Church Peak

Daron and Luke made a goal to hike the 12 highest peaks in Idaho. Last year they hiked Mt. Borah which is the highest, and this summer the goal was to summit Mt. Church which is slightly lower. They got within 100 yards of the top and had to turn around. The wind was blowing about 60 miles an hour and Luke was experiencing altitude sickness where he just starts to shut down and can barely form a coherent sentence. He seems to get this over 10,000 ft. If he can quickly summit after that point and then get below 10,000 ft. he'll be OK, but this was a much harder hike. There was no trail and the rocks were sliding out from underneath them. With the weather getting bad I am glad they had the sense to forgo their goal and turn around. I don't think they'll be doing any more high mountains unless they can camp overnight at a high altitude and give Luke a chance to acclimatize. Here are some pictures from their hike.
These rocks were about the only trail they had to follow.

They said much of the hike was very beautiful with streams, meadows and wildflowers.




They thought this old tree stump looked like a giant cinnamon roll.
This shows how treacherous the rocks were.

On the way back down.