[williswall]

I have to sort of laugh at the vague descriptions in the Mountaineers book "100 Peaks at Mt. Rainier National Park." Foss is described as a "moderate scramble." Pinnacle is described as a "moderate scramble." On Tuesday I did Foss and there was a well defined way trail most the way, making for a delightful afternoon stroll to the summit and back, leaving the Pinnacle Peak trail at 5200'. I exited to the trail slightly higher on another way trail. Sometimes and access and approach to some of these peaks is worse then the summit push. I recently did Scarface and, besides being eaten alive by mosquitos, the forest bash to get there was way worse than any part of the Foss trip. And then there's Pinnacle. I had turned back on this one last year, thinking higher up beneath the actual pinnacle that it looked better to traverse around the other side of the mountain. It wasn't. This time I was with my buddy and his wife, enjoying the mild trip to Plummer peak and the expansive views indicative of the Tatoosh range. We looked at Pinnacle and they decided to at least begin the climb and see how it went. His wife elected to stop about halfway up but he went with me to the top. For a moderate scramble there was consistent class 3 climbing, with longish sections requiring due diligence. If one reads the definition of class 3 and 4, I would say there were a few sections bordering on class 4. Although there was no scary exposure, a fall from this final section would not be pretty. Anyway, after summiting the downclimbing was of course worse, but careful hand and footwork made for an uneventful descent. Pinnacle was my 60th peak here and by far the "worst" of them all, putting me at my personal limit for what's acceptable for this old man. I'm sure others who have done it will chime in and say no big deal. Just sayin'. After the fact these two days in beautiful weather were absolutely perfect. My 2 cents, beware vague descriptions.

Muir snowfield:Paradise-Cowlitz glaciers

Layers

Kautz Glacier

From the Pinnacle saddle

Foss and Unicorn from Pinnacle

Climbiing to Plummer summit

Climb to Foss

Below Plummer

Bare Mountain

Above Louise Lake

[Malachai Constant]

Back in the days the Mounties used to consider Pinnacle and The Castle to be rock climbs but they also used to mandate mountaineering boots also. Nice but sad pictures of Tahoma by the way.