MOUNT OLYMPUS — In case you were wondering what those smoke signals were coming from the mountaintop this past Monday, Feb. 27, that was just Joseph Bullough's camp stove as his wife, Shelley, and a few hardy friends grilled a few hot dogs to commemorate Joe's 400th ascent of Mount Olympus.
You have your routine, Joe has his. At least once a week, and very often much more regularly than that, he climbs the 9,026-foot mountain on the east side of the Salt Lake Valley that was named after, and sorta looks like, the original Mount Olympus in Greece, aka home of the gods.
His 400th summit was nothing out of the ordinary, other than that it was a milestone. Instead of his usual 3-hour roundtrip, Joe and friends spent time at the top to have lunch and soak it all in. After that it was time to, well, do it again. Five days later, Joe racked up No. 401, Three days after that came 402; 500 is just around the corner.
Olympus isn't the North Face of the Eiger, but it's no walk in Liberty Park either. There's 4,100 feet of elevation gain in the three and a half miles from the trailhead to the summit. It takes the average fit person about five hours to go up and come down. Joe, 47, routinely does it in almost half that. His fastest round trip is one hour and 58 minutes. One time he climbed Olympus five times in one day. That took 16 hours.
Why does he do it?
Here's Joe's variation on "because it's there":
"I'd rather do that than run around the track at Olympus High School."
The mountain has become his own private workout gym, refuge and sanctuary all in one. His home is just three miles from the trailhead. He can be there in five minutes. Five minutes after that and he's left the world behind, rising above the pollution, drinking in the fresh air, getting great exercise, and when he's through, "you can go home and eat all you want."
In addition to all that, Olympus keeps him fit to climb all the other mountains on his horizon. Joe has scaled the highest peaks and negotiated many of the long traverses that the Rockies have to offer. He likes the long ones.
He did a 46-mile out-and-back to Gannett Peak, the highest point in Wyoming, in 25 hours. He did a rim-to-rim-to-rim in the Grand Canyon in a single day. Another time he started at the ocean in Maui, wound up at the top of Mauna Kea, Hawaii's highest point, and returned to the ocean, a 38-mile grind.
Five years ago, in the winter of 2007, Joe and climbing companion Brian Dutton set out to conquer a route called the Beatout in the mountains north of Little Cottonwood Canyon. Wearing mountaineering boots and crampons, the two were about to crest Pfiefferhorn when an avalanche dumped them off the cliff. Both were seriously injured but Brian remained conscious and was able to rush to Joe, turn him over so he could breathe, and keep him warm until search and rescue loaded them into a helicopter five hours later.
Joe had several broken ribs, two cracked vertebrae, a collapsed lung, a deep gash on his head, a broken pelvis and a traumatic brain injury. He was in the hospital for 30 days. He still can't remember a single detail of the accident and he has double vision that persists to this day.
Some people might swear off climbing after that. Not Joe. He got back on the mountain as soon as possible. Three months later he was again atop Mount Olympus — shaky and slower, but still on top. Four months after that he stood on the summit of the Pfeifferhorn.
"Never give up on what you love," he says. "No matter what."
"His stamina, perseverance and inner strength are amazing," says fellow mountaineer Michael Hannan.
No one knows this better than Joe's wife, Shelley, who nursed him through his rehabilitation and applauded his return. Shelley loves the mountains too. On her first date with Joe, they had dinner and then went for a hike in City Creek Canyon. Their second date was climbing to the top of King's Peak, Utah's highest point. Shelley's climbed Mount Olympus more than 100 times herself.
"We'd rather be on the mountain than anything," says Shelley as she looks around at their kitchen that has been in a remodeling phase for several years now. "The kitchen has suffered, but we're doing what we love."
As for Joe, a mechanical engineer who works for the Bureau of Reclamation, he stands in his front yard and gazes at the perfect view of Mount Olympus like he's staring at an old friend.
"I'll keep climbing it as long as I can," he says.
Because it's there. And because he can.