GaleHead, North Twin and South Twin 9, 10, and 11

This day just can’t decide what it wants to do. This is the theme of the march up to Galehead. Starting out at the Gale river Trail, I first met a guy who asked, “heading up to Garfield today?” Hmm, you don’t get to Garfield from here…..later, he realized he climbed the wrong mountain. “Jeez, I always get these mountains mixed up.Hope we don’t get any thunderstorms!”
Each and every hiker descending the trail made somewhat of the same comment: “What is this weather doing?”
As if the weather could just make up its big silly mind and either clear up or be crap. The weather finally "chose" to clear itself up, and when I hit the Galehead Hut the clouds vanished to reveal a glorious blue sky. I dropped my pack at the hut and ran the half mile to tag Galehead. Suddenly, the muggy damp air lifted and blew out. Three guys at the top, Dave Bob and Steve were headed over to conquer both North and South Twin. They promised a ride back to my car in their Mitsubishi parked at the bottom of North Twin. I scrambled way ahead of them and found myself on South Twin amidst a horde of ornery biting flies. I waited around for the 3 amigos, but they must have fallen behind. I didn’t want to be too far ahead – that would just suck. Well, unfortunately I did end up too far ahead, realizing this on North Twin. I waited and waited – no sign of the guys. I shot down North Twin, crossing the three river crossings and leaving the leash at each crossing on the other side of the brook. Naturally, this forced me to cross back over each brook to retrieve the leash and promise myself that I wouldn’t forget the leash at the next brook crossing. That plan worked out real well. At the bottom I just began walking down Haystack Road hoping that eventually , the guys would show up. Within about 45 minutes they drove by and picked us up , Ruby sopping wet and covered in mud, and me stinking like an enormous sweat blob.