I’ve secretly been tweeting for the past year and a half

by   •   Highlights
 

I’ve never really been a fan of social media. I used Facebook a lot during my early years of high school, but I’ve never really found the concept of social media that compelling—the entire premise just felt to me like it would be a great way to have a bad time. I severely waned down my Twitter usage years ago, and a little over one year ago, I pinned a tweet on my profile implicitly announcing my departure from the platform.

Well, I have more than one Twitter account. I have an alternate profile—one that I only let four of my friends follow. I thought it would be a convenient way to collect some of my short thoughts and funny moments that weren’t deep enough to warrant an entire blog post.

Today, I noticed that I had been selected as an early participant in the Twitter Circle early rollout and testing phase. This feature can functionally serve the same purpose as having an alternate account, so I made the decision to stop using my alt and go back to using my main, but only tweeting to my Circle.

As part of this transition, I decided to aggregate and share some of my better tweets from my alt account before I retire it (though I would un-retire it if Twitter decides to discontinue Circle at any point).

One of these days, I will stop misspelling “canker sore” as “cancer sore”

September 24, 2020

I spent literally like an hour and a half today trying to figure out the optimal food to eat when suffering from debilitating aphthous ulcer pain

… and then I just got a burger anyway

September 25, 2020

I am happy to announce that the canker sore is beginning to heal, and the pain has subsided enough that it doesn’t feel like I’m committing suicide every time I chew

September 27, 2020

Time to get in my gym sessions before January 1 when it gets flooded with new year’s resolution people

Paradise, NV
December 27, 2020

In today’s episode of “Chase Fraud Protection is useless,” let’s see if Chase can redeem itself from its 0% success rate in catching fraudulent transactions

Oh no, someone is spending $9 on your card at McDonald’s; block it!

Oops, that’s just Adam getting dinner

Still 0%

Los Angeles, CA
January 26, 2021

I am imagining a scenario where somebody purposely types something wrong, adds “that is a typo” after it, but typos and accidentally writes “that is not a typo” instead

I cannot stop laughing

Why am I like this

March 15, 2021

I have a paper cut under my fingernail

Except worse

Because the cut was caused by one of those sturdy plastic Pokémon card sleeves, so it’s thicker than normal paper cuts, and now it feels like the tip of my finger is going to fall off

April 20, 2021

omg this cut healed a couple days ago and then I got another one on the same finger on my opposite hand

April 27, 2021

Upside of parking under a tree: Less cabin overheating by avoiding direct sunlight in 105°F+ weather

Downside of parking under a tree: Every other bird in Utah insists my truck is their bathroom

St. George, UT
June 19, 2021

I drove past a used car dealership in the middle of nowhere in Missouri today and they had like 30 vehicles on the lot

Literally every single one of them was a pickup truck

Springfield, IL
July 10, 2021

I’ve made my way into the Eastern time zone, but kept my computer on Pacific time to keep things easier for work

I keep looking at the clock and thinking “wow, it’s not even noon and I’ve finished so much work today”

Then I remember it’s actually almost 3 PM

Indianapolis, IN
September 2, 2021

One of my favorite things to do at the airport is to sneak up behind people wearing their mask on their chin when they’re clearly not eating or drinking, and start coughing

Atlanta, GA
October 15, 2021

I got two free water bottles after checking into my hotel a few hours ago

I decided to bring one to the gym, but realized I misplaced them

I spent 2 min searching a tiny hotel room

Then I remembered that I put them in a spot so reasonable that I forgot where

The refrigerator

Albuquerque, NM
November 22, 2021

I’m so good at accidentally kicking things that at this point I’m pretty sure my brain just doesn’t know how big my feet are

Enterprise, NV
December 9, 2021

This is the second time in a row I’m eating sushi with my fingers because I forgot to check the stupid box to request utensils from the restaurant with my order

Loveland, CO
March 21, 2022

I just got attacked by violent, rampant, vicious tumbleweed in the middle of nowhere in Wyoming

I am literally not joking and not exaggerating

Gillette, WY
April 17, 2022

The amount that it rains in the Seattle area should be considered cruel and unusual punishment

Issaquah, WA
May 21, 2022

The person sitting next to me on this plane is nodding off so violently that I confused her for the guitarist of a heavy metal band

May 23, 2022

Great news, she woke up before breaking her neck and now she’s back to doing her crossword puzzle

May 23, 2022

Why is there a bird chirping outside my window at 3:58 AM

Tukwila, WA
May 29, 2022

One of my favorite things to do while driving is to watch compact sedans turn left, but they jerk to the right first so they turn really wide as if they’re towing a 20-foot trailer

Las Vegas, NV
September 28, 2020

Everybody needs to stop not having air conditioning

Los Angeles, CA
October 4, 2020

Every time I decide I am going to stay up late, I am hit with an overwhelming sense of drowsiness

October 29, 2020

I just got off a phone call with Tempo’s account manager at Chase Bank and I believe she is working from inside her fish tank today

January 19, 2021

I don’t understand why I’m able to park a full-size pickup truck between the lines, but California compact sedans require 1.5 parking spaces

Los Angeles, CA
January 28, 2021

Why do people say “I can’t hear you because of your mask” then proceed to take their own mask off as if that’s going to allow them to hear better

March 7, 2021

All three of my roommate’s cats are shedding their winter coats all at once and I didn’t realize cat hair could be considered a lifestyle until now

Paradise, NV
April 2, 2021

I have decided that one of the most amusing parts of my job is that, one moment, I’ll be handling a matter that could cost the company $400k, then the very next moment, I have to listen to someone have a meltdown about something that will cost ~$60 as if it’s the end of the world

April 15, 2021

I cooked today for the first time in several months and I forgot to salt my stupid salmon

Paradise, NV
April 27, 2021

I ordered a BTS promo meal thingy from McDonald’s and they didn’t give me the special promo sauce

Never lucky

Long Beach, CA
June 3, 2021

I watched two videos of someone cleaning out and trimming a cow’s hooves and now every other video on my YouTube recommendation page is of cows

Denver, CO
June 29, 2021

I asked for an American pickup truck for my rental at Avis

The woman said “we only have one truck left, but I know you’ll like it” and gave me the spot number to a Nissan Frontier

I’m pretty sure that is the most insulting thing you can possibly say and do to a truck enthusiast

Anaheim, CA
August 13, 2021

I don’t understand the people who say “photo dump!” on social media, and then only post 3 pictures

Louisville, KY
September 17, 2021

I needed to refuel my truck before leaving for my next hotel, so I looked up gas stations

I found one nearby across the street and thought “great, this is in walking distance”

I was already halfway there when I realized my minor error

Amarillo, TX
November 21, 2021

New Mexico is confusing because tow trucks are apparently allowed to use blue strobe lights here so I keep thinking I’m getting pulled over

Gallup, NM
November 28, 2021

I wonder if people in Louisiana who don’t know about the existence of Los Angeles, but do know about the existence of LA Fitness, ever assume LA Fitness was founded in Louisiana instead of Los Angeles, and then wonder why there are no LA Fitnesses in Louisiana

Long Beach, CA
December 28, 2021

Someone just came into the gym and set the temperature to 78°F

I am going to die

Loveland, CO
March 22, 2022

I just learned that WA passed a new law banning lids on drinks

If you want one, you have to ask and put it on yourself

I’m sure this highly effective law has saved many lids from all those people who look at their about-to-overflow lattes and say “I don’t need a lid for this”

Issaquah, WA
May 16, 2022

This is the coldest cold I’ve ever caught

I cannot stop sneezing

I cannot stop blowing my nose

I cannot

Tukwila, WA
May 22, 2022

I purchased a 1-gallon jug of water because it was like a quarter of the price of a six pack of bottled water

I am drinking straight out of it, and may or may not be spilling water everywhere

Can’t tell if I played the system or played myself

Henderson, NV
May 24, 2022

 

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Hello Spokane, Washington

by   •   Hiking, Travel
 

After heading out of Montana and towards the Seattle Metropolitan Area, I took a quick two-night stop in Spokane, the second most populous city in Washington, just barely ahead of Tacoma. I honestly didn’t really expect much out of Spokane, and I booked a stay simply because of its convenient lo­ca­tion between Missoula and Seattle, but I actually thought it was one of the more pleasant cities I’ve visited so far.

My hotel of choice was the Courtyard by Marriott Spokane Downtown at the Convention Center, a slightly older hotel in terms of décor, but still very well-maintained with great staff and an amazing location. I got an upgrade, presumably due to my Bonvoy elite status, which got me a nice view of the Spokane River and a nearby tree with blossoming pink flowers.

Long story short, I think downtown Spokane does downtown the right way. It definitely feels like a downtown area, but it’s not too congested, and I think it is the most welcoming “downtown” I have ever been to.

When I lived in Las Vegas, I lived on the Strip, which is sort of like the “second downtown,” but the City of Las Vegas was working on improving the “original downtown” to be a lot nicer. I feel like Spokane and Las Vegas have similar goals for what they want their downtowns to look like, but Spokane already finished development, and they did pretty much everything the right way. Las Vegas obviously can’t have a river slicing through the city, but if down­town Las Vegas ended up resembling Spokane, I would be very happy and very willing to live there (as opposed to the Strip).

Seeing as my hotel was in a perfect location and overlooked Centennial Trail, I decided to take a walk alongside the river and into Riverfront Park. My first “stop” was at the Spokane Pavilion, which seemed to have some sort of small business event going on, but was still open to the public so I could climb up some stairs and get some shots of the nice architecture of the outdoors area.

I retraced my steps and continued southbound, connecting onto North Howard Street. I crossed the wide bridge and pedestrian walkway, leading me to the Rotary Fountain near the Spokane Visitors Information Center.

I reconnected back onto Centennial Trail, then transferred over to Park Trail and Theme Stream Trail to head back closer to the river. A portion of this area was closed due to construction, but the Howard Street Middle Channel Bridge was open, which let me get onto Canada Island and get a nice view of the Upper Spokane Falls.

I’ve been to Niagara Falls at some point when I was an infant, so I obviously don’t remember it first-hand. I’ve also seen a few waterfalls during my road trip in the past year, though none of them were very big, and one of them was frozen.

I think Spokane Falls is the first waterfall of this volume that I remember seeing, and it is absolutely treacherous. The crashing water colliding with itself and the surrounding rocks, and the speed at which the foam atop the water forms, flows, and dissipates, is unlike anything else I’ve experienced. The waterfall created enough mist that I could feel the wetness from the pedestrian bridge, and it was a bit surreal being only a handful of feet atop a force of nature that could sweep me up and kill me within seconds.

After taking in the view for a little while, I continued northbound towards North Bank Park and started my loop back to my hotel, this time following the northern side of the Spokane River. I passed the Upper Falls Reservoir and continued east past Gonzaga University, where I ran into some marmots.

Just before reaching the intersection at East Spokane Falls Boulevard, I reconnected onto Centennial Trail and crossed the bridge towards Washington State University Spokane.

As I got closer to returning to my hotel, I saw some people huddled around a clearing of grass across from the Community Colleges of Spokane. I saw that they were looking at some geese, but upon closer inspection, I found what they were really interested in—the geese were standing guard over their babies. I’m pretty sure this is the first time I had ever seen baby geese, so of course, I snapped some photos.

Overall, my walk was 3.2 miles (5.15 kilometers) with negligible elevation gain.

After having such an amazing experience throughout Montana, I thought everything else would be underwhelming in comparison, but even with Mon­tan­a still fresh in my mind, Spokane was a very pleasant experience. I have plans to continue my road trip by going through Canada, but I haven’t fi­nal­ized my return path yet; needless to say, I’m thinking of a way to route my return path back through Spokane again, as I’m looking forward to ex­plor­ing the city some more.

 

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The Montana round-up

by   •   Travel
 

After entering through the southeast in late April, I made my way all the way across the state of Montana, stopping for medium-to-long stays in four out of the five biggest Montanan cities: Billings, Bozeman, Helena, and Missoula.

Prior to visiting Montana for the first time ever as part of this road trip, my favorite state was Colorado, with Utah coming in at second. I really enjoyed South Dakota, but I wouldn’t consider South Dakota as a whole as one of my favorite states; just like how I wouldn’t call Nevada my favorite state just be­cause I love Las Vegas, I felt like I couldn’t generalize my experience in southwestern South Dakota and apply it to the entire state.

Now, I can pretty confidently say that Montana is my favorite state in the United States, bumping the other states down one place. I obviously don’t have comprehensive exposure to either Mon­tana or Colorado, but with my limited experience, as well as the knowledge I have about the areas of the states that I haven’t been to yet, I still think Colorado is amazing, but Montana beats it out by a little bit.

I’ve briefly touched on almost all of these points already sparingly throughout my previous Montana blog posts, but I figured I would do a summarized round-up and try to pinpoint some of the key reasons why Montana has taken my #1 spot:

  • The cities are not congested. Montanan cities have seem to found a sweet spot of equilibrium between density and sprawl. There are enough shops, restaurants, and activities for everyone to enjoy, and there are enough people around that businesspeople are incentivized to set up and make a good living, but it’s also spread out enough that everyone can have their own space.

  • The outdoors in Montana are unparalleled by anything else I’ve seen in America—and I already think this, even though I haven’t been to the north­western corner of Montana yet, which allegedly is the most beautiful part. There are many outdoors activity opportunities (as you might have seen from all the hikes I’ve done). There is always interesting scenery to look at, and when you’re out in the wilderness, the air is probably the clean­est, purest, crispest air I’ve ever breathed.

  • The people are very kind and considerate. All the hikers I’ve encountered radiate warmth, peace, and happiness. Everyone has been proactively friendly to me, initiating conversation, but remaining respectful enough as to not pry too much unless I volunteer the information first.

  • The culture has a strong sense of community. I can’t quite pinpoint what exactly made me feel this way, but I immediately felt a sense of belonging through­out a majority of Montana (the only exceptions being the main university areas in Bozeman and Missoula, but even then, it was “normal” at worst). It’s as if everyone was genuinely interested in getting to know their neighbors so they can be there for one another when they need each other.

  • One silly (but meaningful) thing I really liked was the abundance of no-leash parks and hikes—it evokes great joy when a happy dog comes skip­ping towards you asking for pets, not only because I love animals, but also because it sends a clear message about the culture that people trust each other to be responsible and reasonable—something that is basically impossible in major cities.

  • Although there seems to be a lean towards conservatism, there is still good political balance across the state. Especially in the past few years, I’ve learned about the importance of politics and how it can shape a community. When it comes to important matters, failure to have differing o­pin­ions can be harmful, as we can see in states like California and in cities like Seattle and Portland. In Montana, people seem much more willing to actually share their conflicting view­points, discuss controversial topics, and listen to each other, rather than simply trying to shut down everyone who disagrees with them.

  • This isn’t quite as applicable to me because I don’t think I’m going to move to Montana, but for those who do, it seems like a good place to raise a family, with good in-state education options and low cost of living. There are also some more obscure perks, like no state sales tax.

I have plans to head into Canada for a bit over the summer, and because of how positive my experience has been in Montana, I’m looking to cross the border back into the United States through Montana, which would give me an opportunity to drive through Glacier National Park.

 
For now, with the current leg of my Montana visit wrapped up, I wanted to share some of the leftover photos I had that weren’t quite good enough to war­rant their own individual blog post, but collectively were enough for a round-up.

This first set of photos comes from the Holter Museum of Art in Helena, Montana. This was a relatively small museum with free admission (though I made a donation of US$5 to serve as an admission fee) that seemed to primarily feature art made by the children of Helena. I’m used to going to major museums with famous art pieces, but looking at art made by kids was a very unique experience and gave me some insight on how the current youth per­ceives the world.

I went through a phase a little while back of being very interested in “luxury” books with full-grain leather covers, gold foil wrapping, and other unique features. One of the things I liked was art painted on the side of the book that morphed perspective when you opened and closed the book. I found something similar at this museum, which isn’t bad, considering it was painted by someone in middle school.

With my adoration of cats, and having lived with three cats with my most recent previous roommate, I liked this multi-layer art piece, which had thread link­ing the hearts of the girl and the cat. Pudding the Persian liked to sleep by my head on or beside my pillow, and this reminded me of him.

Funny enough, my favorite art piece wasn’t exactly an art piece, but rather, a satire label of the water fountain titled “Ever-Flowing Tears.”

One section of the museum had wireframe models hung up on the ceiling, which I thought were very interesting. I also found it very impressive that a student managed to put all this together and have it come out so well.

My next batch of photographs comes from Spring Meadow Lake State Park, also in Helena.

While in Bozeman, I stayed at the Residence Inn by Marriott Bozeman Downtown and was lucky enough to get a room with a balcony that had an a­maz­ing view to the northwest. It was snowy on the day I arrived, but once the snow melted, the cloud cover and fog cleared and revealed an amazing lay­er of snow-tipped mountains.

And finally, I like to share hotel room photos when I stay at a new hotel brand or one that is of a newer generation of interior design. In Helena, I stayed at the Delta Hotels by Marriott Helena Colonial, which was my first ever Delta. It seemed like it was an older hotel, though the interior was still nice and simple. The lobby area of the hotel had a vintage-feeling staircase going up to the second floor, and the building itself was actually quite large.

During my stay, I noticed that it wasn’t really that busy and the rooms weren’t getting filled, but the meeting rooms were bustling—it seemed like com­pa­nies rented out meeting rooms for corporate events during the day, and I saw that some of them were even being used for Advanced Placement ex­ams for high schoolers.

With Montana complete, here is the latest in my travel map:

 

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Four-month update: Investing $10k in the stock market – Parkzer vs. DougDoug and Twitch chat

by   •   Finance
 

Disclaimer: I am not an investment advisor, and the information contained in this post is not intended to be construed as financial advice. This is simply an anecdotal report of a personal project and does not imply that you should copy my strategy. Past performance is not a guarantee of future re­sults. Con­sult a certified professional if you need guidance with your own financial strategy.
 

Today marks the exact four-month point since starting the US$10,000.00 stock market investment challenge with Doug Wreden and his Twitch chat.

If you’re not up-to-date and don’t feel like reading the previous blog post for all the details, here’s a summary:

  • Doug and I each put $10,000 of our own money into the stock market by individually picking ten companies in which to invest.
  • Because Doug is not an experienced investor, he solicited for help from his DougDoug community on Twitch to contribute to the decision-making process.
  • I have low faith in the success of the stock market over the next year, so I took a more conservative route and bought into sectors that perform well during a recession; on the other hand, Doug’s Twitch chat seems to have not really stuck with an overarching plan, and instead just picked stocks that they generally liked or thought were good companies.
  • Whichever portfolio has a higher balance after market close on January 23, 2023 wins. All profits get donated to charity, and the person with the low­er portfolio balance has to do a punishment as voted on by Doug’s Twitch chat.

With all that out of the way, here is how our portfolios are doing:

Table containing 27 rows and 9 columns of stock market data

As of today, my portfolio is beating Doug’s with a lead of $1,016.31.

My portfolio is generally hanging in there, with Pfizer and Waste Management being the biggest winners. Walmart had also been doing ex­treme­ly well, but as you can see from the sparkline, it recently tanked after they (and Target Corp.) announced that their first-quarter earnings were worse than ex­pected.

Doug, on the other hand, is going through a very rough patch in his portfolio. He had actually been doing well at first, but with Netflix committing com­mer­cial suicide and the general sell-off of technology stocks, things are not looking good for him.

I’m also tracking a few benchmarks to see how our portfolios would have been doing had we invested them in the broad stock market instead of picking our own individual stocks. My hedge-against-recession portfolio has actually been doing pretty well com­pared to the S&P 500, having consistently been higher than it over the past two months and beating it by $258.05 as of today. However, Doug is falling fairly far behind, at $758.26 in the negative com­pared to if he had just bought the S&P 500.

Bonds are generally considered a safe investment, but even bonds are dropping in price. I personally use Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Fund Ad­mi­ral Shares (VBTLX) in my main investment portfolio, so I decided to use the ETF version BND as the benchmark. If Doug and I had invested in bonds instead of companies, Doug would have $1,078.37 more in his portfolio, while I would have only $62.06 more.

Investing internationally is another common way to diversify a portfolio, and I personally own a large chunk of Vanguard Total International Stock In­dex Fund Ad­mi­ral Shares (VTIAX) in my investment portfolio, so I used the ETF version VXUS as our benchmark. If Doug and I had decided to go broad market international instead of investing domestically, Doug would have $849.49 more in his portfolio, while I would be down $166.82.

And finally, to keep things interesting, I also decided to do a benchmark with cryptocurrency. I selected the Grayscale Digital Large Cap Fund (GDLC), not only because I already personally own it in my regular investment portfolio, but also because it is a way to be able to track the health of the broader cryp­to market, as opposed to looking at just a single coin. As of today, the holdings of GDLC include about 65% Bitcoin; about 27% Ethereum; less than 2% each of Solana, Cardano, and Polakdot; and less than 1% each of Uniswap, Chainlink, Avalanche, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash. If Doug and I had taken a risk and put that $10k into crypto instead, Doug would be down $1,984.69 more, while I would be down $3,001.00 more.

If you haven’t noticed yet, I switched the platform I use to track our stocks—I wasn’t fully satisfied with the features of my previous platform, so I de­cid­ed to make my own using Google Sheets and Google Finance instead. Quotes from Google Finance can be up to 20 minutes behind, so it’s not vi­a­ble to use for active trading, but for my purposes of wanting full customizability and the non-urgency of price updates, it works perfectly due to its in­te­gra­tion with Google Sheets.

One of the features I was hoping for previously was to be able to chart our actual portfolio values over time, as opposed to only being able to chart per­cent changes; I made my own chart that sources from a table of the entire daily history of our portfolios, so now you can see the actual dollar a­mounts as the days progress.

My portfolio actually hadn’t been that stellar for a decent chunk of time, but you can see the point in early April at which I pull ahead and everything starts plummeting. Just like how it suddenly changed then, there is just as likely of a chance that it can suddenly change again in the future in the op­po­site direction. We’re still 8 months away from the end of the competition, and that’s a long time for unexpected things to happen, so I’m not getting too complacent.

In the meantime, I still think it’s pretty fun to keep tabs on our progress so we can will a higher power to move the stock market towards the favor of our own portfolio.

 

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Hello, The “M” Trail in Missoula, Montana

by   •   Hiking
 

After making stops in Billings, Bozeman, and Helena, my final stop in Montana before heading west into Idaho and Washington was Missoula. I only ended up booking two nights in Missoula because hotel prices were high and there wasn’t much availability for my special promotional discounted rate that I’m eligible for.

On the day I made the two-hour drive from Helena to Missoula, I made a stop at the “M” Trail on the eastern side of Missoula to get in a quick hike during the time I had before check-in for my next hotel was available.

The trailhead is in the University of Montana campus, but I was able to get free parking in a lot on Campus Drive near the police department because I hiked on a Sunday, and restricted parking is not enforced on weekends. The trail itself is a series of fourteen switchbacks leading straight up to the big, white “M.” Because of the steep incline being built on the side of a mountain, there were nice views of Missoula on the way up, which progressively got better the higher I went.

The actual “M” itself appeared to be made out of some sort of stone (or possibly concrete?) painted white. I’m suspecting it could be concrete because it appears to have been molded into that shape (rather than assembled from smaller pieces), because I noticed that there was some writing engraved into the “M” in some areas.

The “M” isn’t the summit of this mountain—the summit was still a way’s away at the peak of University Mountain—but I hadn’t eaten enough that day and wasn’t prepared for a longer hike, so I decided to stop at the “M.” This was still plenty high enough to get amazing views of all of Missoula, as well as East Missoula and the interstate I took alongside Clark Fork River to get to Missoula.

And of course, with my luck with weather, it looked like some pretty gnarly storm clouds were fast approaching, so I hurried my way back down as to not get rained on or randomly struck by lightning.

The total hike was only a mile and a half, but the grade was high enough that it would leave me winded after doing a few switchbacks. My GPS tracker shows that I hiked 1.64 miles (2.64 kilometers), but I believe only about 1.2 miles of that was part of the straight ascent up and descent down; the rest was relatively flat as I went around to the other side to get another angle of the view. The total elevation gain ended up being around 650 feet (198 meters).

I’m looking at some of my past hikes, and I think this might actually be the highest intensity of incline that I’ve climbed. This comes out to an average of about 107 feet climbed every tenth of a mile, while I believe my previous steepest hike was Ensign Peak, north of the Capitol Hill district in Salt Lake City, Utah, at 94 feet climbed every tenth of a mile.

 

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Hello, Mount Ascension in Helena, Montana

by   •   Hiking
 

For my second major hike of Helena, Montana, I went to Mount Ascension on the south side of the Helena Micropolitan Area. I had difficulty finding a day to go hiking again because of how much it rained during my stay in Helena, and it was still forecasted to rain on the day that I went to Mount As­cen­sion, but I figured that I would end up not really being able to do anything if I keep rescheduling things trying to dodge rain, so I went anyway.

Mount Ascension is near Mount Helena, which I already hiked—it’s sort of “across the street,” on the opposite side of West Main Street and past Davis Gulch Road. Mount Ascension had way more smaller trails leading up to the summit than Mount Helena, and it seemed like it would be a very nice pick-your-own-adventure style of hiking area for the locals who would make repeated visits.

I started heading southbound towards the summit on Pay Dirt Trail, after which I believe I connected onto the edge of Little Moab Trail, then went a­long­side Pail Rider Trail. All the paths had some nice wildflowers nearby.

When I say that there are a lot of smaller trails leading up to the summit, I mean that quite literally—there was a fairly obvious, clear path forward most of the time, but there were very many forks and splits in the road, and I even saw one path that seemed like it would be an extremely strenuous straight-shot up to the top, but there were signs saying that the trail is closed, most likely because it wasn’t trafficked enough and the vegetation covered and ob­structed most of the path.

As I neared the top via 2006 Trail, I reached its intersection with Entertainment Trail and Mount Ascension Loop Trail.

This was just as nice as the other hikes I’ve done in Montana, and there were some convenient rocks at the top upon which I was able to have a seat, take in the sweep­ing views of Helena and South Hills, rehydrate, breathe in the fresh air, and enjoy the serenity of nature.

After beginning my descent from the summit on a small side trail directly to the north of Mount Ascension Loop Trail, I ran into another lookout spot with an amazing view that I would have probably mistaken for the summit had I ascended in the opposite, clockwise direction. This spot had nice views of the city, and it’s looking like the view extended as far as East Helena on the other side of the interstate highway.

My luck avoiding the impending storm was running out, and it started raining. I was hoping to have an opportunity to go more east and explore the Bom­part Hill area as well if my stamina allowed, but I figured it wasn’t exactly the safest thing to be around a bunch of trees on top of a mountain while it’s rain­ing, so I just took a quick route back down to the parking lot.

Overall, my hike was just shy of 3 miles (which translates to a little over 4.5 kilometers), and the total elevation gain was approximately 930 feet (283 me­ters).

 

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