Father, son share life’s highpoints

Where is Gaby?” my 17-year-old son asked as he climbed over the bench seats in the 15-passenger van I drove for some of the highpoints. I felt the sudden rush of panic hit me and settle into one big knot in the middle of my empty stomach.

Gaby, my 17-year-old niece, had accompanied my son and I on a highpoint trip to the East Coast. We had just climbed the Kentucky Highpoint early that morning after a night drive. Four bench seats make the sleeping easy and on the way down both immediately fell into a deep sleep.

Driving to our next highpoint, usually a hurried all day drive, I stopped for gas. At a rural gas station Gaby woke up and left the van. I never heard her get out. I drove for three hours in deep meditation, pondering how Daniel Boone felt wandering these hills when my son woke up, climbed over the seats and asked the question that set my panic button full on... “Where is Gaby!?”

I tried to calm myself with the fact that most good uncles have left their nieces three hours behind at small gas stations in a foreign land. But hey, at least she can speak the language back there. She watched in horror at my taillights leaving the station and called home but as I had no cellphone service in those mountains her concerned parents could reach me. After locking up the brakes in a panicked stop we drove the three hours back to reunite with her. That was a nine-hour mishap we will always remember.

I first considered highpointing after a conversation with a climbing partner in 1970 while in high school. I grew up in Washington state and began climbing in 1969. This idea laid dormant until May of 2002 when my 17-year-old son and I went to the East Coast and did our first official highpoint in Ohio. The project of taking my youngest son on this partnership project seemed like a great thing to do and off we went to make experiences and memories.

Our family has always lived in or near the mountains. We lived for four years in the Himalayan mountains of Nepal. Home was in a remote Nepali village that took four days to walk to. I was doing community development work with a team of people from all over the world there. Daniel was only three years old when he fell in love with mountains and hiking. He walked his first 50 miles out of the village at 5 years old.

How would I describe highpointing with my son?

Lots of driving, lots of rushing from one Highpoint to the next, lots of Denny’s restaurants, lots of him sleeping while I drove, many dark ascents and even sneaking into highpoints that were closed for the night. There were lots of new roads, seeing great country, carrying heavy packs and looking at endless uphill slopes with no top in sight. The western mountains became more of a welcome challenge and weather a predominant factor.

Of course, Denali became the largest challenge of them all to climb. Fortunately, I had climbed it from the north side in 1971. The team I joined started from Toklat Bridge on the Wonder Lake road in May climbing up Pioneer Ridge. We climbed both the North and South peaks and then descended the famous Karsten’s Ridge to Wonder Lake. Daniel had yet to climb Denali. We live in Talkeetna with views of Denali almost every day.

In June of 2014 Daniel successfully climbed the West Buttress of Denali completing his 49th Highpoint. In February of 2015, together with our wives, we summited Mauna Kea, our 50th highpoint.

These trips were not without my revenge. After an all night climb up Mount Whitney in California we encountered snow and a cold rain as we descended. Tired and cold the youths with me fell into a deep comfortable sleep in the van fully clothed in their fleeces. I drove most of the day down to Death Valley. As the temperatures rose I put on the van’s air conditioner so they could sleep without getting hot. Their comfort was always my top concern….ha! Reaching the visitor center in Death Valley I parked in the sun where it was 115 degrees in the shade. I shut the van off and silently got out so I wouldn’t wake up the comatose youth stretched out in the back. Within two minutes the van was alive with groggy youth trying to get out of their fleece and find suitable clothing to put on to make a run for shade. As I sat in the air conditioned visitor center the inside of the van looked like a Black Friday sale at Walmart; clothing going everywhere and youth streaming out of the van barefoot which proved to be on hot pavement. Across the parking lot they came legs pumping like sewing machines trying to avoid the hot pavement — revenge is sweet!

Daniel enlisted in the Marines in 2004, which meant four years active service. This included three tours in Iraq. It was a four-year interruption of our highpointing, which we nervously waited out. We completed the highpoints in 13 years becoming the eighth father son team to summit them all.

This has been one of the best projects we have done as a father and son. We still hike together and last fall did the 100-mile Wonderland Trail around Mount Rainer. Once you’re a lover of mountains is there any stopping? It is a legacy we pass on to the generations. Highpointing is a club of people that live that legacy. I was blessed to enjoy this project with my son and pass on a legacy of love for the mountains. After all, if they call at you, how can you stay at the bottom?

Mike Sloan and Daniel Sloan live in Talkeetna.