Highpointing

On the last weekend of September, 2001, JO and BC climbed Mount Washington in NH via the Tuckerman’s Ravine Trail, and at 6,288 feet, it was by far the highest either of us had ever climbed. We were both exhausted, but we both felt it was quite an accomplishment. Throughout the 2001-2002 winter, JO and BC began researching the highest points in the other states, and discovered that there was an organization with thousands of members devoted to “Highpointing”, which is to stand on the highest natural point in each state (or province). It was then that JO and BC decided that highpointing was an attainable goal for them, and it was a good excuse to see the whole country and to take long road trips. Highpointing is not an easy task for the following reasons:

1) It requires a lot of time to plan each trip, travel to each state, and then walk or hike to each highpoint.

2) It requires a lot of money to buy supplies and travel to each destination. This will prove to be the real limiting factor.

3) It requires a lot of training to get to some of the higher summits. We’re not worried about this so much, we figure that we'll work our way up to the more difficult climbs, and we'll train in advance for the really strenuous ones.

4) For some of the hikes, it's not safe to travel without a climbing partner. Luckily, this is already taken care of since we are going for these climbs together.

BC and JO live in the north suburbs of Boston, MA. We are both in our mid-20’s and in less than ideal shape physically, and have minimal climbing experience. Here are some stats on highpointing:

So far, 131 people have completed all 50 US highpoints. 242 people completed 48 of the highpoints. Denali (Mt. McKinley) in Alaska is the highest and most difficult highpoint at 20320 ft. Six hikes require rock climbing, glacier traversing or other mountaineering skills. 21 hikes are less than a half mile walk car to car. Six hikes require more than one day of hiking (over 16 miles roundtrip from car). 27 hikes have vertical gains of more than 1000 ft. 19 hikes are over 6 miles roundtrip. 12 hikes have summits that are over 10000 ft.

As the summer was getting underway, and the list of completed highpoints was growing, BC began doing research into the highpoints of the Canadian provinces and found that this was only completed for the first time in 1998 by Jack Bennett, and this was chronicled in his book, “Not Won in a Day”, which we both quickly read, and also decided that it might be fun to do some of the Canadian highpoints as well, though it has not been decided whether we will do all 13 of them.

Our current totals for highpoints completed are: 41 states (42 for JO), 1 province, and the District of Columbia. 14 of those states came on a week long trip that we embarked on in the summer of '02 throughout the southeastern U.S. (putting over 5,000 miles on JO’s car), and another 11 came on a 9,000 mile road trip we took in Summer 2003 to the midwest, southwest and prairie states, although we had to bail out of a few because of weather and/or car trouble. JO climbed Mount Whitney (CA) and Boundary Peak (NV) on his own in the fall of 2003, while in CA for work. That put JO ahead of BC by 3 states, but that lead was trimmed back to 1 in the summer of 2004, when JO and BC once again hit the road and hit up the southwest, gaining 7 more highpoints.

State Highpoints

Click on the highpoint names below to see a report on the highpointing trips we have made thus far. We will also put up maps of our journey and pictures taken along the way at some point.

Abbr	Date	State	Location	Altitude	Lat/Long	Topo quad
AK		Alaska	Mount McKinley	20,320	63° 4'N, 151° 0’W	AK Mt. McKinley A-3 1:50,000
CA		California	Mount Whitney	14,494	36° 35'N, 118° 17'W	CA Mt. Whitney 1:25,000
CO	8/10/04	Colorado	Mount Elbert	14,433	39° 07'N, 106° 27'W	CO Mt. Elbert 1:25,000
WA		Washington	Mount Rainier	14,410	46° 51'N, 121° 46'W	WA Mt. Rainier West 1:25,000
WY		Wyoming	Gannett Peak	13,804	43° 11'N, 109° 39'W	WY Gannett Peak 1:25,000
HI		Hawaii	Mauna Kea	13,796	19° 49'N, 155° 28'W	HI Mauna Kea 1:25,000
UT		Utah	Kings Peak	13,528	40° 47'N, 110° 22'W	UT Kings Peak 1:25,000
NM	8/2/04	New Mexico	Wheeler Peak	13,161	36° 33' N, 105° 25'W	NM Wheeler Peak 1:25,000
NV	8/7/04	Nevada	Boundary Peak	13,143	37° 51'N, 118° 21'W	NV Boundary Peak 1:25,000
MT		Montana	Granite Peak	12,799	45° 10'N, 109° 48'W	MT Granite Peak 1:25,000
ID		Idaho	Borah Peak	12,662	44° 08'N, 113° 47'W	ID Borah Peak 1:25,000
AZ	8/4/04	Arizona	Humphreys Peak	12,633	35° 20'N, 111° 41'W	AZ Humphreys Peak 1:25,000
OR		Oregon	Mount Hood	11,239	45° 22'N, 121° 42'W	OR Mt. Hood South 1:25,000
TX	5/22/03	Texas	Guadalupe Peak	8,749	31° 53'N, 104° 52'W	TX Guadalupe Peak 1:25,000
SD	5/19/03	South Dakota	Harney Peak	7,242	43° 52'N, 103° 32'W	SD Custer 1:25,000
NC	7/3/02	North Carolina	Mount Mitchell	6,684	35° 46'N, 82° 16'W	NC Mt. Mitchell 1:25,000
TN	7/4/02	Tennessee	Clingman’s Dome	6,643	35° 33'N, 83° 30'W	TN Clingmans Dome 1:25,000
NH	9/15/01	New Hampshire	Mount Washington	6,288	44° 16'N, 71° 18'W	NH Mt. Washington 1:25,000
VA	7/5/02	Virginia	Mount Rogers	5,729	36° 39'N, 81° 33'W	VA Whitetop Mountain 1:25,000
NE	5/20/03	Nebraska	Panorama Point	5,424	41° 1'N, 104° 2'W	NE Pine Bluffs SE 1:25,000
NY	6/22/02	New York	Mount Marcy	5,344	44° 07'N, 73° 55'W	NY Mt. Marcy 1:25,000
ME	8/17/02	Maine	Mount Katahdin	5,267	45° 54'N, 68° 55'W	ME Mt. Katahdin 1:25,000
OK	5/21/03	Oklahoma	Black Mesa	4,973	36° 56'N, 103° 0'W	OK Kenton 1:25,000
WV	8/10/02	West Virginia	Spruce Knob	4,863	38° 42'N, 79° 32'W	WV Spruce Knob 1:25,000
GA	7/2/02	Georgia	Brasstown Bald	4,784	34° 52'N, 83° 49'W	GA Jacks Gap 1:25,000
VT	6/1/02	Vermont	Mount Mansfield	4,393	44° 33'N, 72° 49'W	VT Mt. Mansfield 1:24,000
KY	7/4/02	Kentucky	Black Mountain	4,139	36° 55'N, 82° 54'W	KY Benham 1:25,000
KS	8/1/04	Kansas	Mount Sunflower	4,039	39° 01'N, 102° 02'W	KS Mt. Sunflower 1:25,000
SC	7/4/02	South Carolina	Sassafras Mountain	3,560	35° 04'N, 82° 47'W	SC,NC Estatoe Gap 1:25,000
ND	5/19/03	North Dakota	White Butte	3,506	46° 23'N, 103° 18'W	ND Amidon 1:24,000
MA	5/4/02	Massachusetts	Mount Greylock	3,491	42° 38'N, 73° 10'W	MA North Adams 1:25,000
MD	8/10/02	Maryland	Backbone Mountain	3,360	39° 14'N, 79° 29'W	MD Davis 1:25,000
PA	8/10/02	Pennsylvania	Mount Davis	3,213	39° 47'N, 79° 11'W	PA Markleton 1:25,000
AR	6/30/02	Arkansas	Magazine Mountain	2,753	35° 10'N, 93° 39'W	AR Blue Mountain 1:25,000
AL	7/1/02	Alabama	Cheaha Mountain	2,407	33° 29'N, 85° 49'W	AL Cheaha Mountain 1:25,000
CT	4/27/02	Connecticut	Mount Frissell (South Slope)	2,380	42° 03'N, 73° 29'W	MA Bish Bash Falls 1:25,000
MN	5/17/03	Minnesota	Eagle Mountain	2,301	47° 54'N, 90° 34'W	MN Eagle Mountain 1:25,000
MI	5/16/03	Michigan	Mount Arvon	1,979	46° 45'N, 89° 09'W	MI Skanee South 1:25,000
WI	5/17/03	Wisconsin	Timms Hill	1,951	45° 27'N, 90° 12'W	WI Timms Hill 1:25,000
NJ	7/6/02	New Jersey	High Point	1,803	41° 19'N, 74° 38'W	NJ Port Jervis South 1:25,000
MO	7/1/02	Missouri	Taum Sauk Mountain	1,772	37° 34'N, 90° 44'W	MO Ironton 1:25,000
IA	5/18/03	Iowa	Hawkeye Point	1,670	43° 27'N, 95° 42'W	IA Sibley East 1:25,000
OH	8/12/04	Ohio	Campbell Hill	1,550	40° 21'N, 83° 44'W	OH Zanesfield 1:25,000
IN	8/12/04	Indiana	Hoosier Hill	1,257	40° 00'N, 84° 51'W	IN Spartanburg 1:25,000
IL	5/18/03	Illinois	Charles Mound	1,235	42° 30'N, 90° 14'W	IL Shullsburg 1:25,000
RI	5/26/02	Rhode Island	Jerimoth Hill	812	41° 51'N, 71° 47'W	RI East Killingly 1:25,000
MS	7/1/02	Mississippi	Woodall Mountain	806	34° 46'N, 88° 15'W	MS Iuka 1:25,000
LA	6/30/02	Louisiana	Driskill Mountain	535	32° 25'N, 92° 54'W	LA Bryceland 1:25,000
DE	7/6/02	Delaware	Ebright Azimuth	448	39° 50'N, 75° 31'W	DE Wilmington North 1:25,000
DC	8/10/02	District of Columbia	Fort Reno Park	429	38° 57’N, 77° 5’W	DC Washington West 1:25,000
FL	6/29/02	Florida	Britton Hill	345	30° 59'N, 86° 17'W	FL Paxton 1:25,000

Provincial Highpoints

Abbr	Date	Province	Location	Altitude	Lat/Long	Topo quad
YT		Yukon Territory	Mount Logan	19,551	60° 34’N 140° 23’W	115 C 09
BC		British Columbia	Mount Fairweather	15,300	58° 54’N 137° 31’W	114 I 13
AL		Alberta	Mount Columbia	12,294	52° 9’N 117° 27’W	083 C 03
NWT		Northwest Territories	Mount Nirvana	9,098	61° 52’N 127° 42’W	095 E 13
NU		Nunavut	Barbeau Peak	8,583	84° 54’N 75° 1’W	340 D 15
QB		Quebec	Mont D’Iberville	5,322	58° 43’N 63° 43’W	014 L 13
NF		Newfoundland	Mount Caubvick	5,322	58° 43’N 63° 43’W	014 L 13
SK		Saskatchewan	Cypress Hills	4,816	49° 33’N 109° 59’W	072 F 12
MT		Manitoba	Baldy Mountain	2,729	51° 28’N 100° 43’W	062 N 07
NB	8/16/02	New Brunswick	Mount Carleton	2,690	47° 23’N 66° 53’W	021 O 07
ON		Ontario	Ishpatina Ridge	2,275	47° 19’N 80° 19’W	041 P 07
NS		Nova Scotia	White Hill	1,747	46° 42’N 60° 36’W	011 K 10
PEI		Prince Edward Island	Springton	466	46° 20’N 63° 25’W	011 L 06

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