Now! Climbing

When last I checked in I was about to get my butt kicked by the AMGA (American Mountain Guides Association) Advanced Alpine Guide Course and Aspirant exam, the penultimate step in getting probably the hardest leg of the IFMGA (International Federation of Mountain Guides Associations) training out the way. In brief, the IFMGA cert is basically the gold standard for guides’ training worldwide, hands down, and very few Americans have completed it. I’m not there yet, but I’m working on it, and it takes a lot of work. Now that gaining Guide Aspirant status in the Alpine discipline is over, it’s time to concentrate on passing the exam in the rock discipline and hopefully becoming a Certified Rock Guide in October, that being the highest level of training in rock guiding one can achieve in this country.

I get ahead of myself though. Back to the beginning of the course. The layout is this: myself, Mark Allen, an AMGA Certified Ski Mountaineering guide and climber based out of Mazama, WA, who works with International Mountain Guides, North Cascades Mountain Guides, and his own company Expeditions Northwest, and Tyler Jones, Rainier Mountaineering Guide, Alaska veteran, Ouray Ice Comp Competitor and renown badass were paired up with instructor, IFMGA guide and Marmot athlete Keith Garvey to make up the team for the course. Normally these things are bigger, more like eight or ten folks, but what with the economy and all (I guess) we lucked out and had this super small, strong, little unit for our course which was awesome since it meant we’d get a lot done, and not awesome because it meant we’d get a lot done and have no place to hide, and as it turns out, we did.

The course went like this:

Day 1: Meet at Mt. Erie near Anacortes, WA, which is a little crag near the San Juan Islands which I believe is something of a holdover from the days when the AMGA was run out of the American Alpine Institute’s basement in Bellingham. Anyway, there we ran the first leg of the Aspirant Exam, where we’d be tested on our rescue and movement skills. First we had to get the climbing out of the way. Simple. Lead a 5.10 in rock shoes. The climb Keith picked was a little weird and had all of us shaking just a touch, but sending commenced and we were through it. I felt better later watching Keith not love climbing it with a pack on and agreeing the moves were pretty funky. Ok. Next leg was a 5.8 in mountain boots. Easy enough. Next leg was a toprope: run up about 60′ of 5.2, then run down a similar route next to it, facing out, and do it fast. Fast means under 2 minutes, and you get two tries. GO! Okay. Done. It’s surprising just how fast you can move when prompted. Next came the rescue drill where we had to demonstrate technical proficiency in systems for raising, lowering, rapping, etc. with an injured climber. A complex drill, but one we had wired in beforehand and which is well-ingrained in you if you do this AMGA stuff. Then the knot-pass, which is sort of a worst-case scenario for lowering somebody two rope-lengths (see Touching the Void – a skilled knot-pass might have prevented the tragedy, or so it’s said). Then we’re done. Day 1 assessment over. Breath of relief. “Okay, so the weather looks Cascadian this week, starting in a couple days. Let’s get to it tomorrow and start the Torment-Forbidden Traverse.” Gulp. The Torment-Forbidden Traverse, an interesting route in its own right, is the gold standard for AMGA exam testpieces, as far as I can gather. Why? Because it’s remote, glaciated, complicated, and long. Grade V long. The idea is that you hike in to Boston Basin, climb Torment, a minor peak, via its South Ridge, which is 5.5-ish, then begin a massive mile-long traverse of the ridge between it and Forbidden Peak, a more climbed and more major objective. The ridge presents such a huge guiding challenge because it involves tons of transitions between rock, snow, ice, moving together, pitching it out, going up, going down, going sideways, and all with the impetus to go! go! go! because it’s long, and it’s the Cascades after all, so your weather window is probably limited, and you still have to climb the West Ridge of Forbidden, itself  a grade III 5.6, then get down. Unfortunately on our way out of Mt. Erie, Tyler’s van breaks down and is towed by a tow truck that ostensibly appears way too small.

Minor setback. Okay. We spent the night near the Skagit River fighting mosquitoes, packing, tour planning, and getting ready to rock.

Day 2: Into Boston Basin and onto the Torment. Gaining Torment’s South Ridge we picked a route that would avoid the problems that would tragically not avoid Craig and Willie just days later. This has been kind of a bad year for friends in the mountains. The only really negative thing about the course was losing Craig Leubben during it, and knowing that just days before we had seen the spot where it would happen. I didn’t know Craig personally and so I’ve seen more of that loss in the faces of my friends which let me know how well loved he was and how much he’ll be missed. Like I said, it’s been a bad run for losing friends. Anyway, Torment went well and we were able to gain the ridge and get pretty far along it before bivvying once.

Day 3: Woke up early and finished up the traverse, climbed the West Ridge of Forbidden [III 5.6], which is an awesome route, and then descended. We got down to camp  in the late afternoon and had the pleasure of running into a pile of friends and guides who had just finished various climbs in the area.

Day 4: Climbed to the Quien Sabe glacier on Sahale Peak and did our crevasse rescue skills. This involved having your partner jump into the crevasse, you arrest the fall, build an anchor, prep the lip, descend to them and apply a chest harness, then reascend and pull them out, all with minimal gear and no trickery. We then climbed up the glacier and onto the rock and summitted Sahale, then Mark took us down, and we got out of guide role and boot-skied the sh*t out of some 45° snow and ran down to camp at the Sahale high camp, which is rather scenic.

Day 5: In a brief encounter with Cascadian weather, we hiked down to Cascade Pass in some driving precip and cached some gear before heading up the other side to Mixup Peak. Luckily we got above the ceiling, or at least into a suckerhole and climbed that peak via its very odd, compact, staircasey East Face [II 5.4]. We then descended the peak, got down to our stuff, and stomped out in time to get to Concrete to gorge on pizza and beer. The plan was to start again tomorrow and head in to Eldorado Peak for a run at the West Arete [IV 5.7], but luckily weather intervened and we were spared.

Day 6: Rest and logistics day. We retrieve Tyler’s van from the dealership and head east to Mark’s beloved “Unabomber Shack” in Mazama to escape weather, eat and hang out.

Day 7: Schwack up to the N. Ridge of Cuttthroat Peak [III 5.5], climb it, and descend the SE Buttress [III 5.8]. Lots of short-roping, rappelling, tree sap and running down trail, mostly in that order. Fearing bad weather we decide to spend the next day at Goat Wall, a big wall of metamorphosed pyroclastic rock just outside Mazama.

Day 8: Wake up, make what Mark calls a “slutty” breakfast (think lots of cheese and bacon, as opposed to something like, say, some elegant sushi, which might oppositely be described perhaps as demure), climb the Inspiration Route, a five-pitch 5.10 sport climb on the wall, then shortrope and shortpitch to the wall’s summit. We descend, then realize Mark has left his pack at the top. Keith and Tyler laugh and depart so that Keith can get moving to Marblemount such that we might head into Mt. Shuksan the next day. Mark and I decide this is actually not a bad thing since climbing a 5.10 sport climb really fast might actually be a fun antidote to climbing 5.easy ridges really slowly in boots. Taking this as our charge, we manage to get up, retrieve the pack, rappel the route in seven raps (I think) and get down to the car in 1 hour and 17 minutes. We feel pretty good about this. Tyler notes his amusement at seeing us charging down the wall and running the trail back to the car. “Nice, boys! Nice!” We commence to pack and get ready for our last three days of climbing which will comprise the assessment period of the Aspirant Exam. Our objective will be to climb the Fisher Chimneys route on Mt. Shuksan to the upper Curtis Glacier, then take that to the Northeast Ridge of the Pinnacle, summit, then descend the South Face and traverse back down the White Salmon Glacier to Hell’s Highway and Winnie’s Slide, then back down the chimneys.

Day 9: We wake up early in Mazama and drive to Glacier. We eat lunch and see the weather forecast and adjust our plans a bit to get the climbing in before the weather turns on us. We hike in wearing Gore-Tex and not loving the weather, but it’s not so bad either. We climb the access gullies to the moraine below the chimneys and bivy.

Day 10: 3:00 AM departure. Tyler brings us up the chimneys in the dark, then I take us up the glacier to the ridge and with Mark in front we summit in surprisingly nice weather. From there, the weather declines. Near whiteout nav down the glacier. This takes a while. Down the chimneys in the dark. Long day, lots of guiding challenges, lots of big crevasses and rotting bridges, lots of work. Lots of relief to be done guiding! WOO! Keith’s infectious yells of “I LOVE THIS SH*T! I LOVE WHITEOUTS! UNGGGH!” actually work on getting us all psyched to yell more nonsense like “I LOVE DOWNCLIMBING RATTY FOURTH-CLASS IN THE DARK! UNGGGH! YEAH! I LOVE HOUR 15! UNGGGH! BEST CLIMB EV-ER!” A surprisingly enjoyable hour of laying in the dark looking at the stars precedes bed. This is the face Keith makes when he yells his war cries:

Day 11: Miraculously, it does not rain overnight and we wake feeling pretty happy to not be in full cower. Keith, as is his custom, makes coffee before leaving his sleeping bag and I am well-pleased to be on the receiving end of his generosity. We pack camp and descend to the Lower Curtis Glacier for the final assessment of our skills, the ice movement test. Naturally it starts raining, but really just kind of drizzles and feels like we’re in a cloud, because we are. The movement test is simple – lead some vertical ice, place screws, show good technique. Easy. The next part is a little stranger, which is running a course on 20-60° ice with your mountain axe, going up and down things fast. Easy enough. The next test is the one we’ve been waiting for: Death march out a long muddy trail with a heavy pack while soaked and getting wetter. Ah, the Cascades indeed. Well, mercifully it’s spared us until and we know it’s all over soon s0 nobody really cares about anything except getting done, which we do in good time and, soaking wet, enjoy a celebratory PBR, thanks purely to Tyler’s vision and foresight. It feels very, very, very good to be done. After a long afternoon of debriefing and pizza-eating at the North Fork Beer Shrine, we return to Bellingham where Mark takes us on the bar tour, and fun is had. More yells of “Unggh!” ensue, and I earn myself a headache, but feel pretty okay despite. We sleep at AAI guide and superstar Dawn Glanz’s house. Have you seen the cover of the new Alpinist? She’s on it.

Day 12: At this point, it’s all over but the crying, as they say, and so it seems that another slutty breakfast is in order. Having gone to school in Bellingham and worked for years with AAI, Mark knows exactly where to go. Breakfast delivers and drastically helps our situation, or mine at least. Afterwards, the time comes for debriefs and departures, we have a group chat, swap any gear that’s been hiding in our packs, and have our final talks with Keith. My mangled attempt at quoting Norman Maclean applies, though here are the man’s actual words: “What we eventually come to mean by life are those moments when life, instead of going sideways, backwards, forward, or nowhere at all, lines out straight, tense and inevitable, with a complication, climax, and, given some luck, a purgation.” Indeed. Relief slides over me as I drive to Seattle to engage in some relaxing mancating with my good friend Nick Moore. More on that later. A fine chapter.

A more complete set of photos is up here on my Zenfolio site. There’s a couple good ones. {C}