On July 22, 2023 Marc McPherson and I (Nick Burson), left our homes in Ellensburg, WA. We arrived at the Pole Creek TH later that afternoon and caught a nap before we started our journey just after midnight. Our clock started at 00:04:53 on 07-23-2023. That day we summited North and Middle Sister. We then drove around and had a successful summit of South Sister before midnight. We exited in the dark and camped in one of the campsites at the South Sister trailhead. On 07-24-2023 we drove south for a successful summit of Lassen Peak. We then went back north to the Clear Creek TH where we had a quick nap and then started our climb of Mount Shasta just before midnight. We successfully summited Mount Shasta and then napped again at the TH before driving around to the Bunny Flats TH for our Shastina climb. We successfully summited Shastina (and Mt. Shasta) both on 07-25-2023. A planned "down" day to get caught up on sleep was slightly foiled by full campgrounds and a flat tire after coming off of Shastina but to no avail we pressed north on 07-26-2023. We arrived at the Woodpecker TH for our attempt of Mount Jefferson. An early departure on 07-27-2023 put us high on the mountain right when we wanted. Another successful summit and Mount Jefferson was ours. On our way out that night in the dark we had a stand off with a cougar for about 15 minutes while it was trying to decide if it was really interested in us or not. A decent sleep once back at the trailhead and a good breakfast took us on the road to Mount Hood. Despite the route being out and summits bids not being advised, we took a run at it and found a way through for a summit of Mt. Hood before sunset on 07-28-2023. The blowing scree was less than enjoyable near the top. After dinner in the parking lot we drove north to Mt. Adams where we set camp and caught another snooze. We took a leisurely start of Mt. Adams on 07-29-2023 and after another successful summit we made it back in time to enjoy a little camp, shower, beers, and sleep. On 07-30-2023 we left Mt. Adams early in time to get to Mt. Rainier in hopes of grabbing a walk up climbing permit. We were granted a permit and started right away. Though forecasted high winds wanted to keep us from the summit, we were able to catch an epic sunset from the summit. We saw the sun setting on one side of the mountain and the moon rising on the other. Exhausted at this point, more naps in the truck were granted. We moved north to Darrington where we resorted our gear and the made our way to the North Fork Sauk TH where we began our long trek of Glacier Peak on 07-31-2023. After a successful summit of Glacier Peak on 08-01-2023, we took a long sleep at the trailhead and then drove north to the Park Butte TH for our last mountain. On 08-02-2023 we started climbing Mount Baker at 09:05:47 and reached the summit at approximately 17:11! We returned to the trailhead at 23:05:44. This completed all 12 summits of the USA Cascade volcanoes above 10,000'!
Marc and I were exhausted at the end of this trip. During the trip we took turns driving so the other could nap and took naps at trailheads when we could. All of the climbs were single pushes, car to car style. Most of our food had been brought with us other than one stop at Burger King and some ice, water, and beer resupply at gas stations along the way.
We had attempted this project in 2022 but came up 200' shy of the summit of North Sister due to an unanticipated snow section without runout. Not having gear with us last year and deteriorating weather for the remaining mountains we called it off.
This year we wanted to start with North Sister, and we were granted success. After climbing all three sisters we moved south to climb the remaining mountains in order from south to north. This was a dream trip and we met some pretty cool people along the way. We also had 8 of the 12 summits entirely to ourselves which was unreal!