A couple of hours of climbing and we were treated to a beautiful sunrise - trouble was - I couldn't see it. Mount Rainier is a volcanic mountain, and I had failed to account for blowing volcanic ash. The volcanic ash had irritated my eye with the remaining contact lens, and now I couldn't see clearly out of either eye. I informed the guide that now I couldn't see out of either eye, but I had come too far to turn back now. We were now traveling on steep but relatively smooth snow, so I followed the rope and continued on to the top.

Sitting on the summit, we were treated to clear skies and expansive views - or so the other climbers told me, all I could see was a blur of white and blue. I took several pictures with my auto focus, point and shoot camera so I could at least check out the views later with my photographs. One of the guides remembered that he had a pair of prescription glacier glasses and offered them to me. They certainly weren't the correct prescription, but they were much better than nothing.