“Takin’ it….” In the Alaskan Range
By: Rob Owens
As I swing into the dirt and ice filled crack I am reminded of last
spring in Alaska. The climbing feels similar. Today I am swinging into
a crack full of moss. I miss periodically, dulling my picks. Not much
of an issue, today; I have only another 15 meters of this and then I
will be on comfortable grade 5 water ice. Tonight I will be warm and
safe at my home in Canmore. In Alaska the cracks were filled with
bullet proof ice, the climbing was easier but the consequences were
frightful. If I dulled my picks I would have to deal with them for
another 8000 feet of ice and mixed climbing. The lack of commitment
today is replaced by increased difficulty and similar emotions are
brought forth. I am now trying to free climb the previously aided bolt
ladder on the “Suffer Machine”, on the Stanley Headwall, in my own
Canadian Rockies. Virgin terrain for this, free climbing style. Six
months earlier we were defining ourselves and our style, on a couple
of classic, for a reason, Alaskan gems!
January 2001, Canmore, AB; Eamonn and I are strong! Our friendship,
skills, motivation, and energy. We have been climbing and celebrating
together, with intensity, for the past few years. We have depth!
We need a plan. Something to test ourselves, to express ourselves, our
friendship. Pure this time. We need a challenge, a level that we have
never reached or even attempted. The path to our dreams leads us to
the big mountains of the Alaskan Range. It starts with Mt. McKinley
replaced with thoughts of a committing route on Mt. Foraker, despite
the self doubt that flourishes within us. We then add Mt. Hunter and
eventually, not wanting to sell ourselves short, we again added
McKinley.
The plan. The “Infinite Spur” on Foraker, which was introduced to us
via a local ‘trouble maker’/friend that had completed the third ascent
of this elusive gem the season before. The Moonflower Buttress on
Hunter, front row center at our base camp, and in our dreams, during
the Cassin ridge trip from two years ago. Lastly, another attempt on
the Cassin ridge of McKinley to round off the good ole Canadian Hat
trick. Plum lines on the three major peaks that encompass the rugged
Kahiltna Glacier. Ambitious plan considering the weather patterns of
the range but we figured we might as well plan big.
The summits are not the primary goals; we both need to stay within
certain style guidelines. Low impact, single push, safe, all free, no
jugging of ropes; we were going there to climb.
May 13th 6pm. We have just arrived in Kahiltna base camp. “Fuck it,
there is no time to acclimatize, the weather is good and we should go
for it.” We are camped at the base of the Moonflower. We are already
tired, still unacclimatized and trying a style that we know nothing
about. Starting up an Alaskan grade six with little more then day
packs. Eight pm the next day we start climbing. We pass a couple
climbers that are camped, at the standard ‘first bivy’ ledge, within
three hours. They were the first to try the route this year and from
now on we are blazing the trail.
We climb through the night, all free, running it out, too dark to see
places for good protection, leading in blocks. Scratching up thin ice,
granite, and stemming over the deadly snow mushrooms that are left
precariously perched from the winter storms. Are we too early for this
route, for this style? The leader has a light pack and the second has
the stove, tarp, and food. At noon the next day, after a cold tiring
night of suffering through breaking trail on vertical terrain, we are
at the base of the ‘prow pitch’. We rest a bit, freeze stiff, and keep
moving. I free climb the first pitch and Eamonn follows clean with the
heavy pack. We feel M5+. Great climbing, well protected and technical;
five stars. I then free the next pitch, the pendulum pitch, which
takes too long and I feel rather foolish. This pitch has never been
free climbed before and I was the sucker that thought we should try
it. If we are trying to go light and fast we are now failing. I want
to climb all free but there should be the odd exception. It is M6
slab, safe, but boring compared to rest of the climbing thus far.
Eamonn climbs the pitch as well but does weight the rope for his own
safety, due to the traversing nature of the pitch. A rope length
later, before a big traverse, we chicken out and bail. Fear overcomes
our will and desire. We are too light, or too heavy; green at this
style. It took sixteen hours to climb twelve pitches, most of them not
that hard. We were falling asleep at belays. We started the route
unacclimatized and with sleep deprivation. We learned. We rappel the
route, passing two fresh teams of climbers in the three hours that it
takes to get off. As we lower off the last rappel the glacier we are
on is engulfed by yet another huge powder avalanche that rips down
from the massive gully to our right. I feel small. We really weren’t
that committed I guess. Think of how fast we can do it next time. Next
time we will be confident!
A day of rest, the weather is still good, as is the forecast, we are
off to the Infinite Spur on the south side of Foraker. Different style
but a large challenge. We plan on keeping it clean, single push, safe,
but we will take our time. We have never done anything this massive or
committing.
May 17th, morning, 55lb packs, we start the two-day approach on ski’s.
The approach encompasses immense terrain with crevasses and slopes as
large as I have ever seen. I am nervous, scared and so close to
cracking under the pressure; to speaking up and revealing my fear. I
want to turn around already. Self doubt runs rabid. What if we get
caught in a storm up high, what if we break a leg? If anything goes
wrong high on this route we are as good as dead. I am sick with fear.
If I bail out I might as well quit climbing forever. I can’t do that,
this is what I live for. Climbing is my form of self expression, my
art. I master my fear for a little while longer.
May 18th,1pm, the base of the route, in a storm, avalanches pouring
relentlessly off the steep walls surrounding us. I stick the point of
my pocket knife into the palm of my hand that exposes a large amount
of grotesque meaty flesh that pours out from deep within. I have an
excuse to chicken out, but I don’t. I am worried about infection. If
it gets infected we’re fucked.
May 19th , we start up the massive route of our present dreams. Last
night my fear was replaced with drive. All is good now and I am ready
to commit. The fear is mastered.
We deal with a complex bergshrund, then send 1500 ft. of steep snow,
at night, in good weather. We have the reserves to keep warm in the
frigid nighttime temperatures. We are now at the base of why we came.
Multiple pitches of five star mixed climbing, well protected,
committing. Fear is lost and the zone is reached.
The climbing eases in the following days but the weather worsens. We
are blazing the trail for subsequent ascents. Plowing through
bottom-less snow, digging platforms, knocking the top off steep snow
ridges. The puncture wound in my hand is constantly trying to close
only to be ripped open at regular intervals, sending striking pain
down my spine. We climb mostly at night to avoid the shit weather that
the daylight brings. It is snowing almost everyday and is whited out
most of the time. We push on. Sleeping through the storms of the day
and climbing in the cold, clear nights.
We crank the foreshortened 3000 foot“icy ridge” in a record slow time,
at night, amongst darkness, in the cold, digging the whole way, and we
are exhausted at the base of the rock buttress that blocks the way. We
are early in the season and there is a lot of snow left over from the
winter storms. Maybe we should have waited a few weeks?
On the first ascent, in 1979, George and Michael went right of the
buttress to find hard, loose 5.9 rock climbing. Last year, Barry and
Karl went left and suffered through deep snow and slow ice climbing.
We go straight up the buttress; a gully splits the headwall that
offers three pitches of very fun and interesting mixed climbing. At
most AI 4 but stressful where the ice is thin, runout and tiring on
the steep, vertical bulge with the still, 50 lb packs.
The same day, really tired now! We desperately need a ledge of some
sort to stop and sleep on. We carry on with several pitches of steep
mixed climbing up to M5. Three hard pitches in total. The relentless
spindrift, heavy packs, and major fatigue don’t help things. Amazing
climbing quality. Ice filled cracks. I begin to weep; trying to get
purchase with an axe pick so dull…..! I strive to reach the ice, deep
inside a crack that I can almost get an arm into. I swing 20 times
trying to feed my fist and tool cleanly through the gauntlet in order
to reach the ice deep inside. I have no accuracy and proceed to wear a
hole in the backside of my glove. I throw a temper tantrum not five
meters above Eamonn. I scream and curse through the unrelenting
spindrift caused by the increasingly intense snowfall and wind. Seems
to be a low point…or will it be a high point? Maybe if I ever have to
opportunity to reflect on this climb. Previous and subsequent teams
have avoided this slow but aesthetic climbing by scooting left on easy
snow slopes.
We are at the base of the dreaded horizontal ridge. The tent ledge
that we end up with, after two hours of digging, lends itself to the
worst night of sleep that we have ever had not to mention a feeling of
major commitment.
The next day brings suffering, the true meaning of suffering. Fear,
danger, avalanches, near death from being pulled off of the knife-edge
snow ridge by a releasing slab avalanche. Shoveling, crawling,
surviving every step of the way. Exposed, no gear except the rope and
the grim idea of jumping off the other side. What would the
consequences be of jumping off the exposed, jagged rocky left side of
the ridge, to save Eamonn, if he slips down the 60-degree ice face on
the right? Lets leave this one to mystery. Whiteout, howling winds, no
stopping permitted, not due to the lack of wanting or trying.
When my energy fades and my hope diminishes Eamonn raises up and takes
the lead; when Eamonn is tired I take the lead. We are feeding off of
each others energy; if we both sit down we may never get up. We are a
strong team. Our goal is life and we know what it takes to keep each
other moving. A surprisingly fun mixed pitch ends the suffering with a
light clearing in the weather and a posh ledge below the serac band at
14,000 feet.
A good nights sleep reveals slight altitude sickness in Eamonn and the
grimacing, enhanced storm continues. Our journey to the summit will
involve exposed avalanche slopes that are a funnel for huge terrain
above. We have four days of food left. The slopes are already loaded
and it is snowing heavily. When will it stop? If it snows for four
more days it will only get worse. We want to move now but can’t.
Getting sick up high is not an option. Going down is not an option. We
are forced to rest a day. The darkest day of my life. Too much time to
think about our chances, all that I want out of my life, all that I
haven’t yet received or experienced. My whole life runs through my
mind. People I haven’t thought of in years, people from my childhood.
Every meaningful situation that I have ever had; all of it revealed in
the thirty some hours that we spend being tortured, enlightened.
Eamonn is feeling the same. We don’t talk about it but we both know it
as we are writing it down on the small amounts of soggy paper that we
both brought for situations just like this.
The next day dawns and the storm raves on. The slopes above aren’t
visible but they don’t look good. We hear constant distant avalanches.
Eamonn feels better and we feel the need to go for it, to get it over
with! We swear to each other to protect ourselves as best we can. I
want, need to live; more then ever before. If we must, we will dig,
for an hour every rope length, to find a place to put an ice screw;
life insurance. We may get hurt but atleast we won’t be ripped off the
mountain. I take off and immediately knock off a small slab. I whimper
and keep going. We must try. It isn’t that bad. We find ice frequently
enough to do running belays and the snow seems fairly stable. Six
hours, a short day, with nasty winds and sharp snow ripping at the
skin on our faces, produces safety at 16,000 feet. We dig in for the
night; and end up digging every hour for the next twenty five as the
weather worsens and our tent is relentlessly threatening to collapse
with the accumulations from blowing snow. I stay soaked all day and I
know my energy level is low when I refuse to warm up, despite resting
in the tent. The next morning reveals a slight clearing and we go for
it. Not twenty minutes later we are in a whiteout, again, and insane
winds drain our energy. The climbing is easy but we are very tired and
it is very cold. I have the luxury of swinging my hands to prevent
them from freezing, unlike the several days earlier on the “ice ridge”
when the present blisters on my finger tips were created. Pragmatism,
survival, desire and action! MOVE!
We summit, ponder for no more then 3 seconds and start down the broad,
crevasse loaded Sultana ridge. We are not having fun. We haven’t had
fun for some time now. Fun is a luxury we cannot afford. Fun is for
climbing at the Stanley Headwall with a morning start at the Summit
Café and an evening of reflection at the Drake Inn over a couple of
warm Guiness stout. We are in the alpine, fighting. Alpinism is about
self discovery and the future. Enlightenment is unattainable with a
smile and your arm around a girl.
Zero visibility, with no sign of previous ascent, we wallow down the
Sultana ridge, deep snow all the way. Powder snow is covering the
crevasses that we fall into at regular intervals. My back is tied in
knots from the still, too heavy loads. Why, I ask? One more night on
the mountain and we will be in the safety of base camp. So close yet
so far!
May 26th, 5pm. We race across the flat glacier toward Kahiltna base
camp, trying to beat the hoards of West Buttress-eer's that finally
had a break in the weather that allowed them to get back to the safety
of base camp. If they only knew. We are eating our pain. I am ready to
cry.
A good night rest and a day of reflection provide the energy needed
for the last push. We need to pick up our skis that we left twelve
miles of glacier travel away, at the base of the south face of Foraker.
Our style dictates no garbage and if we left these skis we would be
failing. We use snow shoes and leave base camp at 9pm, utilizing the
cooler temps of the night, to minimize suffering during the intense
radiant heat of the day. Ten hours later we had blown our loads but
were back at base camp and waiting for the plane. We are tired, sick
of suffering and fully worked over. We are leaving! Too much pain
already.
May 28th, 9am and we catch a glimpse of the route as we drop over
“one-shot” pass in our single engine ski plane. What a line it is!
Plum, steep, direct. Everything that I had ever dreamed of. The style
was impeccable. We spent less then two weeks in the Alaskan range and
achieved great things externally and internally. Safe, minimal
garbage, all free, no jugging, low impact due to the amount of time
spent in the area, single push and minimal time spent acclimatizing.
We worked hard. We spent less then three days in total in base camp.
I don’t feel we failed on the Moonflower Buttress. We left the route
incomplete, but we didn’t sacrifice our style. On Mt. Foraker we
overflowed with success. Our goal was to summit while keeping within
certain style guidelines. We achieved both.
Now I can dream up new adventures. I just reached a new level: in
climbing, consciousness, spirit, and life. What is to come? I now
understand the importance of, as my friend Ben always says, “takin’
it”. Sometimes you have to “take it” in order to reach “it”. Climbing
doesn’t have to be fun. Fortunately it sometimes is. We climb to push
ourselves; we push ourselves to learn, evolve, and prosper.
I feel now, here on what they call the “Suffer Machine”, that today I
have it pretty good. Not much suffering at all. Pain free, suffer
less, free at last!
By: Rob Owens
This piece was in the 2002 Canadian Alpine Journal. This is my copy
before all the grammar was ‘improved’ upon.
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