Meals International Mountain Guides provides dinner, breakfast, and hot drinks while on the mountain for most Mt. Rainier programs (does not include 1 or 2 Day programs such as CMGH or CRS). We do our best to provide simple, tasty and nutritious breakfasts and dinners for you while on the mountain. We try to supply high quality, hearty food considering the mountain setting. Your guides will be melting snow for hot drinks and for cold drinking water.
The dinner at Camp Muir is often something like burritos: rice, refried beans, sautéed vegetables and pre-cooked chicken or beef. At high camp on the Ingraham Glacier it will commonly be a one-pot rice or pasta meal with added fresh vegetables and a meat option. Breakfasts are simple and quick affairs. Pancakes and bacon are common at Camp Muir. We depart high camp on day three before dawn, so breakfast is either instant oatmeal or cold cereal. Normal hot drinks are provided at each of these meals coffee, cocoa, tea and hot cider.
We do our best to accommodate most dietary lifestyle preferences, such as vegetarian, pescatarian, vegan and gluten free diets. We recommend that vegetarians, pescatarians and vegans bring additional protein supplements. Talk to your guide when you arrive for your ½ Day Team Orientation about food. (Please see *below if you he Medically Necessary Dietary Restrictions).
Trail Snacks/lunches It is your responsibility to provide your own lunch/trail food for your climb, as well as meals before and after your climb. You can click here to see what some of our guides bring to eat on the mountain. Make sure you bring enough calories to keep you going all day. We will be working hard while on the mountain so don't cut yourself short. This is no time to go on a diet, because if you don't keep fuel in the furnace you'll run out of energy. You will often hear the guides saying, "Lunch begins after breakfast, and ends at dinner," meaning that we eat at every rest break throughout the day and there will never be a set "lunch" break. Bring foods that you know you'll want to eat. Some mountain forites for the first day are cold pizza, deli sandwiches, fried chicken, and potato chips. Things like G.O.R.P, granola bars, fruit, string cheese, crackers, dried meats like salami, candy bars, etc. are good any day. It never hurts to throw in some electrolyte powder or other drink mix for your water.
Powerbars, Cliff Bars, Luna Bars, etc. can be great energy but just make sure that you are going to want to eat them. They can be bland and unpalatable in the high altitude cold of a mountain and can also freeze and be impossible to eat. Make sure that whatever you bring can either be eaten while cold, or can fit in your pocket to stay warm. Finally, it is not a bad idea to bring a couple of gel packets (like Gu or Power Gel) for summit day. If you lose your appetite on the upper mountain, a Gu will keep you going and is easy on the stomach.
Beverages For all of our programs on Mt. Rainier, we recommend each person carry two wide mouthed Nalgene plastic bottles. Wide mouthed bottles are easier to fill, especially when melting snow, and resist freezing a bit longer than small necked bottles. In the early season (May-June) you may want to carry your bottles in insulated covers, like the Outdoor Research Water Bottle Parka to oid freezing. In the later summer, we carry our bottles wrapped in our puffy jackets inside our packs on summit day. Two bottles should last you through the hiking day until you get to camp. Later in the summer, running streams may provide an additional source of water below 8,000 feet. If you drink stream water, we recommend treating it with either iodine tablets or chlorine dioxide tablets. Iodine is fast (30 minutes) but has a bad aftertaste unless used with the optional taste neutralizing tablets. Chlorine dioxide takes 4 hours but has little aftertaste.
At camps, the guides melt enough water for all to hydrate and fill their bottles. The guides also melt water for the morning and evening meals which both include a variety of hot drinks. At meals, all water consumed is brought to a boil and is safe to drink. For filling water bottles, we can't boil enough water to fill everyone's bottles. Instead, we recommend that each person decide for themselves whether to treat their water or not. If the water source is clean, untouched snow, we normally assume it will be relatively pure. Later in the season, when the last winter's snow is all melted, it might be a good idea to treat un-boiled water. Again, we lee it to the individual to make their own decision. IMG and our guides cannot guarantee the purity of any drinking water on the mountain.
A great way to mask the taste of boiled or treated water is with drink additives like Gatorade, Nuun, Cytomax and others. These electrolyte replacement mixes add flor and some essential nutrients to your water. Just be sure to let the water treatment you use work completely before adding sugared drink mix or it will neutralize the effect.
*Medically Necessary Dietary Restrictions Individuals with medically necessary food restrictions should disclose this information during the online application process. While it is possible for us to accommodate many situations, we encourage you to inform us in advance if you he a serious condition necessitating strict medical food restrictions (i.e. serious food allergies) so we can help advise you. You should also consult with your licensed medical practitioner and follow their advice. In certain circumstances we may advise you to supplement your meals with your preferred protein options or replacement diet. If you he a history of anaphylaxis, please consult your physician and plan to he an epi-pen ailable in case of emergency exposure. Please inform your guide on arrival of food restrictions.
Please note that we will still bring, prepare and make ailable to you the same meals that are provided for the entire team. No credit, compensation or refund will be provided for unused team food provided by IMG.