By Doug Brunk, San Diego Bureau
Dr. Douglas Butler and a climbing guide were trekking to the summit of Wyoming's tallest mountain, Gannett Peak (13,804 feet), when danger struck.
They had gotten off route and the morning sun began to loosen large rocks from steep snow-covered slopes on both sides of the trail.
“Fortunately, they were coming down one at a time,” said Dr. Butler, a family physician who lives in Crumpler, N.C. “One rock came too close for comfort. When 100-pound rocks start coming down a really steep slope, you really don't have a chance.”
The duo dodged the falling rocks and escaped unharmed. It marked the most threatened Dr. Butler felt in his quest to reach Gannett and the highest geographic points in the other 49 United States, a pursuit he began in 1999 and completed in 2003.
The idea—known as highpointing—came from one of his high school teachers in Denver. “He had gone over to Kansas, which was a 2- to 3-hour drive from Denver, and spent most of the day trying to find that state's high point, because most of the hills in West Kansas are about the same height,” Dr. Butler recalled. “He said it took him just about the whole day to find the correct hill. As a teenager, the idea for the quest seemed odd but intriguing to me. As my life went on, it seemed less odd and more intriguing.”
Dr. Butler starting visiting mountain peaks when he was in his mid-30s. He initially was drawn to remote destinations such as the volcanoes in Mexico and Ecuador, and Aconcagua, the highest peak in the Americas. “Then I got to thinking [that] the state high points would be neat to do.”
Now 53, Dr. Butler wrote a travel memoir called “A Walk Atop America: Fifty State Summits and a Dream to Reach Them All” (www.awalkatopamerica.com
Dr. Butler reached most of the summits in 2000 and 2001. Most were accessible by automobile or by 2- to 5-mile hikes, he said, but five required assistance from guides, including Gannett Peak, Mount McKinley in Alaska (20,320 feet), Mount Rainier in Washington (14,411), Granite Peak in Montana (12,799 feet), and Mount Hood in Oregon (11,239 feet).
His effort to reach Panorama Point, the highest summit in Nebraska at 5,424 feet, would have been thwarted were it not for the kindness of perfect strangers. The 20 miles of dirt road that led to the peak were covered with 6 inches of snow, and a blizzard was approaching. “All I had was this little rental car,” Dr. Butler said. “I got about one-third of the way and knew I was never going to reach it. It was getting dark.”
He flagged down a farmer, who took him to his house and “called somebody else with a four-wheel drive, who drove me to the farm where the high point was,” he said. “People left their dinners; they did all of this for a stranger.”
These kinds of encounters “changed my life,” said Dr. Butler, who is a locum tenens physician with Project USA, which provides medical care for Native Americans. “Physicians don't receive a lot of kindness from anybody except their patients. To get out and see that kindness made me want to go back in a system where I can work more directly with the patients and not have to fight the reimbursement systems. That's one reason I chose [American] Indian health.”
Dr. Butler said he can't think of any personal goal that would rival what he's accomplished with his quest of summits. “There are some mountains I'd like to climb in South America, but the knees and the hips aren't what they used to be,” he said.
Dr. Butler's quest included a steep ascent of the face of Granite Peak in Montana. Courtesy Dr. Douglas Butler
Preparing to Ascend Mount Rainier
Editor's note: These excerpts from Chapter 2 of “A Walk Atop America: Fifty State Summits and a Dream to Reach Them All” (Boone, N.C.: Parkway Publishers, 2007) are reprinted with permission from the publisher.
On the southern flank of Mt. Rainier, nineteen clients and seven guides met at a place called Paradise, an aptly named location 5,420 feet above sea level. Inside a small chalet, each climber spread their gear onto the floor. Prompted by a checklist, a guide reviewed each piece. My gear passed inspection; I did not. I was wearing blue jeans, flannel, and t-shirts—all cotton garments. Cotton, the guide chided, was a dangerous fabric, one that quickly becomes wet from perspiration or rain. When damp, this natural fabric loses all insulating ability, potentially allowing hypothermia.