By Gail Wood
When Henry Romer moved to the Northwest 45 years ago, he was captured by the beauty of Mount Rainier and the Cascade Range.
“Like everyone else, we came to the Northwest and said, ‘Wow, mountains,’” Romer said with a chuckle.
But admiring, watching from an office window, wasn’t enough. He soon bought some hiking boots and began trekking along the wooded trails. It wasn’t long before he joined the Olympia Branch of the Mountaineers.
Growing up in Canton, New York, Romer had experienced sailing and canoeing before.
“But I hadn’t experienced mountains before,” Romer said. “They just took over.”
After getting his doctorate in physics at the University of Minnesota and joining the research faculty at the University of Washington in the early 1970s, Romer moved for nearly two years to do research at Stanford University. Naturally, with Romer already smitten by the hiking bug, he visited Yosemite National Park, hiking the backside of Half Dome and through the wooded park.
“I got seriously hooked on the outdoors,” Romer said.
Eventually, Romer moved to Olympia and worked as a mechanical engineer in the private sector. And his pursuit of hiking continued. Over 15 years, Romer climbed the state’s six tallest peaks. Mount St. Helen’s, several years before the volcano blew its top in 1980, was the first on his list.
His appetite for peaks continued and eventually he summited Rainier, Adams, Glacier, Baker and Olympus. Those are the six highest peaks in Washington. And last year Romer received the six peaks award for climbing the state’s six tallest peaks in the state. When St. Helen’s shrunk over 2,000 feet to about 8,000, the big six aren’t as big.
Now, Romer, who will be 73 in July, has a new bucket list. He wants to climb all 100 of the peaks in Washington that are talked about in a friend’s guide book. Right now, he’s climbed 59 of those peaks, which isn’t bad considering he had topped only seven of those peaks three years ago. As he stood on the top of Mount Ruth last weekend, Romer began naming off the other surrounding peaks he could see, many of which he had climbed.
“The neat thing about the 100 peak list is while there’s the well known peaks on it and there’s all these others,” Romer said. “So you get to fill in all the parts of the park you didn’t know.”
In 1976, Romer took a climbing class from the Mountaineer’s and learned how to self-arrest with an ice ax and how to prussic out of a crevasse. That’s led to his long association with the climbing club and today’s he’s a board member with the Olympia Mountaineers.
Over 100 years ago, the Mountaineers were formed in Seattle and now have seven branches across the state and has over 10,000 members. The Olympia branch has about 700 members.
“For years they’ve run people through their climbing course and put them out into the wide world of climbing,” Romer said.
That’s expanded. The group continues to host climbing classes and provide outdoor education and they have expanded to include sea kayaking, cross country skiing and sailing.
Because it’s the tallest peak, Romer said Rainier was the hardest of the mountains he’s climbed to the summit. While there’s not technical rock climbing, he said there is a technical challenge because of the snow. Climbers have to be able to handle the steep snow slopes.
“There’s both a psychological and objective exposure,” Romer said. “You have to be comfortable with doing that. And because it’s 14,000 feet, you have to be prepared to operate for long hours under those conditions.”
With 40-plus years of experience in hiking, Romer has picked up some insight into the challenge. In his attempt to help share that experience, Romer blogs (at www.henryinthewoods.com) about the new light-weight equipment available today. He shares tips on how to cut that 50-pound pack to the 20-pound range.
“Getting down to the 20 pound range is more of the rarified atmosphere,” Romer said. “It’s that 10 pound journey from what you can buy at REI to what you can do by being clever.”
Romer hasn’t tired of the quest of reaching the summit. His theme all along has been about seeking the doable challenge. He’s never dreamed of climbing Mount McKinley or Mount Everest or doing the tallest peaks on the seven continents. He feels that’s why he’s still able to go out and enjoy the outdoors.
“One of the reasons I’m still doing it is because I have tried to stay away from the extreme stuff,” Romer said.
He hikes with people who have artificial knees or hips.
“I’m still going on the original parts,” Romer said with a laugh. “Partly that may be genetics. But I’ve been careful in what I’ve done.”
And he’s just kept on climbing peaks and enjoying the outdoors.
“I just love it,” Romer said in summary.
