Alpine Style!

Trip Report, Slo-Am Makalu West Face Expedition 2008

Our expedition to Makalu occurred from September 12^th through November 15^th, 2008. The expedition was plagued with difficulties from start to finish. We made one attempt to climb the West Face which ended no further than the bergshrund below the start of the climbing at 6,300 meters. Steve was ill at the time. Steve also made a solo attempt to climb the West face and reached a higher bergschrund at 6,600 meters.  A new route on the West face of Kangchungtse (aka Makalu 2), 7,600 meters was completed by myself and Marko during our acclimatization.

After some logistical hassles with our planned approach to base camp via helicopter, we ended up doing the week long trek in from the village of Tumlingtar at 400 meters. There seemed to be a lot of confusion among locals, porters and other climbers as to where exactly base camp is located. For the normal route, most climbers seem to prefer a camp in the moraine below the Northwest ridge at around 5,700 meters. This is half a day’s walk from what is referred to as “base camp” by most trekking groups below the South face and at 4,800 meters. This is something not to be overlooked when arranging porters to bring in your expedition loads.  The seasonal monsoon lasted longer than normal and was quite strong until we arrived in base camp on October 4^th. The approach hike was wet, warm and we encountered countless leeches which kept things from being dull.

Upon reaching our base camp, we were shocked to find it incredibly littered with the refuse of numerous previous expeditions. It was the filthiest base camp any of us had ever encountered in our mountain travels. It was a sad site to see and certainly decreased the aesthetics of the otherwise beautiful high mountain surroundings.  Steve and Marko arrived with some cold like illness, which for Steve never went away the entire expedition. Eventually, I too succumbed to the mystery virus, which contributed to the difficulties with this expedition.

The monsoon let up as we arrived in base camp and the winds began. At first, the winds were helpful as it cleared all the monsoon generated snow fall from the steep faces. Conditions up high on the mountain quickly became good for travel on the snow surface, but, obviously, the high winds made life at the higher altitudes challenging.  We acclimatized on the normal, Makalu La, route reaching a high point at Makalu La, 7,400 meters. 

With continuing winds and Steve not feeling all that well, Marko and I decided to attempt a route on the West Face of Kangchungtse which sits on the opposite side of Makalu La from Makalu for further acclimatization. We ascended to camp 2 at near 6,700 meters on the normal route. From there, we went directly to the base of the West Face and ascended a line more or less directly up the center of it. The climbing consisted of mostly steep, glacial ice and some moderate mixed terrain higher up on the face. The difficulties were up to M4 or 5. It took us about 16 hours to complete the 900 meter route and return to base camp via Makalu La. The summit was in the wind most of the day as was that of Makalu. It seemed to be the norm for the duration of our stay in that area. Makalu La was very windy and the tents set up there by a Spanish expedition had been completely destroyed. There was also an abundance of discarded equipment and other climbing refuse left there. Again, this was a saddening site.

Upon descending to base camp, Marko and I both became ill with cold like symptoms similar to Steve’s. After three days there at 5,700 meters and no improvement in either the winds or our health, we decided to descend to a lower camp for a few days’ worth of convalescence.  This helped both our physical and mental health so we re-ascended to base camp to hope for a break in the winds and a chance at attempting the true object of our desires, the West Face of Makalu.

It was now October 26^th and getting pretty late in the season. The winds had not yet abated and the temperatures were continuing to get colder. It was starting to feel pretty wintery around the place. We had to start our trek out to civilization no later than November 7^th, which seemed about as late as one would want to be up there anyway. We waited for a break in the winds and consulted our weather forecaster in the US, Jim Woodmencey, of Mountainweather.com. A slight respite was predicted for the first week of November and we decided to give it our best shot.

On October 30^th, we left base camp with greatly overloaded packs for an attempt. The weather forecast was for improving, but not perfect conditions. As a result, we took a lot of extra stuff for the expected cold, which in turn necessitated a “slower” approach and, hence, even more stuff to last up there longer. We ended up with what I would describe as “failure” packs, but nonetheless, gave it a shot.  We had been at very high altitude for over a month and although we were well acclimatized, the length of stay at that height and our illnesses had left us somewhat physically and mentally deteriorated. We had very little fire in the belly.  We ascended the ice field below the very impressive West Face in awe. There were numerous extremely large craters in the snow and ice from rock fall, likely caused by the wind. We decided on making a bivouac in the bergschrund on the left side of the lower ice field at around 6,300 meters. As we approached the ‘schrund, we became aware of the frequent rock fall down the face and hurriedly got tucked in under its lip.  We flattened a spot in there and made the most of our night getting poured on by wind driven ice pellet and gravel spindrift. The wind that night roared up high and sounded like a big fire. Our tent was somewhat sheltered, but was getting moved a little by occasional gusts. Morning came and none had the motivation to get the show going. We slept in and debated our options: descending, ascending or waiting. Sometime during breakfast, a beer bottle sized piece of ice was blown into the bergshrund and penetrated our tent, narrowly missing Marko’s head and landing in his bowl of oatmeal. It was all the additional information we needed to abort this attempt.

We returned to base camp forlorn but, somewhat relieved. For Marko and me, it was over. We both lacked the energy for another attempt. Our bodies were getting weaker by the day and our motivation was not as high as would be necessary for such a serious outing. Steve, having not done anything resembling climbing thus far on the expedition, was still hungry for something. A few days later, with light pack, he went back up solo on a reconnaissance mission with the option to “go for it” if it seemed at all feasible. He took a slightly different approach and ascended to a slightly higher bergshrund to bivouac in. After a less than pleasant night in the wind, he returned again. During that time, Marko and I also did some further reconnaissance of our own for a future attempt. Marko hiked up a small peak/ridge to the East to get good photos of the entire face, while I hiked down valley and checked out other possible sites for a base camp.

We departed base camp as planned on November 7^th and arrived in Kathmandu on November 15^th.  We spent 34 days in or near base camp and saw two (maybe three) days that looked at all windless up high. The high base camp, though convenient for the normal route, was a difficult place to stay for so long. Our collective illnesses took a toll on our fitness and health. As well, numerous difficulties with the logistics and with our on mountain staff created additional stress for us that we had not encountered on previous expeditions. We did climb one nice new route on a 7,600 meter peak. Also, we gained a lot of information for a future attempt on the face which all of us are eager to try in a few years. The face looks beautiful and difficult, but certainly not impossible. We saw several possibilities for ascent through the immense rock headwall that caps the peak. The biggest problem will be finding good conditions for climbing. During the autumn, the obvious challenge is getting a weather window after the monsoon ends, but before the onset of the winter winds and colder temperatures. The pre-monsoon season presents its own set of challenges with potentially higher avalanche danger due to snow fall on the face. Either season would likely still involve the hazard of rock fall onto the lower ice fields from the rock head wall.

To be continued.

The Northeast Buttress of Slesse Mountain provided me with the finest climbing experience I have ever had in the Cascade Mountains. Seeing as it was Carl’s first trip there, it must have been his, too. Having just returned from a short two weeks of skiing in Chile, it was an abrupt change of gears for me to go from winter and snow back to summer and dry rock. I went through the US customs in Dallas in the morning on my way to Seattle and crossed back out of the US later that day into the fine country of Canada. I wondered what the Department of Homeland Security would think of that, but I was never delayed in any of the multiple border crossings during the week.

Information about  the climb for us was a mixed bag. There were plenty of route descriptions in various guide books, though all were slightly different. We could get no recent info from anyone about access and the glacier approach, etc. The helicopter flight service we hired to ferry us in also knew of no one that had been in there this season. We just needed to fly in and find out for ourselves. We met with the pilot, Dave, later on in the evening after crossing the border. We arranged to have him meet us with the helicopter somewhere out the road into the West side of the mountain, the side we were to descend. This way, we could leave our car as close as possible for when we came down of f of the peak. The flight in was to be brief and very expensive. Little did we know how valuable it would be.

In the early morning the following day, we drove out to the aforementioned road only to find out that it was now closed for no apparent reason some six plus miles from where we wanted to get to and where the pilot was to meet us. We hurriedly drove back towards the town of Chilliwack to make a phone call to Dave before he took off. We luckily caught him and told him of the new pick up point. We knew he’d find us, but now we just added an additional six miles of walking to the already lengthy descent. Ten minutes later, Dave landed and we got in. The weather was nice and sunny with only few small, distant clouds. The views of Slesse and the surrounding mountains were exceptional as we ascended up the West side of the Peak. Dave gave us quite a ride, letting us scope out the death march road to walk out as well as the descent off of the summit. We flew around to the East side of the mountain and got our first views of the Northeast Buttress climbing route and its approach.  We were in for a surprise.

The route looked great. It was clean of snow and looked dry. The glacier leading to it did not look so great. It is a small, dying pocket glacier and was in a state of decomposition. Numerous large blocks of glacial snow and ice lay in the small pocket where there once was a glacier. Some were still falling apart. It looked tricky to get across to say the least. More likely, it would be dangerous. This was looking to be a quick end to our trip. Dave, however spotted a small perch of rock right at the toe of the buttress where the climbing begins that he felt he could get one skid on and, perhaps let us out. We flew up to it in moments and he steadily eased the ship onto the rock pedestal that was smaller than the bed of my pickup truck. It was relatively easy if a little unnerving getting out. The drop off on either side of the rock was severe. Dave was very steady and it felt easier than getting out of a telepherique in the Alps. Moments later, Carl and I were alone on the rock in the quiet of this remote alpine setting. We were essentially on a belay ledge and put our harnesses and helmets on right away. Had I been thinking about it, I would have handed Dave our ice axes and crampons as we probably wouldn’t need them. Oh well, we had planned on climbing the route with the stuff anyway, so we might as well do it.

We started up moderate, fourth class terrain. It was slow going with the big (for rock climbing) packs full of overnight gear, food, water and extra clothes. A few hundred feet up we started belayed, fifth class climbing. The first pitch proved to be one of the more interesting of the entire route. It was not hard, maybe 5.7, but had virtually no protection and involved slabby, friction climbing. I guess the weight of the packs helped with the friction underfoot a little. Harder, but better protected climbing followed. The route was straight forward and easy to follow. It was mostly on the crest and the climbing was always in the 5.6-5.8 range. The ridge steepened a bit in the middle and there was an obvious traverse and bypass to the North side to avoid the harder climbing here. Some larger clouds were forming above now, but it was still pretty nice. The rock was sound by mountain standards. It was also well featured and a real pleasure to climb.  The views down the large sweep of mountain to the decomposing glacier and further on down to the forested valley below were beautiful. There was big relief here and it had a similar feel to being on a big face in the Alps only without any people or cable cars around.

We climbed for hours and on into the afternoon and were still a long way from the summit. This seemed OK since we had bivy gear. Still, I did not trust the clouds above and we hadn’t seen any decent bivy ledges for quite some time. We wanted to summit and start the descent by day’s end, if possible. The final pitches to the top proved to be the best and most challenging. The climbing here was very steep and climbed right onto the crest of the buttress as it flanked the overhanging East face. There was good air here. If you had dropped a biner, it would go for over a thousand feet before hitting anything. There was a pitch of 5.9 in this section that had a small roof to clear. This was the crux. After that, the angle eased, but the climbing was no give away. Brilliant climbing up well featured granite on 5.7/8 ground led us right to the summit which, at 7:00 pm was enshrouded in fog.  We had managed to make the ascent in 13 belayed pitches over 12 hours. Reading the summit register, it appeared that we were likely the first party to have climbed the route that season and only the second to climb the peak at all. Perhaps the road closure and now lengthy approach was scaring people away.

The summit did not have much promise for a comfortable night’s sleep so our stay there was brief.  We wanted to get down to some sort of suitable bivy site before it got too dark to see. The fog made it very hard to find the descent route which was much more complex than the accent route. A few rappels and some traversing later we were in the dark looking for a piece of flat ground. There was not much to be found. Eventually, we found a sloping, earthen ledge. Now, the ice axes were to come in handy. We were able to hack out a flat spot in the dirt with our axes just big enough to get out tent on. It was a good thing we brought a tent, too since the fog had now turned in to light rain.

The bivy was comfortable and dry, however there was no snow around so we were unable to make any water, which we both needed badly. We had been on the move for over 14 hours that day and each had about two liters to drink. We were parched and I felt my legs cramp up throughout the night which poured rain down on top of our shelter. It was a fitful night of sleep, but reasonable enough all things considered. The rain let up a bit in the morning and we got out, broke camp and continued down in the fog. Things were a bit easier to see now that it was daylight, but the fog kept us on our toes for a while longer.

Eventually, we made it out of the technical terrain and simply had to put one foot in front of the other for the six thousand foot toe-pounder of a descent. We walked for untold hours until we reached the road and then our car just before nightfall. Our feet were blistered and our muscles were quite sore, but our spirits were high after such a fantastic climb and good adventure. Highly recommended!

Our second bivy on Mount Alberta (not planned) was a simple matter of just passing the time until it was light enough to see where we were going again. There was no comfort other than the knowledge that we were out of harm’s way for the time being. I lay prone, alternating between shivering and doing isometrics to stave off succumbing to hypothermia. I tried to doze off from time to time as I was genuinely exhausted from the physical exertion, the lack of sleep, the mental anxiety, the BITTER cold, the monster approach, from Mount Alberta. I knew Steve was miserable, as well, but I also knew that he was in his “happy place”, as well. I was too. This is what we came for: complete submission to the beast, salvation through annihilation. Welcome to the church of real alpine climbing.

I knew that my body would somehow wake me before frostbite or hypothermia could take hold. The intermittent spindrift (our companion and foe during the descent down the gully) that powdered my face kept me from sleeping anyway. Lying there, on the tiny snow ledge, in our frozen and wet thin down sleeping bags, passing the dark hours of the night became a lesson in patience. It was a lesson that we had both learned countless times before but were still pupils of the study. Steve had the lighter sleeping bag so he got the small tarp to cover him. Our tiny beds were carved on top of a long, narrow snow ledge, perched below a slightly overhanging rock wall which seemed to offer some shelter from what may come from above. Feeling the allure of the immeasurably greater degree of comfort to be found in the nearby Lloyd McKay hut, Steve did not want to stay here another night. To him, bivying here was as appealing to lying in a ditch one had just dug. I offered him the tarp (it would not fit over the both of us, end to end, on this ledge) as an inducement. We both knew that to continue down this gully in the dark could get us hosed. We had not gone down the normal descent gully and what lay ahead of us was unknown and even more so now that it was dark and starting to snow. It would be better to continue in the daylight and we could definitely stay here for the night in relative safety. At least, this is what I had convinced myself of.

I thought about how cold my feet could get before I had “a problem.” I thought about how nice it would be when (if?) the sun comes up in the morning on this East facing flank of Mount Alberta, bathing us in the first warming rays of a new day. I thought about eating every calorie of food I had on me to give my body’s more fuel (I did this). I thought about the rest of the unknown descent. Would it go? Would the snow be stable? Would it be simple? I thought about the slog through the deep snow back to the hut from the bottom of the face. I thought about the food we had left there. I thought about the long ski in our climbing boots back over Wooley Shoulder and down to Steve’s camper truck on the Icefields Parkway. I thought about my son. I wondered how my girlfriend was sleeping. Shivering through the long hours of a late winter Canadian night there is plenty of time for thinking, too much time.

It may be clichéd, but to say that morning did not come soon enough would be an understatement. I knew from the clear skies above that one thing was sure: warmth, soon. We unfurled ourselves from our snow covered ice wraps and rapped off of the single 3/4” cam we had for an anchor. Several more and some downclimbing through snow saw us clear the bergschrund at the bottom of the face. A thrilling (fun?) glissade down the final slopes delivered us to the much welcomed wallowing, hour long post-hole adventure back to the hut. We had another half a day of simple movement to be released.

Arriving in Talkeetna to clear, sunny skies was a bit of a surprise to Bull and I. We both expected the forecasted rain and snow showers and a leisurely day sorting through our gear and getting packed for our trip to the Root Canal Glacier, the base camp for our hopeful  climb on the Ham ‘n Eggs route on the Moose’s Tooth. We were even more surprised to hear our pilot, Paul, tell us we needed to get ready in an hour. Wow! We were going to get in there this afternoon, an unusually quick turn of events from waking to cloudy skies in Anchorage that morning.

Two hours later we were shoveling snow, making camp just minutes away from the huge bastion of rock that makes up the Moose’s Tooth’s massive South face. The wall is 3,000 feet tall and is spread out along the Root Canal glacier for over half a mile. From the West the corniced summit ridge dances up and down over four different summits culminating on the highest, Eastern summit.  Piercing the through the sweeping granite face to the col between the Eastern central summit and the main summit is an aesthetic, thin line of snow and ice rising for 2,600 feet. This obvious line is the Ham n’ Eggs route. Once considered a test-piece of the Alaska Range, now it is a highly sought after alpine classic and the easiest line of ascent to the Moose’s Tooth’s summit. The route now has numerous would be suitors and, though not exceedingly difficult, the actual summit denies most that attempt the route. Many gain the col, only 400 vertical feet shy of the summit, but do make it the final way to the route’s culmination. Stopping at the col and calling it a “modern ascent” is still just another term for “attempt”.  Nonetheless, we aspired to climb the route in its entirety. What more we hoped to have the real alpine experience and bivy at the col, giving us a full day to reach the summit and descent the complex route. Climbing the difficult ice pitches with full packs on would not be easy, but we wanted more than just a “cragging” day on this mountain.

Knowing Alaska as I do, I told Bull, my client, that we need not to waste any good weather and should probably get after it tomorrow morning if the weather is clear. Though making camp and dinner took us well into the well lit evening hours, he agreed, eager and intoxicated by the Alaskan air. Not being too worried about time, we made a gentleman’s start at 9:00 am. We roped up right at camp and were starting our first mixed pitch just 30 minutes later. The first bit of climbing: honest, scrappy dry tooling was a good wakeup call and helped set the tone for the rest of the climb. After this, we were able to move together for several hundred feet up steep snow to the base of the ice climbing. While certainly not fat by Ouray standards, there was just enough ice on the short, vertical step to allow passage, though not enough for protection. It was strenuous pulling the slightly overhanging bulges with a full pack, but helped keep one’s head in the game. Thankfully, there was no spindrift for which this route is notorious. More steep snow, some extremely narrow ice runnels, and a few more steep steps brought us to the col after six hours of climbing. The weather was still brilliant as we dug a small platform for our tiny tent along the narrow summit ridge.

The summit blazed in the late afternoon sun and with the Alaskan perpetual dusk on our side, we decided to make our bid for the top that evening. We took light packs and traversed to the base of the smooth, 70 degree ice headwall guarding the summit slopes. Being glacial, this was the thickest and hardest ice we had climbed yet. It was calf burning terrain, but it was brief. This was followed up by a few more ever steepening snow pitches then some cornice meandering towards the distant, true summit. The summit of Denali, Mount Hunter, Mount Huntington and the stunning peaks along the Ruth Gorge all were out in their alpenglow glory. Just one day after arriving, we were on top of the Moose’s Tooth! Bull and I were elated in our efforts and the rewards of our labor. Remaining was our descent back to our base camp the following day.

After a restful night’s sleep, we woke to another fine day. Fine enough that we decided to make the short, easy trip over to the peak’s Eastern central summit before starting the long series of rappels down the ascent couloirs.  Two summits and 13 rappels later, we were back on the Root Canal glacier and walking the short distance back to our camp.

We wisely allotted a week for this climb. The weather is often fickle and we certainly did not expect to get up our route so quickly. We enjoyed a snowy rest day talked over the possibility of trying another route on the South face. Rising up between the Western and West central summits lies another deeply inset, narrow gully. The route ascending this couloir to either the West or the West central summit is called Shaken, Not Stirred. Much narrower, more sustained and significantly more difficult than Ham n’ Eggs, Shaken was a route we needed to take very seriously if we were to get up it. It would be much too narrow and difficult for us to realistically climb with full packs, ruling out the possibility of a bivy. We would have to climb fast with day packs, summiting and descending the route’s 3,000 continuously vertical feet in a single push.

After two and a half full rest days, we woke up at 3:00 am and headed over to the route’s hidden entrance. From the get go, we knew that this was a much different beast than Ham n’ Eggs. A pitch of spicy, delicate mixed climbing led to another of ice just 6-8 inches wide up a vertical corner. The “easier” sections of this route were still real climbing and we did not move together through any of it, belaying every single foot of the climb for 20 60-meter pitches. Pitches 11-15 were perhaps the wildest of the climb, threading up an extremely narrow chimney (at times, a foot wide) with ice that was capped in several places by large, overhanging chockstones. Surmounting the chockstones involved strenuous, thinly protected dry tooling and footless climbing. These proved to be the route’s crux. The narrow col above pitch 17 provided a good, albeit windy, place for a brief rest before climbing the corniced ridge on out to the West summit and end of the route.

Though blessed with good weather throughout the climb, the summit was veiled in clouds allowing us only fleeting, limited views of the Ruth Gorge right at our feet. We descended exactly as we came up and made 20 rappels down the narrow cleft to the glacier below.   A 13 hour round trip was good enough for us. We managed to stand atop three of the four summits of the Moose’s Tooth and climbed two incredible routes inside of six days. We left very sated.

So, after working on “re-redpointing” some climbs here in Ouray, I decided to get back to my roots and go for some rock climbing road trip action. I decided to go back to Vegas for the first time in almost ten years. I grabbed my shoes, harnesses, chalk bags, QD’s, a light rack, a few changes of city clothes, my girlfriend, Cindy and off we went!

The weather was perfect and the climbing good. The Gallery, Sweet Pain Wall, The Pier, The Bras Wall, Straight Shooter Wall: we got our asses handed to us on a plate at the crags, which is just what I wanted. All cragging. No long routes. I’ll save the real climbing for later. I just wanted to get spanked. There is a new guide book to Red Rocks out by Jerry Handren, which is a vast improvement on the older ones. It is very well done.

Another fine reason to just go cragging is to allow your self some time in the evening to sample some of the nightlife. Vegas is great also for the plethora of alternative diversions one can fine when not climbing. It is about as much fun watching all the freaky, main stream American tourists meandering the streets at night as seeing one of the shows yourself. Actually, watching the people is a show in and of itself, but that is another story.
Pain, struggle, fantasy, thrashing, pleasure, more pain and rest. These themes sum up our recent Vegas experience: sport climbing, punishment, erotic performances, heavy metal concert, fine dining, whipping onto small wires, waxing, sweating, S & M shops, burning, sleeping, bewilderment and more climbing.

I do feel like I can climb again, but now it is getting cold and I may have to start ice climbing soon. Another thought comes to mind: rock climbing is far better for your ice climbing than vice-versa. Ice climbing helps your head but not your fingers. Those grips on the tools are just too big.

So, here is a bit more regarding my recent climbs with Steve House and Marko Prezelj on both Naisa/Nasir Brak and K7 West.

Naisa Brak, the perfect rock pyramid. The SW ridge is the left skyline, Tasty Talking takes the ridge in the foreground, while the orignial British route (and descent route) takes the right skyline.

We climbed the striking, SW ridge as a day climb from our base camp nearby. We followed a prominent chimney system on the far West side of the South face for about 300 meters to its intersection with the SW ridge. The climbing in the chimney was mostly easy with the occasional 4th and easy 5th class step. At the ridge, we properly roped up and climbed to the summit of the pyramid in 14 pitches. The climbing on the ridge was surprisingly good and the quality of the rock just kept getting better the higher we got. Initially, the the climbing was moderate with difficulty being in the 5.7-5.9 range. By the time we reached the steeper, upper section of the ridge (pitches 10-14) the climbing got harder and more exposed. Also, the crack systems were much more incipient so the route finding was difficult, though the rock was quite featured so extremely climbable. There was some 10+/11- sections on two of the pitches and plenty of 30 to 50 foot run outs on 5.9. It was an extremely nice rock climb and the rock was much better than expected for a virgin line. It was much more run out than the Tasty Talking route on the adjacent SE ridge, but not as sustained in difficulty.

K7 massif showing all three summits and the various bastions of rock that create the fortress like architecture of this complex mountain structure. Our line of ascent took the thin couloir that leads down and right from the summit then disappears behind one of the rock buttresses in the foreground.

We reached the summit of this previously unclimbed peak on September 3rd, our third day in ascent. The climb was comprised of difficulties in rock, ice and snow, each of which was neatly separated by each day of our ascent. The K7 massif is a large fortress like thing that flanked by several, large granite buttresses on all sides. In between many of these buttresses are large, active seracs looming over the lower reaches of the mountain. So, there are relatively few obvious, safe lines on any of the summits. The East/main summit is probably the most accessible, while the middle is the least, guarded on all sides by huge seracs. The West summit has a south face split by a slender, elegant couloir leading to very near the summit. The couloir begins in a large hanging, inner basin that is quite difficult to see from just about any vantage point in the surrounding area. The bottom of this hanging valley ends abruptly in yet another large, active serac, thereby denying easy access.
We found a large dihedral on the rock buttress to the left of this serac that appeared to end in a ledge system that might gain entry to the inner basin. We went out for a reconnaissance climb of this feature and found (once again) surprisingly good rock climbing and that it did indeed give access to the inner basin. So, this would be where we would start the route. When starting the climb in earnest, we had to climb this six pitch section in eight pitches, most of which had to be climbed twice by one of us in order to get our packs up it. The climbing was difficult in places, up to 11-, and rock shoes were necessary, hence the leader would often go without a pack and the pack contained our boots, crampons, and all the other ice equipment, camping supplies, food, etc. It was a good bit of work, but we made it up the rock and into the basin by late afternoon. We found an easy bivuac site on a flat area in the snow, just above the lower serac at about 5,200 m.
The following day we climbed into and up the long couloir splitting the right side of the South face. After soloing for 300 meters, we roped up and climbed the rest of it in about 12 pitches. We found some good ice, some rotten ice and some mixed climbing. The difficulty was up to WI5 with some mixed sections. There was one particularly stunning feature of 80º ice that was about one foot wide. At the top of the couloir, at about 6,000 meters, we moved onto the ridge to the left and, after much debate, decided to hack a bivy ledge into the 30º ice. It was the widest and flattest place we could find. Since we were a party of three, we had a bigger sized tent and chopping the ledge to accommodate it was no short affair.
The morning of our third day started out cloudy, but so had just about every day before that. We had hoped for better weather for our summit attempt and even brought along extra supplies so we could wait out a day or two if necessary. We decided to go anyway, as the weather had not been terrible and we could always come back down. We started off with a long traverse left towards the middle of the upper face. This brought us to several pitches of interesting, but not too hard alpine ice. The altitude started to be a factor here as we were now above 6,000 meters. We moved much slower. We took the path of least resistance up the face to its intersection with the upper part of what would be a South ridge. We tried to follow this ridge on up, but large snow mushrooms forced us to traverse under them to the West. This bit of climbing around the snow mushrooms prooved to be some of the more difficult, time consuming and dangerous climbing of the entire route. The underside of the mushrooms consisted of 60º-80º snow that sometimes would not support your weight. A 60 meter traverse under the biggest of them took us a few hours but put us right under the final, 50º summit slopes, which we easily climbed to the top. Or, did we?
When we arrived at the summit, we all high fived, celebrated, took many photos and expressed our joy in the climb. Though it was a complete whiteout and we could see nothing, it was nonetheless sensational to finally be on top after such a great climb. That is until it cleared for a brief moment and we could see that in addition to the other beautiful summits surrounding us was the ACTUAL summit of K7 West, about 20-30 meters higher and just a little beyond. It was like someone farted in the elevator. The clouds came in again, this time it started snowing, and we beat feet on over to the real summit. Marko was in front and arrived first. Upon getting on top, which is nothing more than a large, overhanging cornice, he noticed a long fracture in the snow propagate from just beyond where he was. He stopped right there, just short of the absolute highest point fearing breaking off the cornice and told Steve and I not to get any closer. It was like being inside a ping pong ball and difficult to tell which direction the cornice lie on: right or left. The summit pinched down to a small triangle of snow a the top. After a much more brief summit celebration, we turned around and began the process of retracing our steps down.
We had to simply reverse the sketchy snow traverse so this took some time. After that, we were able to rappel via V-threads down the ice face back to our bivy which we reached around 9:00 pm after 15 hours on the go. We spent the next day descending the way we came up and did another 14 rappels down the ice couloir and then 6 down the rock dihedral.

“It is the large, siege-mentality expedition that is an aberration, a sixteen-cylinder shark-finned gas-guzzler that should be relegated to the mountaineering junk pile where it so richly deserves to rust.”

R.G. Morse, The Naked Mountain

K2’s mighty West Face is one of the greatest big mountain walls in the world and ripe for a beautiful alpine style ascent. This past summer a large, 18-person team of Russians converged upon Concordia intent on forcing a direct line up the steepest part of the face by any means necessary. Like they have done before on Jannu, they sieged the mountain, fixing ropes from base camp to nearly the summit, establishing seven camps enroute! Like Maestri and many others, they have left the refuse of their daftness behind to spite their detractors and litter the face; a not-so-subtle “fuck you!” to the others to follow like a dog pissing on the fire hydrant.

This expedition marks yet another unfortunate regression in mountain sport at the hands of Russians due to their insistence on adhering to such stillborn styles and attitudes. They call this alpinism? I call it what it is: disgusting, lame and weak! There is no reason for what amounts to the fleecing and raping of the ambitions of future (or, perhaps even the current) generations of inspired alpinists. The” Russian Way” is an agent of death to modern alpinism.

By late July they had breached the main difficulties of the wall, fixing ropes to over 8,000 meters. “The bastion has been climbed!” They would stay there as long as needed to push the route up the remaining 500 meters to the top. There would be little left to uncertainty. Like a machine, the 18-member climbing team would continue to slowly grind and manufacture their way up the face. This is much more reminiscent of a military exercise, not true alpinism. True alpinism is art; it is beauty, things that are quite the opposite of this folly. Hubris, narcissism, vanity and especially solipsism are their true inspiration. Three weeks later, the final 500 meters to K2’s summit succumbed to their greedy hands.

Since these Russians (though certainly not all) clearly were unable to climb K2’s West Face by fair means this summer, then they should have waited until they were able to do so. And, if it is (more likely) just beyond them, then they should have gone elsewhere and tried something that was within their means. Instead, they chose to bring the mountain down to their own pathetic level. Certainly, they should have left it for others who do have the skills, courage and vision to do so. It can be done.

While I am sure my ranting might easily be dismissed as just the jealous rants of a rival climber, I harbor no illusions that I might have been able to do the face justice myself. Still, I would love to have tried and would have humbly accepted defeat had it proved beyond me.

It is a true tragedy that this face has been violated in such a manner. It is forever changed both physically and psychologically. If there is any saving grace it is that in their efforts to force the route up the straightest possible line up the face, they left the obvious, much more elegant “crescent” line to the left untouched. Shame on these men for desecrating yet another great one in the name of the “Russian Way!” What these gentlemen really lack is imagination.

I ended up in the ER last night after being wracked with incapacitating and severe stomach pain. The doctors initially thought I had a gall stone but after many tests, decided I had just picked up an extremely noisome virus from Central Asia. After numbing my stomach, and giving me several Percocets, I was discharged and promptly went out to downtown Seattle and spend the rest of the evening in a small club getting bludgeoned by the local Black Metal act, Wolves in the Throne Room. It was a good head check and rather abrupt “welcome home, Vince.”
Anyway, after cruising the various websites for spray I found trumped up and partially accurate stuff about our expedition. First off, don’t believe the hype. Second off, I know I am coming off as a hypocrite as I said that we would not be doing any updates from basecamp when, in fact, Steve was phoning in and leaving online voice reports on  thecleanestline.com. Well, I did not know about this beforehand and since Steve’s doing the reports basically helped us recoup the cost of our sat phone bill (it gets expensive calling up girlfriends and weather forecasters), it now does not seem like such a bad thing. Even though the information was coming straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak, others still managed to not get the story (exactly) right.
So, without going into gory detail, which, I promise I will do as I have time and my health improves, here are the simple facts of the expedition in outline form.

Sulu Peak (ca. 6,000 m) via a possible new route on the WNW face, 1,000 m, TD.
Naisa/Nasir Brak (5,100 m) via a new route up the SW ridge, 800m, 5.11.
Farol West (ca. 6,300 m) attempt (we made it to the schrund so, I guess that qualifies as an attempt, barely).
K7 West (ca. 6,800 m) first ascent of peak via South face couloir, 2,000 m, ED, 5.10/11, WI 5.
POS Ridge (5,000 m) possible first ascent of South ridge, 800 m, 5.10, grass 2.
K6 West (7,100 m) attempt via NNW face (we did not even get to the schrund on this one but had one bivy near the base after negotiating the lower icefall on approach).

We also did some very good bouldering while there, but this, as was pointed out to me by Marko, was akin to going to a whorehouse to masturbate.

That is about the size of it. Like I said, there will be more to come as for details and stories. I got a lot to say, especially about those pesky Russians on K2. Check back in a few days.

I am now in Pakistan getting ready to head to our base camp in the Charakusa Valley. I had hoped to make another post about the last of the Alps North Faces climbs, but things got hectic in Chamonix. Long story short: we tried for the North Face of the Petit Dru, did not do it and ended up doing a great climb on the North Face of Mont Blanc du Tacul, the Contamine/Mazaud route on the Triangle du Tacul. It was good, fun mixed climbing and a great day (although, there was very high winds), but was a bit dissappointingly short and felt a little too much like a simple pleasure route. Still, it was a great consulation and much better than not climbing at all.

I’ll be climbing in the Charakusa with Steve House and Marko Prezelj. Not bad company, heh? We hope to try a route on K6, but have other plans up our sleves, as well. Being traditionalists (and sort of luddites) we are not going to be doing any sort of base camp dispatches. It is just not our style. So, for now this will probably be the last time I post unitl I return in late September (unless, of course, I get stuck in Islamabad for a few days or something. I am sure I will have plenty to say when I return.

“Fortune smiles on the brave”

-Virgil (I think)

The North Faces of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo. The Cime Grande is the middle tower. 

After our twenty-one hour ordeal on Piz Badile, we both needed some rest time before considering our next adventure. A few days spent relaxing in St. Moritz and a visit to the newly opened Messner Mountain Museum in Bolzano, Italy could not have been better. Nearly a week later, our bodies were again ready, and our minds were eager for the heights. The weather in the Western Alps was still stormy while over in Eastern Europe they were experiencing a heat wave. We decided to head East and check out the Dolomites. Neither Cindy nor I had ever been there climbing before (though, I had done a little ice climbing in Val di Daone several years ago). Sticking with the “Six Classic” North Faces of the Alps theme, the Cime Grande di Lavaredo seemed a worthwhile and very tempting goal.
Being part of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo (or, simply the Tre Cime), the Grand (like our “Grand” Teton) is the tallest of the three peaks that make up the Lavaredo group. Often called “the greatest climbing monument on earth,” the Tre Cime is a striking site, indeed. They rise abruptly from the gentle plains of the surrounding valleys and high alpine meadows. Viewed from their most mellow aspect, the south, they still look as rugged and steep as the Tetons, with similar vertical rise, though these peaks are made of a grey and yellow limestone called Dolomite. The rock is more like that found in the Canadian Rockies, but unlike the Rockies which have steep faces and smooth, sloped backsides, the Dolomites rise steeply from all sides, often forming towers and needle like formations. When viewed from the north, the peaks look very foreboding, indeed. The Grand and the Ovest (West) Cime rise straight up from the plateau in sheer vertical faces like two halves of the same peak that had been cleaved apart then put side by side, revealing the sweet inside of the massive rock peak. Though there is no glacier on this North Face, the aura is nonetheless quite austere as there are few high peaks in the world that rise this abruptly in an unbroken, dead vertical climb towards their summits’.
Another interesting feature of this place is that the rock is void of the common weakness of dihedrals, cracks and chimney systems that would be the logical choice for routes for the first ascensionists. Instead, the classic routes here follow the easiest path possible up the steep faces, often wandering right then back left along the easiest holds, sometime traversing straight across for an entire pitch. Route finding can be a real challenge. The first ascensionists here definitely had their work cut out for them.
The Comici Route on the Grand Cime, forged a path up the steep face slightly right of center. Looking at the topo from the ground it was hard to see the logic behind the many traverses and wanderings as it climbed for 17 pitches to the ledge system below the summit. It was also hard to imagine what it would have been like in 1933, when Comici and the Dimai brothers climbed the route, to have even thought about heading up such a steep wall so void of obvious cracks. Since then, many other routes have been put up on all three of the summits, many of which are more modern, forging more or less straight paths up the faces with the protection of expansion bolts and at a high climbing standard. Just left of the Comici route lies the Hasse-Brandler, an 18 pitch 5.12, that was recently free soloed by Alex Huber. The Comici, has a few sections of mid grade 5.10, though is protected by pitons of dubious quality and on very steep ground. Hence, it is more commonly climbed by a mix of aid and free climbing in these difficult sections. A fall at one of the cruxes would have a fairly reasonable chance, in the this author’s opinion, of breaking or dislodging one or many of the pitons. Often, the pins had numerous slings of even more dubious quality tied to them. This made it easy to reach up and clip to, but hard if not impossible to clip directly to the pin itself. A large number of the pins were not driven in all the way and many of those were bent downward. “A fall?” I wondered. At least they were numerous enough. I brought four cams and four nuts to help supplement the fixed gear and that was about all I could use as the few cracks to be found were often behind loose-feeling blocks. No doubt, the route had been climbed hundreds and hundreds of times over the years, so most of the really loose stuff had been picked clean. Still, we found a few cookies waiting to be trundled.
We spent the night before our climb at the Riffugio :Lavaredo, which is just a half hour walk from the road on the south side of the mountain. The approach from there is just 40 minutes, so we did not have to get a super early start. We left the hut around 5:00 and were at the base, roped up and ready to climb by 6:00. There was just one party ahed of us. They must have stayed at the parking lot as we did not see them at the hut. Two easy pitches up a short pillar puts you right at the belly of the beast: six hard, steep pitches up the middle of the wall. Though short, these pitches take time negotiating around and over various overhangs and small corners. It was steep enough to haul so we did for the first two pitches. We only had one rope (probably a mistake, but I was trying to go as light as possible) so I could only haul on the pitches that were shorter than half a rope length (30 meters). The rock was cold, crrmpy, and did I mention it was steep? Super intimidating. After pitch eight, you could look down and see that you were away from the base of the route. In other words, the wall was slightly overhanging from here down. If you peed, it would clear the wall and land at least ten feet away from the base of it (not that I actually tried this). The climbing was much more strenuous than that found on the Piz Badile and it was very nice to have chalk. I could really feel it on the pitches climbed with the pack. Looking over at some climbers on the Hasse-Brandler, it was hard to imagine Huber soloing that route. It was hard to imagine free soloing this route. It must be like a whole different sport for that guy.
After eight pitches, though, the climbing eased up considerably. From here it was, at most, 5.8 to the top, though the protection became more sparse and the rock quality a bit more chossy. A wet chimney near the top put us at “the 25 meter traverse”, which was just what it is called: a dead horizontal traverse of 25 meters. It goes out above the lip of a huge roof and, though not difficult, it is wild and scary as there is only museum vintage pitons equipped with A4 faded slings for protection. A HUGE expanse of air sits just below your feet. At this point we had caught up to the other party, a very friendly and eager, early twenty-somethingsTyrollean crew. We passed by them here as they had a small route finding problem. They cheered on Cindy as she clung tenaciously and clawed her way across the traverse. They also kept reminding her of how much air was right below her feet, which really did not encourage her, but kept things interesting, nonetheless. Two sections on the traverse required some down climbing, which was fine for me in the lead, but a bit sketchy for Cindy following as a fall would have been like a real lead fall onto one of the antique pitons. She was slightly gripped despite the encouragement and advice from the boys slightly above her.

Two more chossy, but easy pitches saw us to the major ledge system below the summit. A simple, but airy traverse around to the south side put us below fourth class ledges to the top. At 4:00, we topped out, ten hours after starting our adventure at the base of the face. It had remained a little cloudy all day, but did not seem to threaten thunder and lightning. Typical of most peaks in the Alps, a crucifix adorned the summit and made for a good back-drop for the celebratory photos. On down we went with the Tyrollean boys. Though I had information on the standard route up, which would be relatively easy to descend, we opted to rap down an unknown descent on a steep, new climbing route. At first, this seemed like it might be a mistake. As we rapped into it, the wall fell away from us and became radically overhanging. How would we be able to get into the wall to get to the next station? But as we looked around, we could see that the route up traversed slightly around the over hangs. We had a couple of snags pulling the ropes, but overall, this descent got us to easy ground in just four very steep, double rappels. A slide down steep scree put us at the parking area and the Auronzo Refuge for food and beverage.