Crazy Horn

When I was 19 years old, I promised my dear friend Kate Mannle that I would climb the Matterhorn with her (4478m/14,692ft). Last summer, I went on a climbing trip in the Italian Dolomites with Jim Gilchrist and it seemed like the perfect time make good on my promise to Kate.  I made the excited call to Kate. It was time to climb the Matterhorn, I told her.  Kate said yes, promptly watched a You Tube video of climbing the Matterhorn, vomited and decided the Matterhorn wasn’t for her. I would go solo. 

During my time in Switzerland I would be traveling with my mom and my goal was to climb the Matterhorn as efficiently as I could so I didn’t take away the opportunity to spend time with her.  First, I would take the railway to Gornergrat (3100m) with my mom and all my gear. After site seeing, my mom could take the train back to Zermatt and I would traverse over to the Hornli Hut (3260m). On the map it looked perfect.  In reality the traverse from Gornergrat wasn’t so feasible.  Glaciers and a huge rift separated me from the Hornli. I took the train back to Zermatt with my mom feeling defeated before even starting. 

Back in Zermatt, in the late afternoon, I raced to the tram that takes you toward the Hornli Hut. The lady was closing the ticket office and I begged her for a ticket. She caved, and sold me a very overpriced tram ride. By 6pm I was at the Hornli Hut debating what to do. Break the bank and stay in the hut? Bivy around the hut? Or start climbing? I didn’t want to follow guides up the route and the lower mountain looked free of crowds so I decided to start climbing. I would climb until dark and then bivy on a ledge. 

I started by emptying a Starbucks Via into my Nalgene, shaking it, and having three quarters of my only liter of coffee water spray all over me. As it happens the only liter of water I bought in town was carbonated.  A liter at the Hornli Hut was 10 Euros, so 300mls would have to do for the next 10 hours.

At dark I found a small ledge to scramble to off the main route with an old piton to clip into. I clipped in and settled into my summer down sleeping bag. Within minutes a pssssh of air signified the deflating of my air pad and I was laying uncomfortably on the rocks. It ended up being a very cold and sleepless night.

A show of brilliant stars and glowing moonlight filled the sky. Soft white shadows of moonlit glaciers glowed in the distance.  I listened to a choir of gneisses and other sedimentary rock fall and explode down steep slopes through the night. At times I felt the presence of friends recently lost and the souls of the ill-fated and disastrous Whymper party in 1865. The plus about shivering all night is you are ready for an early alpine start.  

After several sleepless hours, I was awoken by the clatter of carabiners and the wondering serpent of headlamps.  My plan was to start before the guided groups but the guides in anticipation of a warm day started early. I packed up my gear as quickly as possible and started climbing. I was a few parties from the lead group.  Apparently, I hadn’t gotten the memo that private climbers (unguided parties or soloist) are expected to be behind all the guided groups. I instantly found myself in a very hostile situation at 13,000ft on the side of a vertical rock face smeared in verglas. I was sandwiched by an angry Swiss guide in front of me and an angry Swiss guide behind me screaming . At one point, the guide directly behind me got within 6 inches of my face and yelled “You have no right to be here……” In a bottle neck of fixed lines, high on the route, I saw a line to the left and quickly scrambled around the guided groups and away from the yelling Swiss guides. 

Those Swiss guides; like caricatures of themselves- chiseled faces, perfect tans, pressed Gortex jackets, neat mountaineering coils and chests sticking out farther than their noses give the Matterhorn some serious character. The Matterhorn is a scene, a beautiful one, but still a scene.  After tiptoeing across the summit knife edge ridge unroped with heart thumping, I reached the summit iconic cross. Hours later I was in the streets of Zermatt enjoying block party food for Swiss National Day with my mom.

Dolomite Gold

Something feels like it’s missing this summer- Last summer after my Denali expedition I was on a plane to Italy to climb in the Dolomites with Jim Gilchrist, Jerry Willis and Brian Nolastname within days of getting off of the snow. It seemed like just what the doctor had  ordered to recover from a glaciated peak. Jim in particular had been making trips to the Dolomites since 300 BC. Let’s just say he knows every classic route like the back of his hand.  His objective was simple- “I’ve done all the classics and want to do modern routes.” I had no objection except that Air Canada had lost my baggage and I was left standing in Colfosco, Italy jet lagged with nothing but a pair of nylon pants, a t- shirt, and my climbing helmet. Not standard issue for an Italian climbing trip.

The first several days were rough. I was weak from Denali. I had a rented via ferrata harness, a onesie BD belay device (why do they even make these?), and the cheapest climbing shoes that a handful of euros could buy. We started on a Massimo Da Pozzo route called Primo Spigolo on the Tofana Di Rozes. The route redefined my definition of runout. Jim and I lowered feeling defeated, realizing that it was only Italian multi pitch climbing day one.  

We drove back to town licking our wounds. Every trad climbers want to be a hardman. We felt like big pieces of dookey. The nice thing about getting spanked in the Dolomites is the drive back to town is a flash of winding roads and breathtaking landscapes. It was simply the most stunning scenery I have ever seen. Within an hour of getting off the rock you can be in town eating decent Italian food and drink away your sorrows with guide book open, making grand climbing plans for the next day. 

By the next day, I had shaken off some of the jet lag and accepted my marginal gear and the fact that the Italian counterparts for Canadian Air were in no rush to get me my luggage. For the next week and  a half it was like we were on a mission. Almost 100 pitches went down in just a handful of days.

The routes in the Dolomites have a legendary historical feel;  maybe a little too antiquated at times.  At times you are hanging on  a nest of pins with a single 4mm piece of cord tied through the petons with an overhand knot. Italians don’t seem concerned or committed to anchor replacement.

One highlight of my trip was climbing the Costantini- Apollonio that was put up by  two gentleman in 1944. The approach starts at the Rifugio Dibona and within an hour you are at the base of a 20 Pitch route that goes free at 7a. Angela Dibona and his early 1900 mountaineering counterparts are worshipped like gods in Cortina. There is a bronze statue of Dibona  smack dab in the middle of town. 

After endless engaging pitches of limestone protected by gear, pins, bolts, threads and chunks of wood wedged into cracks, it is only a 1.5 hour walk back to the Rifugio through ruins from World War I. Before the sun has time to go down, you can be sitting on the Rifugio Dibona porch getting blown away by a phenomenal Dolomite vistas and homemade pasta. 

Check out: http://www.planetmountain.com/english/rock/dolomites/itineraries/scheda.php?lang=eng&id_itinerario=275&id_tipologia=38

What I learned on Denali 2013

In June I left my day job as a Registered Nurse at a small community hospital in Glenwood Springs Colorado and headed North to Alaska. This was my fourth trip to wonderful state and second trip to the Alaska Range. This trip I was fortunate enough to be an assistant guide on an Alpine Ascents International Expedition up the West Buttress. I would be co guiding with senior guide Ben Jones and Willie Benegas, two larger then life characters. I’ve heard many people explain why they climb with a comment involving it is a learning process. Each time I set foot into the hill or pull my way up a steep face I learn something new. Here are some of the more important thing the West Buttress taught me this past season. I greatly appreciate the teaching moments each of my teammates provided me with.

1. Some people are genetically programmed to be more likely then others to walk into crevases. Multiple times on the same trip. Withing one weeks time.

2. Some people are genetically programmed to be more likely to have what ever we attach to them fall off including but not limited to crampons, snow shoes (especially snow shoes) climbing harness, gloves, backpacks, pants and mittens.

3. Fixed lines may look simple and straight forward. But they are not. It is possible to make them more complex then a calculus problem involving the square root of fractals. If one tries hard enough he or she can wrap them selves several times though a fixed line resulting in a hanging human tangled upside down mess.

4. Even in an international group with language barriers all adult conversations lead to mention of adult x rated videos below 17,000ft.

5. “Mama huhu” is my favorite thing to say in Chinese especially to a Chinese client who speaks no English who was suppose to have a private translator on the trip.

6. If Chinese members of an entirely different expedition offer to make you “Chinese soup,” no matter how hungry you are respectfully decline. Also decline anything that comes in a tube that says fish paste. Failure to do so will result in your clients just about shitting themselves and turning snow into fudgsicles. (Which you as a guide will have to clean up)

7. Dudes from Denmark, who are x military and serve as body guards to diplomats in Afghanistan have really warped and hilarious senses of humors.

8. It is cool to bring your I Pod Movie or I Pad mini on expeditions and watch movies in your tent all night.

9. If you live in a desert nation and do not have access to snow you can train for Denali by Scuba diving. This was new to me.

10. Women see men in two ways those “who could get it,” and those “who aint never gonna get it.”  

11. On the mountain every pop song that plays on the world ban radio is “the best song ever.”

12. There are rules to drinking Yerba Mate and I am capable of breaking every possible one of them.   

13. My beard hold 234ml of frozen water in ideal conditions. 

14. On rest days Guides will dig extremely large holes in the snow for no particular reason except to stay in "rock climbing shape."