At 81, Richland man still climbs

Bill Painter of Richland wanted a little activity before sitting down to talk about becoming the oldest person to reach the top of Mount Rainier. Nothing too strenuous.

Just pedaling 44 miles on his bicycle, digging a backyard fish pond and hiking 900 feet up Badger Mountain.

At the age of 81, five months and 11 days, Painter reached the 14,411-foot summit about sunrise on July 4, breaking a mark set by Jack Borgenicht of Long Valley, N.J., who got to the top on his 81st birthday in August 1992, Mount Rainier National Park officials confirmed.

Not only did Painter carry his own 50-pound pack, but — unlike Borgenicht and most of the other 11,000 climbers who try to scale the snowy peak each year — he did it without a guide.

“It’s very uncommon,” park search and rescue supervisor Michael J. Gauthier said Wednesday. “I think it’s really quite an achievement.”

Painter was the leader, accompanied by his sons, their wives and his grandson.

They followed the most typical route, going from Paradise at the high point on the park road to 10,000-foot Camp Muir on July 2, crossing to Ingraham Glacier the next day and reaching the top at 5:45 a.m.

Conditioning? Painter bikes more than 150 miles a week and has scaled Badger Mountain 1,132 times, climbed in Nepal and gotten 20,000 feet up 29,035-foot Mount Everest.

In jest, Painter said his energy comes from the job he had before he retired 19 years ago, helping to make plutonium for hydrogen bombs at the Hanford nuclear reservation.

“It was those atomic drinks,” he said.

When it comes to physical fitness, Painter is a born-again.

A native of Logan, Utah, he grew up in a valley surrounded by mountains and enjoyed climbing, but after a year at Utah State University he joined the Army and began smoking, a habit he didn’t shake until he was 45.

In retirement he has kept busy with such projects as digging the hole for an 8-foot-deep swimming pool in his back yard — by hand, with a shovel.

•Six members of the Spokane-based Hobnailers hiking club have completed a seven-weekend project to walk the entire 72-mile Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes.

“We did it in five pieces, ranging from 11 to 16 miles each,” said Gard-ner Bailey, who joined the club in 1999 after reading about their weekly walks in The Spokesman-Review. Joining Bailey were Larry and Marlene Charneski, Tim DeWitt, Elnora Wildermuth and Harriet Skaarvold.

The paved rail-trail follows the old Union Pacific railway across the Idaho Panhandle from Plummer, along Lake Coeur d’Alene and the Coeur d’Alene River to Mullan.