Mount Bachelor - Deschutes National Forest

Our visit to central Oregon is to see a picturesque trio of mountain peaks ranked as top third, fourth, and fifth in height statewide in Oregon – 3 Sisters (South Sister 10,363’, North Sister 10,090’, and Middle Sister 10,052’). The Sisters and Broken Top account for about a third of the Three Sisters Wilderness. It has been said that during the Pleistocene Era, the High Chief’s 3 daughters cascaded over the land of Oregon. Yet, Mount Bachelor, a 9,065-feet mountain peak merely 5 miles away from Broken Top, however, stays outside the boundary of the Sisters. [4Feet]: Our original plan was to climb Broken Top (9,177’) for a stunning close-up of the Sisters. Unfortunately, the highway to the trailhead closed in winter. Several feet of accumulated snow makes the road impassable unless hikers are willing to snowshoe 7 extra miles to the trailhead. Therefore, we changed our hiking place to the nearby mountain - Mount Bachelor, a stratovolcano (also a ski resort) with a rise of 3,500 feet above its base. In fact, after our Friday hike, we drove 119 miles from Mount Hood National Forest to Bend, Oregon, and stayed overnight. Bend is a small city on the Deschutes River approximately 22 miles away from Mount Bachelor. In the early morning, people in town could easily spot the snowcapped Mt. Bachelor on the horizon painted with the precious golden color with pink blush by sunrise. The ski resort remained closed due to the pandemic. The only way to reach the summit is to ‘snowshoe’ off-piste. Climbing a steep hill is never considered easy; with deep snow (3.5 feet) on top of the trail, it is promisingly challenging. It was more like a climb than a hike as both hands were deemed necessary to assist the ascent. On a sunny day, snowshoeing a ginormous snowfield against gravity definitely recalled our memory of the summit attempt at Mount Adams. After an elevation gain of more than 2,000 feet in a mere 1.5 miles, we stopped by a mountain ledge wherein we were allowed an open view of the Sisters and Broken Top. The sun shined beautifully on their crowns and reflected their eye-catching winter dresses to their ‘brother’. The Sisters display their beauty mostly in winter and spring as they usually turn dark and ashy in last summer. 11/28/20