, read on...*** We continued east through scenic lightly-forested country on I-90, which gave way to flatter prairie as we neared Billings. We stopped there for dinner at a pretty good Thai place, but that's where the pleasantness ended; Billings is probably one of the most hideous cities I've ever seen. We soon left to continue east on I-94, ready to put some miles behind us (but not before a couple of urgent post-dinner pee breaks for Arthur), then I took advantage of an unexpected lack of drowsiness to get us across the entire rest of the state on the highway. The terrain grew more boring as we headed east into dusk, then nightfall, and only the occasional impressive lightning strike on the eastern horizon broke the monotony. Amazingly, I did not see a single deer on the entire drive. At last, we crossed into North Dakota, a state I hadn't been to since I was six years old, and barely remembered. I made it about another 40 miles in. before my energy ran out, and Doug took over for the last bit of driving toward the state highpoint of White Butte. My alarm went off and I awoke on not enough sleep to a subdued dawn breaking across the North Dakota prairies. After waking Doug and Arthur, we were soon on our way, and before long, I could see White Butte looming--or at least standing slightly higher--over the surrounding area. I wasn't quite sure if the roads we were taking were the right way, but sure enough we soon arrived at the "trailhead" for White Butte, near a quiet farmhouse. Doug and Arthur had opted to sleep some more instead of repeating the summit, so I set off with only a trekking pole (to sweep the ground ahead for rattlers) and walked up the mile-long farm road, enjoying the cool and damp morning air. I passed an abandoned farmhouse and continued on, admiring the sparsely-populated farm and ranch land around me.  As I neared the chalky white outcroppings near the summit, a lone cow watched me from a short distance. The trail started steeply uphill, but quickly abated, passing through another meadow or two before making the final climb to the top of the ridge. I steered clear of one or two turns thanks to cairns of small, knobby rocks. Before I knew it, I was on the top with its register, benchmark, cairn, and grave marker, looking out on this pretty and desolate country. Only three or four other farmhouses were visible, and it seemed appropriate that here, atop North Dakota, not another soul should be in sight.  I stayed a few minutes, then retraced my steps back down. The cow, I now noticed, was accompanied by a young calf; I steered clear of them as best I could. The remainder of the walk was uneventful, and I was quite satisfied to have not encountered any rattlesnakes!  I snoozed while Doug drove us to Bismarck, where we grabbed breakfast, then I took over on the rainy drive to Minot, crossing over the large reservoir that marked the Missouri River at one point. We got root beer floats in Minot, an unending nightmare of construction and traffic, finally escaping the gridlock north of town as a crop duster looped and glided overhead. Onward we continued toward Bottineau and the Turtle Mountains, until we could finally see the range of hills in the distance as a long, low-slung forested rise on the horizon.  The Turtles, and their highpoint of Boundary Butte, are somewhat of an oddity. While the rest of North Dakota is flat-to-rolling prairie and farmland, this patch of hills, lakes, and forests rises several hundred feet in a plateau several dozen miles across, straddling the US-Canada border, and feels very different than the rest of the state. The highpoint itself lies almost exactly on the 49th parallel, literally just a step or two south of the official international border, purely by chance (were it merely five feet further north, the summit would lie in Manitoba, and North Dakota's most prominent peak would be Saddle Butte). Boundary has a rather astounding (for North Dakota, anyway) 1,034' of prominence. I was certainly intrigued... We reached Bottineau--somehow thankfully avoiding this creepy-ass thing--and found our turn to take us north. There were apparently two common options to reach the summit, both along the same approach road: one a lengthy bushwhack, the other a mile-and-a-half hike along old forest roads straight to the top. We decided to go with the most attractive latter option, and found the correct turnoff to drive to the start of the road walk--but there weren't really roads there. Instead, we pretty much drove through a meadow of high grass, picked up a mown strip of "road" past some old farm equipment, and continued through a series of other meadows. The good news was that we were making really good progress getting close to the highpoint; the bad, we were nowhere near where we were supposed to be starting our hike! The meadows finally ran out a mere 0.4 air miles from the summit, at which point we just opted to bushwhack. I didn't even bother changing out of my shorts--how bad could it be? It. Was. Awful. The brush was thick, the air hot and muggy, the DEET ineffective, and the area was choked with lakes and mires. We didn't make it far before reaching a small lake, and skirted between it and some peat bogs on an old beaver dam where we managed to soak our feet in the mud and had to contend with brambles. On the far side of the lake, I managed to find an old game trail that allowed slightly faster progress, but that petered out before our reaching a large grassy expanse. We thought about crossing it, but the first few steps into thick mud dissuaded us from that approach! We were now only a tenth of a mile from the top, but it might as well have been a thousand, for all we could see. We headed north along the east side of the marsh through more crappy brush, and then--oh joy!--there was a clearing up ahead. Canadia! We emerged into the border swath and realized we were merely one short, steep 100' climb from the summit--we could even see the abandoned(?) border shack at the crest of the ridge.  With North Dakota at our left, and Manitoba at our right, we ascended the steep, grassy slope; there were old tire tracks on the more Canadese side of the border strip, and I imagine it would've been quite easy to duck over to the Manitoba side briefly if one so chose. Soon, we topped out at the border monument and shack--sweet, we'd made it. Around us were near-impenetrable forests, except for the old road we could see that we'd intended to take, and the border swath stretching east and west from our lofty vantage point. It cut through the woods--and to the west, across a lake--over several rolling hills before dropping to the plains a thousand feet below.   The way back was pretty much equally shitty, and we were glad to reach the car, though still perplexed as to how we'd driven so far off route. Asking Doug if it'd been worth it, he said "no--but at least we don't have to come back!". On we drove, stopping in Dunseith for beverages and noticing the giant turtle statue of tire rims there (what the hell is it with these people and turtles!!?), then continued to Grand Forks by way of Rugby. I was planning to stop to see the geographic center of North America in town, finally spotting a neat-looking monument which ended up being...a monument to the Aurora Borealis? Um, what...I finally gave up looking and continued on, perplexed at why a town would make it so difficult to find their one and only claim to fame. Once out of Rugby's construction, we made decent time to Grand Forks across the flatter eastern half of North Dakota, grabbing dinner there. We crossed into Minnesota around sunset, admiring the impressive salmon-hued thunderheads building to the east. Our next objective was called Height of Land, which was on the "second lap list" of state highpoints Doug and Arthur were pursuing. Basically, the list is of the most prominent peak in each state that's not the highpoint. While I was interested in climbing each state's most prominent, I was less interested in the ones like Height of Land; Minnesota's highest, Eagle Mountain, was the most prominent as well, but was too far to drive or hike on this trip. But I won't turn down a county highpoint, so I was happy to tag this one too. As night fell, intermittent rain made me worry we could be in for a misery-fest, even though the hike was supposed to be very short. The five-mile dirt road in toward the peak was in good condition, winding through a maze of small lakes and short hills, very little of which we could see in the dark. The pulloff to the short 4WD spur road to the top (less than a quarter mile each way) was hard to spot, as the start was very grassy. We decided to try driving it, but didn't make it far before hitting some dangerously slick mud. We managed to get the car turned around, parked, and got out to walk the last few minutes to the top, somehow staying upright in the mud. The summit was flat, completely wooded, and had a lookout tower you couldn't climb; I felt we really hadn't missed out on anything coming here in the dark. Oh, and there were bugs beyond bugs, some of them trying to fly down my throat. We beat a hasty retreat back to the car, then after shutting the doors, spent ten minutes squishing the legions of bugs on the interior of the car, turning the roof into a mass graveyard of insectia. Disgusting. We rolled out, but not before I redubbed this summit "Height of Lame". Sleep came to me quickly. I came to, disoriented, in the middle of a pleasant town in the pre-dawn light and rain. I thought we were in Duluth for a moment, but Doug informed me we were actually in Ashland, WI. Sweet. I thanked him for his admirable push of driving through the rain in the middle of the night, then took over a while. Another hour and a half of pretty but uneventful driving through the woods and various small towns, and the rain had stopped; we'd reached Ogema, the "gateway to Timms Hill". From here we just followed signs into the county park and to the small parking area below the top. It was a five-minute walk up an easy trail to the summit, which held a lookout tower, a radio tower with an open ladder, and a Highpointers' Club mailbox and register. We raced up the lookout tower and admired the pleasant, if underwhelming views from atop Wisconsin. Arthur begged his dad to let him climb the ladder up the other tower, but was denied. I'd hoped to climb nearby Pearson Hill (less than a foot lower than Timms, and thus a potential state highpoint candidate) but hadn't been able to pull any info up on my phone in time. Ah well, I'll come back for it the next time I'm in the area. Timms was nice, but forgettable... From here, we began the drive south to Madison, first following the GPS's unnecessarily-complicated route toward Wausau over a bunch of random county roads, with Rib Mountain forming an imposing hill on the right. We grabbed breakfast in town, and I managed to persuade Doug and Arthur to climb this county highpoint! (they have a strict rule not to get involved with "that sort of thing"). It wasn't officially on our list, but I'd heard good things about it; as it turns out, it was about the most fun you can have in Wisconsin while sober! We paid to enter the park, then drove up the good paved road up to the crest of the ridge, passing a few ski lifts and some rather nice views off to the north. At the west end of the loop, there was limited parking but the summit area was obvious--several HUGE stacks of boulders and another lookout tower adorned the area. I climbed the tower first, enjoying sweeping views that put those from Timms to shame.   Then, I tackled the summit boulders, which were a good 30' high, actually a bit exposed near the top, and definitely class 3 (they could be made even harder if you wanted). Surprisingly fun! For good measure, I clambered up the neighboring Queen's Chair and lounged there a moment, then left and continued south. Skirting downtown Madison, I decided to take the advice of a friend who'd lived in the area, and stopped at Culver's for butterburgers, cheese curds, and custard. The butterburgers weren't anything to write home about, but the curds and custard were delicious! I'll be paying a repeat visit if I'm in the area again, for sure (side note: there's a Culver's in Thornton, and several in the Springs--I discovered this several months later!)...from there, it was a congested drive along US-18 to the most prominent summit in Wisconsin, an unassuming forested hill called Blue Mounds. We paid (again) to enter this park, made the short drive uphill, and emerged onto what might be the broadest and flattest summit plateau I've ever seen. Seriously, you could play a few simultaneous games of soccer up there with room to spare. It was a nightmare from a finding-the-true-summit perspective, though...  I spent ten minutes wandering the grassy field on top, seeing some HAM radio operators along the way, and finally calling it good. I made a quick side trip to the eastern lookout tower, trying (and failing) to spot the view of downtown Madison from the top. On the way back, a park ranger was writing some parked car a ticket...tough neighborhood. We continued, leaving behind the pretty, forested part of Wisconsin and entering the boring farmland part. This didn't last too long, however, and we soon dipped down into the greater Mississippi River Valley, a land of thickly forested hills and bluffs, pleasant secluded valleys, and nearly-as-secluded villages. This part took a while, but was hardly boring. We at last reached a road junction and found ourselves at the edge of the Mighty Mississippi herself. Driving north a bit, we soon found the bridge across into Iowa, and after a short construction delay, crossed over. Iowa actually does have mountains. Well, kind of...three ranked summits lie within the state's borders, each of a very different character. The first objective was P990, also called Mount Earl for some unknown reason, which was the only summit in the state actually resembling a true mountain in any way! It lies in a secluded patch of Mississippi River valley, the one area of the higher bluffs above that happens to be cut off enough to garner the requisite 300' of prominence. It's a surprisingly steep, rocky, pine-covered hill, and--given what I'd seen on the Wisconsin side of the River--surprisingly mild in the bushwhacking department.  We parked at the base, rolled under the barbed-wire fence as one, and briskly made our way up the steep slopes. It was steep enough I found myself having to catch my breath a few times, and the occasional rock was underfoot; bizarrely, one could've found the same conditions on any number of bushwhacks in the western US! The pines were not too thick, but we occasionally had to find a different route to avoid brush.  After a bit longer than expected (but still maybe only 15 minutes), we popped onto the summit ridge, turned left, and reached the top near a tree and an old root beer can. We descended the same way, reaching the fields and slipping back under the fence undetected. On we drove, our next destination a few hours away... The second ranked peak, Pilot Knob, is a pleasant rounded hill in a state park, partly covered in forest and surrounded by a lake or two. We made good time to the park, and at the entrance, took a left to a campground where we spotted a trail heading in about the right direction. The trail took us around the lake a few minutes, then we cut left at a junction and reached a higher parking lot. From there, it was just another minute or two to the grassy summit, topped by a cute stone observation tower.  The views from atop Hancock County were pretty decent for Iowa, with gently rolling farmland stretching off in all directions.  The area seemed to be popular, and we had to dodge a few Iowegians as we hurried our way back down the trail to our car. We grabbed dinner in nearby Forest Lake, then continued on, surrounded by the phosphorescence of lightning bugs as we drove... I drove across most of the rest of Iowa toward the unranked state highpoint, Hawkeye Point, in the northwest corner of the state. Waking Doug up as I drew close, we navigated the last few miles to the old farmstead at the "summit", reaching it maybe 11 at night. The farm had once been owned by the Sterlers, legendary for their congeniality, but after Mrs. Sterler had passed away, the land had been donated to the county as a public park. I wandered the displays--among them a small museum and signs point to the other 49 state highpoints--before gridding the highest few bumps of land in the area. The only other thing of note about this one was that it finally linked up my eastern and western state highpoints in an unbroken chain, from coast to coast. Woo... Last up: the Carroll County highpoint. I'm not even going to dignify this one with a photo--it's a freaking rise in a cornfield. I may be pretty obsessed with county highpoints, but even I have my limits, and doing 97 more "hikes" like this one to finish the state of Iowa is one of them. Doug woke me as we neared the area, and we found the turnoff outside of Manning to drive north and gradually uphill to the highpoint areas, near a house and water tower, arriving around 2 AM. I was ready to catch a few hours of sleep and set out at first light, but Doug was all for just climbing it straight away. We crossed a fence and began painstakingly making our way through row after row of 6' tall cornstalks. My god, this sucked...I led us to where my waypoint said high ground existed, though it clearly was lower than some other areas. Doug and Arthur called it good; I spent a few more minutes tagging what looked to be areas of higher corn, though with such limited visibility, I couldn't know for certain. Knowing the other three candidate areas nearby were supposed to be lower, and being fed up with this creepy Children of the Corn shit, I called it good and booked it back to the road via some differently-angled rows of corn. Yay every ranked peak in Iowa. Now, all that was left was for us to drive home. I soon conked out yet again. I awoke in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Omaha, and we began the long, unbelievably-boring drive across Nebraska. This was perhaps the worst part of the trip; North Dakota had been pretty in its own way, and Iowa, while mostly gently-rolling farmland, had nevertheless had a certain charm. The Cornhusker State was just a neverending nightmare of bland farmland, very few towns, and nothing of interest. Even an attempt to grab food in Lincoln--a city larger than Fort Collins--left me frustrated and empty-stomached. Doug and I took turns driving and sleeping (is there really anything else to do in Nebraska?) until we blissfully crossed the state line into Colorado on I-76. Yes, it was more of the same, but at least the end finally felt in sight. One food stop in Sterling later, and I was awake and full enough to belt out the last few hours. Finally pulling up to the house never felt so good, and after a final gear-sorting in the front driveway, we parted ways at the conclusion of a largely successful and entirely unforgettable trip. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow): 
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Good reading all along. 
