Climbing Mauna Kea |
 I’m signalling that Mauna Kea was my 24th US state highpoint. More importantly, when I reached the summit of Mauna Kea, I completed my quest to climb the 13 US state highpoints that together constitute the ten highest and ten hardest of the state highpoints (which are, coincidentally, all the US state highpoints over 10,000 feet / 3,000 metres). I climbed Denali / Mt McKinley in July 1997 and some months after I climbed Eagle Mountain (Minnesota’s highpoint) in late 2004, I formulated my 13-highpoint goal. After climbing Gannett Peak (Wyoming) and Granite Peak (Montana) in 2006, I climbed all the remaining ten “biggies” together with Eric Hodge during the course of five separate expeditions to the United States. |