Everyone knows I love a good theme party<\/a>, especially an outdoor celebration with costumes. For one of the last articles at my dream job<\/a>, I wrote about how the Pacific Northwest Costume Climbers are taking our beloved Mt. St. Helens Mother\u2019s Day tradition to the next level. <\/em><\/p>\n The sweat pours from your brow as you trudge under the spring sun, a mere half-mile from the summit. You know you\u2019re tired, but begin to question if you\u2019re unwell when you see not one, but a dozen people bounding toward you, clad in all kinds of hiking-inappropriate garb. One man is in a hula skirt, followed by a woman dressed as Belle from Beauty and the Beast. You sit down for safety and watch the apparitions get closer. You\u2019re not hallucinating. You\u2019ve just stumbled upon the elusive Mother\u2019s Day hikers outside of their usual haunt.<\/p>\n One of the Pacific Northwest\u2019s grand traditions \u2013 a right of passage for many aspiring mountaineers \u2013 is climbing Mt. St. Helens, in a dress, on Mother\u2019s Day. Inspired by the famous 1987 red dress of Kathy Phibbs<\/a>, photographed and featured on the cover of the Seattle Times<\/em>, thousands of aspiring summiteers flock to the flanks of Helens each May, donning their Sunday best. But as the tradition has grown and permits have become more restricted, many are taking their dress-game elsewhere.<\/p>\n Enter: Mushtaque Silat, dress-hiking enthusiast and annual organizer of the anywhere-but-Helens Mother\u2019s Day dress tradition for the newly minted Pacific Northwest Costume Climbers.<\/p>\n \u201cMy hiking career started back in 2009,\u201d said Mushtaque, who one day hopes to explore more of the mountains in his homeland of Pakistan. \u201cI was just following all the Washington Trails Association (WTA) hikes and finally got to a point where I needed something more challenging. I joined The Mountaineers in 2015 and took the scrambling course. Got to learn a lot of new skills and get comfortable in the snow. I took the glacier travel class and was able to climb the Washington five volcanoes.\u201d<\/p>\n One of those volcanoes was Mt. St. Helens on Mother\u2019s Day weekend, a tradition Mushtaque and his crew took part in with great enthusiasm. But after a few years, crowds got bigger and permits became harder to come by. Plus, they\u2019d seen Helens already.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are so many mountains out there \u2013 why not try something else,\u201d said Martina Kohlus, a 7-year Mountaineers member, and regular participant in the dress-donning tradition.<\/p>\n So explore they did. To train and have regular touch points with the community of costume climbers, Mushtaque began organizing weekly sunset hikes in the Snoqualmie region. A highly international crew shows up each week, with the training regimen helping to ready folks for the annual dress-climb the weekend before Mother\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n The location is selected based on the whims of the weather. One year, the group had to bail on a trip to Ruth Mountain to instead go to Umtanum Ridge because of an atmospheric river. No matter, they shared a fun day and surprised casual day hikers with their spirited attire and spirited celebrations.<\/p>\n As for a dress code? \u201cNot everybody shows up in a dress, but everyone dresses up,\u201d said Mushtaque. \u201cIt\u2019s a really multicultural crew with a lot of people from India, so they wear Saris. Other people wear kilts. I\u2019ve worn my wife\u2019s dresses that she\u2019s discarded. It really depends on what people are comfortable with.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not really a dress person,\u201d said Lindsay Fincher, ten-year Mountaineers member and reluctant dress-hiker. \u201cI was digging through my closet one year and I found this dress that I\u2019d bought for a job many years ago where we had to put on this formal conference. I really hated that job. My boss was an awful person. But when I was digging through my closet, I was thinking that I wanted to take this dress that held bad memories and turn it into something awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n The tradition is fun for onlookers too. \u201cPeople definitely notice you,\u201d said Mushtaque. \u201cThey want to take our picture and celebrate with us.\u201d Sometimes folks join in their summit celebrations. Mushtaque always plans for a few hours at teach summit so folks can share food, dance, sing, take goofy pictures, and listen to memorable ukulele performances by Eva Agnieszka Szalewicz, who the group lovingly refers to as \u201cour musician.\u201d<\/p>\n When I asked why this has become such an important tradition, the answer came as no surprise. \u201cWe all have our lives \u2013 our very busy lives,\u201d said Martina, who grew up in big cities in Germany and the Czech Republic and never thought of herself as a mountain person before moving to the PNW. \u201cSome of those people I don\u2019t get to see unless I go to those hikes. It\u2019s a great opportunity for all of us to come together and just enjoy ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThese trips are a really nice day to see a lot of people you don\u2019t normally get to see,\u201d said Lindsay. \u201cOne of my favorite hikes was in 2021. We did Icicle Ridge in Leavenworth, and at that point, COVID was going on and everyone was finally able to get vaccinated. A lot of us hadn\u2019t seen each other for a year or so. The time away made our experience together all the more special.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEvery year I am able to attend is unique in its own way,\u201d said Martina. \u201cIt\u2019s not about the climb itself, it\u2019s just about being together.<\/p>\n This article originally appeared in our The Mountaineers spring 2024 issue\u00a0of\u00a0<\/em><\/em>Mountaineer\u00a0magazine. To view the original article in magazine form and read more stories, visit the magazine archive<\/a>.<\/em> To read more of my articles, check out my\u00a0list of external publications<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Everyone knows I love a good theme party, especially an outdoor celebration with costumes. For one of the last articles at my dream job, I wrote about how the Pacific Northwest Costume Climbers are taking our beloved Mt. St. Helens Mother\u2019s Day tradition to the next level. The sweat pours from your brow as you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43229,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11760],"tags":[26817,1384,26816,9906],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-43228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adventure","tag-climbers","tag-costume","tag-northwest","tag-pacific"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/occasionallyepic.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/IMG_0686-1024x576.jpg\")
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Enter: Mushtaque Silat<\/h2>\n
Explore they did<\/h2>\n
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Fun for everyone<\/h2>\n
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