In Fall 2021 my coworker David and I schemed up a plan to climb a lesser known California 14er. Mount Sill at 14,159 ft looked ideal, with its relatively short approach and an easy road to the parking lot. Although various trip reports warned us about the bushwhacking, boulder fields, and routefinding through class 3/4 terrain, we really had no idea what to expect from this off-trail adventure.

I had just moved to LA a month prior, and so had my dear friends Sam and Chenyu. They were eager to join us for Sill, so our group became 4 total.

After a big Thai dinner on Friday night, we began the 5 hr drive to Big Pine Creek Campground, set up our tents in the dark and waited for morning. The goal for Saturday was to reach 11000 ft and position ourselves for a summit attempt on Sunday.

The hike began at 7800 ft on the floor of a wide valley. Just as we passed a split in the trail to continue along the South Fork of Big Pine creek, Chenyu got stung in the face by a wasp. As painful as it was, he decided to soldier on, and pretty soon we reached a creek crossing in a thick part of the aspen forest.The trail zigzagged up a steep wall, avoiding a waterfall on a rocky lip, and soonafter we caught our first view of Mount Sill. From here the trail grew fainter and fainter until there was no longer a trail at all. David navigated us through a tricky forested section to reach a boulder field. The going got much slower, and the last 1000 ft climb up to Elinor lake had some steep gullies with overgrown bush. I was relieved when we decided to stop and set up camp by the lake's edge at 11000 ft. We cooked dinner and went to bed without setting an alarm, thinking that there'd be plenty of time to summit the next day.

On Sunday morning we caught a beautiful sunrise casting alpenglow on the Palisade Crest high above the lake. Mount Sill was the rightmost and tallest peak in the crest. We filled our day packs, put on helmets, and started up several rocky ledges. The boulder fields went on forever, but so far nothing was too technical yet. The hard part was navigation.

There were two possible routes when we reached the unnamed glacial lake at 12200 ft. By this point, Sam had decided to call it a day and head back to camp. After some debate, David, Chenyu, and I decided to go left of the lake. Halfway across the lake, we realized this steep traverse was chossy and unstable. We couldn't see an obvious path continuing up to Glacier Notch. It was getting close to turnaround time, and even if we kept going, we didn't know if it was even possible to get up to Glacier Notch from the path we had chosen. At around 12400 ft, the three of us began retracing our steps and descending down to camp to join Sam.

After a short break back at Elinor Lake, we packed up camp and began our descent down to the car, which was a challenge in itself. The terrain features on the way down looked much different than on the way up, so we got lost a couple times. All of us had work the next day, so once we made it back to the car here was no time for dillydallying. Driving back to LA, we all knew that this weekend's big adventure would be on our minds for a while.

Ten months later...

Skip ahead to August 2022! I was no longer living in LA but planned to be there for a work trip. David was down to give Sill another shot while I was in town so we teamed up, this time just the two of us. The idea was to try a slightly different route avoiding Elinor Lake and improve upon our mistakes we made last time. Once again we drove up from LA on a Friday night to begin our second attempt.

It was cool to see the same trail in a different season. The creek had much more water at this time of year, and the crossing was a bit trickier. We followed the same route as last year until around 10400 ft. Here we took the drainage to the right instead of to the left toward Elinor Lake. This new path felt like the correct one because there was a lot less bushwhacking. The terrain felt smoother and slabbier. Just as the sun disappeared behind Mount Sill, we made it up to the unnamed glacial lake where we turned around last year. Setting up camp here had us feeling much more confident to reach the summit the next day.Unlike last year, we set our alarms and woke up before sunrise to start the summit push. Going right of the lake, we crept up the steep wall diagonally. The path was not at all obvious, and it was a matter of picking which class 3 chute to go up. By the end of the morning we made it to the saddle between Mt Gayley and Mt Sill. There were some sketchy moves in this section where slipping was not allowed.From the saddle we could see the Palisade Glacier on the other side of the ridge. We could also see Glacier Notch, our next objective, and there was only one way up. Unfortunately the way was extremely steep and loose. Although David felt more comfortable on this type of terrain, I did not like the feeling of large unstable rocks under my feet. Fearing an ankle sprain and knowing the downclimb would be even worse, I decided to head down. David didn't want to continue alone, so we both called it here. It had been a worthy attempt but the summit was simply out of reach, another 1000 vertical ft of hard scrambling away.This year we made it up to 13000 ft before turning around. Our camp spot was better, and we had started the summit day much earlier. It was a skill and stamina issue that prevented us from summitting, and I consoled myself knowing that we didn't make any big mistakes this time.

Looking back on these two trips, I realized that sometimes we just need a reason to get out of the city and enjoy the beauty and challenge of the high Sierra. Climbing Mount Sill was that reason. Getting to the top would have been nice, but the real mission had already been accomplished.