On Staying Positive

I finished seven weeks of field work at the end of October itching to get on some alpine routes. Word on the street from sources both reputable and suspect was that ice conditions were shaping up in the Tetons, so on a sunny Tuesday afternoon Landon Wiedenman and I set off for Glacier Gulch to have a look at the North Face of the Grand. From the Teton Glacier, our prospects looked dim – black streaks on rocks taunted us with dreams of ice – so we settled on taking the Hossack-McGowan up for a look at the North Molar Tooth Couloir.

Landon in Glacier Gulch

Landon and I have been climbing together for as long as I’ve been climbing in the Tetons. Lately, he’s been spending more time getting his massage practice off the ground than climbing, so I’ve taken it upon myself to drag him into the mountains with promises of plastic ice and warm temperatures. He’s solid and continues to impress me with how hard he can push off the couch.

Rappelling over the bergschrund

Our foray up the Grand was cut short at 1 PM when we realized that going any higher would mean a long, dark walk out that night over snow-covered boulder fields. Our plan had been to climb the route and walk out, so we hadn't brought enough fuel to spend another night on the glacier. But the new snow on already loose moraine was a hazard we preferred to negotiate in daylight.

We rationalized that the route was anemic at best and it was going to require a lot of dry-tooling to get to the smears of ice beckoning from the East Ridge, neither of us had slept well, and I was getting sick; so we went down.

Landon and the Teton Glacier cirque

The beauty of the Teton Glacier cirque never ceases to amaze me, and I stopped to take the same picture I take every time I go up there: Landon a small figure against the enormity of the glacier, with Mt. Owen and the Grand towering above.

Camp at the toe of the glacier

We returned to camp and made coffee and water. The stove gave us each a litre of lukewarm water before it hissed away the last of its fuel. Sunset found us past the delicate travel on the snow-covered moraine, at the car by 10 PM.

I spent the next several days resting and beating a lackluster flu-ish illness before the skies opened once again, and Landon and I headed back up into the mountains for a shot at a thin smear of ice on the North Face of Mt. Wister. We’d learned from our mistake and brought an extra days worth of food and fuel. That, on top of the extra ice screws necessary for a route with that much ice, made for heavy packs. The tradeoff was that having a camp so close to route would allow us to focus on the climbing. I even brought a pair of speakers which we used to drown out the wilderness experience with a pumping dubstep wobble.

North Face of Wister, red marks the line of ascent

We planned to climb a summer rock route, North Face, East Chimney, then access the ice via a beautiful Traverse of the God’s-esque ledge which intersected the smear at a quarter height. Morning saw us climbing short mixed steps punctuated by snow slopes in five pitches to the chimney proper. The last of these mixed steps was a wonderful slanting chimney capped with an icy goulette – classic! When we arrived at the East Chimney proper, we decided to climb steep mixed terrain rather than the chimney, which looked wide and overhung in several spots. I hooked and thrutch up one of the most challenging mixed leads of my life, swearing most of the way, and in two pitches we were on the traverse ledge. Unfortunately, by the time we’d crossed the ledge and climbed a short but poorly protected icy step, the sun was setting.

Landon below the mixed chimney

“You can go as far as you want,” Landon said as we checked out the ice in the fading sunlight, “set a v-thread and rap off.” He wasn’t interested in following the pitch. I’d come all this way to climb the damn thing so I flipped the ropes and started off. The ice was thin enough that I could see the rock behind like figurines in a snow globe. I climbed twenty feet before I could get in a stubby, and another forty before I got in a screw that might stop a fall. Fortunately, Landon’s anchor included three stellar cams, but ripping all the gear would still mean a big fall. I got gripped.

Looking down from partway up the crux pitch

“Can you get gear?”

“I’m busy,” I spit. “If I could get gear, I’d put it in.”

“Take it easy. You’ll find screws,” Landon assured me from the belay.

Self-portrait at the top of the crux pitch

I swore under my breath at Landon for being so gracious while I threw myself at a dangerous pitch and ensured we’d do the descent in the dark. Finally, I found an ooze of ice thick enough for a v-thread. I twisted in a screw for a belay, clipped into it, relaxed, and promptly dropped a screw as I tried to place it. It tumbled down the ice, hit the ledge and shot off into space. In my mind, I was watching myself fall that same distance.

It took me three tries to hit the v-thread. (Just a few days ago I hit my first v-thread of the season on the first try.) I was wrecked. I rappelled to Landon and apologized. He forgave me and we re-racked the gear. The descent included re-climbing the traverse ledge, then a combination of down-climbing and rappelling. A full moon illuminated the sky, and that combined with our headlamps allowed for an eventless descent. Near the bottom, we even started joking.

Unformed route on the North Face of Dissapointment Peak

The next day we walked out. Back at home, a quick check of the NOAA forecast confirmed that there would be no other opportunities to climb before I had to be back at work. I wanted another go at the smear. With the beta, I know now that I could take it to the top, but that’s not what climbing is about: I’ve learned more from failure than I ever learned from success, which is good because I fail often. It’s having something to come back to that keeps me going.