Curiously Named Locales: Mt Defiance via Starvation Creek

Photo Credit: Wanderlust Hiker

I've spent one day a week, every week, for the last two and a half years, hiking. This has been in service of a long term goal. A few years ago as I was headed towards forty, I decided I wanted to climb Mt Hood. It felt like a good, dangerous enough, mid-life crisis for a guy like me. I met with a friend who works in mountain rescue. She assured me that I was not ready. The mountain had a season for climbing, something I would not have realized on my own. She gave me a list of hikes ranging from dilettante to brutal. I still have the hand-written list on my bookshelf. There is one remaining item on the list. Mount Defiance. Supposedly the hardest hike in the Columbia Gorge. The joke among the local mountaineering group, the Mazamas, is that you climb Mt Hood to train for Mt Defiance. 

    The name of the mountain is great, called such by an early resident of Hood River because the mountain seemed to hold onto snow well into spring in seeming defiance of the season and weather. The name of the trailhead where I intended to start also has a great name, Starvation Creek. There are competing theories on the origin of the creek's name. It is possible it was named because a group of west-bound pioneers nearly starved there. It was also once called Starveout when two passenger trains on the Union Pacific Railroad got stuck there in heavy snow sometime in the winter of 1884-1885. No one actually starved on this occasion since food was brought in from nearby Hood River by men on skis. Legend has it that the train passengers were paid $3 a day to work on digging out the trains. 

    Another hiker and I have made a pact to hike Defiance together, but our availability windows don't always line up. So here I am 130 hikes or so later, still eyeing the tallest peak in the Gorge. From down below. 

Sources:

https://wanderlusthiker.com/mount-defiance-the-hangriest-of-gorge-hikes/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Defiance_(Oregon)

https://stateparks.oregon.gov/index.cfm?do=park.profile&parkId=122

https://www.oregonhikers.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8739 (user BorntoBBrad)