Psychovertical Read online

  This was a big adventure, something to my mind that other people did. For years I had talked to customers leaving for trips to the Alps, and never considered that I would or could go myself. I suppose I finally realised that if you wanted to do the things that you considered only other people did, all you had to do was do them.

  It also marked the start of a big change. I had left my job, and would be moving to London when I got back from the Alps to live with Mandy, who was still doing her teacher training course in New Cross. All of a sudden life seemed to be full of expectation, the excitement of a new future of alpine dreams celebrated not with a drink, but with a giant Toblerone, which seemed kind of appropriate with the triangle of the Matterhorn emblazoned on its gold wrapper.

  Aaron tried to reduce the chance of falling by taking off his rucksack, and hanging it from a nose-sized pebble so he could climb up unencumbered. He balanced and hopped his way up, several holds ripping out as he moved, until finally he joined me at my stance.

  ‘It’s not really worth clipping you in to the belay,’ I said, nodding at the flint, which seemed to have shrunk now both of us were looking at it. Aaron grabbed my rucksack and moved up a little higher to a large cobble the size of a football, and half sat on it, proclaiming it far more secure than the flint.

  ‘OK Andy – can you climb back down and get my rucksack?’ I tugged the flake to see if I could use it as an anchor. It popped out like a rotten tooth and spun down the slope into the mouth of a crevasse.

  The long dark journey through France didn’t end with a picture-postcard Chamonix of gleaming snowy peaks, but a claggy, dull town full of restless skiers. We climbed off the bus and picked up our enormous rucksacks, full with all our begged and borrowed climbing gear, clothes, camping equipment, and also food. We walked through the dirty and slushy streets, the skies above us thick with cloud. The occasional red rescue helicopter clapping overhead was the only sign that there were big serious mountains above. From town we walked out to the camp site, only to find it was buried under fifty feet of bulldozed snow. The owner appeared and showed us the washroom, complete with washing machines and dryers, and told us we could camp there for the same price. It didn’t seem like a good deal so we moved on, past rows of millionaires’ mansions, until we found a path that sneaked up behind a big house. A hundred yards from the road we made our home, pitching our tent and getting everything ready for the big climbs ahead.

  Back in town we visited the guides’ building, where Aaron told me you could get information on the weather and conditions, routes that had been done, and maps of the range. It was a welcome escape from the damp cold outside, a place of old stone and polished wood. Everything was foreign to me though, the weather forecast, the maps, the climbs. The only thing I was interested in was the North Face of Les Droites. I walked up to the stern-looking woman in the office and asked her if she could tell me where it was on the map on the wall. She walked over and traced a line along a large glacier.

  ‘Yes, we might try it while we’re here,’ I said, nodding my head towards Aaron.

  She lowered her gaze and looked hard at me, standing in my scruffy clothes, my hair a mess from sleeping on the bus, glasses scraped and scuffed. ‘It is a very hard and dangerous climb. Have you climbed many other big faces like this?’ she asked.

  ‘Not really,’ I said with an embarrassed shrug, at which she smiled and went back to her desk. Everything had been said that could be said.

  Our research completed, we walked outside to see the sun finally breaking through. I looked up, and again tried to imagine if the clouds I could see towering above me were really mountains, impossibly bold and looming. Then I realised that these visions were not clouds, that the spirals of darkness were minarets of rock, which indeed towered high over the valley.

  That first time I saw the Mont Blanc Massif, its scale and grandeur were far too profound to take in. I stood with my mouth open and realised just how much bigger this was than anything I’d imagined, so big it filled my head and blocked out everything else in my mind. I was terrified.

  The following morning we woke early, at four, and set off on the snow-choked trail that led up the other side of the valley from the Massif itself, to a range of smaller and far less intimidating peaks called the Aiguilles Rouges. We thought that they would be a better warm-up for us. We were far too overwhelmed to try anything in the proper mountains yet.

  The snow was deep, and we sank down to our waists as we tried to make a trail up through the forest, moving with excruciating slowness in the dark, the leader sweating under the toil of breaking trail, the second shivering in the slowness of his wake. The higher we went, the deeper the snow became, until eventually we crept along on all fours, trying to stay on the surface.

  By 10 a.m. we had made maybe a thousand feet of progress, when all of a sudden, before we could consult our map, we broke through a gap in the trees and found an unexpected white road of compact snow and a bunch of early morning skiers racing past us. It was a piste. Bugger.

  Up the piste we trudged, quadrupling our height gain, until with some dismay we reached a large cable-car station and cafe, complete with hundreds of skiers who no doubt wondered where these two tramps where heading without skis. We saw a tiny ski lift was taking people towards the rock faces above, and so we sacrificed some of our funds in order to make a swifter ascent to the actual climbing.

  The man in charge of the chairlift looked at us with a mixture of confusion, concern and dismay, as we moved up with the queue of skiers and jumped onto the swaying seat. The journey was made slightly worrying by the fact we forgot to take off our rucksacks or find the pull-down safety bar. We rode up the mountain clutching each other, with only a few inches of bum-cheek holding us on the slippery plastic.

  Getting to the rock from the top of the chairlift was harder than I’d expected, with the deep powder coming up to our armpits in places, but we pushed on. This was what I’d dreamt about for the last few months, winter climbing in the Alps, and, although it hadn’t quite lived up to my expectations, it was certainly different from short climbs in the Peak District.

  As we ploughed our trench the whole Massif opened up behind, the mighty Dru, the Grandes Jorasses, Mont Blanc. Then I saw the Droites roaring up from the huge river of ice of the Argentière glacier. It stood in profile, the north-east spur like a lowered drawbridge from the castle of rock that formed the upper part of the face. The ice below swept down for thousands of feet, looking steep and diamond hard. I shuddered at the thought of even standing directly under such a face, let alone setting foot on it. What an idiot. What a dreamer. I turned and tried to focus on the easy snow gully ahead.

  We reached the gully after a ridiculous struggle and attempted to climb upwards, the snow unresponsive to our will to climb. We were simply digging ourselves further into the slope rather than up it. It was no good. I’d read lots of books about alpine climbing where it said that snow conditions improved in the early hours, so I suggested we dig a snow hole and try again in the morning.

  I’d never dug a snow hole before, but there was no shortage of building materials. We shovelled away with our helmets. I’d also read that snow-hole digging was wet work, with the snow melting on your clothes, which proved to be the case. It was dark by the time we finally finished making a tiny cave big enough for us to lie down in. I stood outside while Aaron sorted out his sleeping bag, and watched as ice built up on the shell of my clothing, reappearing each time I wiped it clear as the moisture trapped in my clothes got wicked through to the outer layer. I was fascinated to see this happening, and with the extreme nature of the cold, and with this wild place more alien than I’d ever imagined.

  Finally Aaron was ready and I crept into the cave, a claustrophobic chamber only just big enough to sit in, and made all the smaller once both of us and all our gear were stuffed in. Not wanting to get my down sleeping bag wet, I took off my damp clothes, threw them to the end of the snow hole, and lay there naked waiting for my bag
to warm up.

  So great was our impatience to climb, our alarm clock went off at midnight, and we set about getting ready to climb again. It was now that I regretted not placing my clothes in my sleeping bag to dry. I picked them up, now as stiff as boards, and prised them apart so I could put them on.

  Outside the temperature was positively arctic, forcing us to cover up every inch of skin as we followed our tracks back up to the gully. Aaron sank back up to his neck as soon as he tried to move further above our high point. There was no change.

  The daytime temperature had probably been –10 Celsius, the night-time temperature –20. My grand plan was based on summer conditions where the daytime temperature would be above freezing, with the lower night-time temperature freezing the snow. We turned around and went back to our snow hole, feeling no ill will to the mountain or each other, still simply exhilarated at being in such a wild place.

  I moved down slowly, my crampon points searching out tiny little features in the slope as foot holds, kicking hard into the mud itself when nothing could be found. The rucksack was getting closer as the wind picked up again, and I tried to tug it free of its perch. If we lost it we’d be trapped up here, far from the valley, unable to reach a hut. I’d never felt so exposed in my life. I was utterly terrified, but with the terror came that incredible feeling of being more alive and focused on the moment than ever before. Past and future, even the minute before and the minute to come, dulled until they blacked out, leaving me here in the very moment of action, climbing down a frozen heap of mud and stones for a rucksack.

  Balanced on one crampon, I grabbed the rucksack, carefully slipped its straps onto one shoulder and then the other, then started back up the slope. With the weight of the rucksack, climbing back up was twice as hard as climbing down, and four times as hard as climbing up the first time. Finally I reached Aaron and told him that this was the hardest thing I’d ever climbed, which, although true, wasn’t saying much when you considered my winter-climbing CV.

  Going on seemed to be a recipe for disaster, but with no real belays so was abseiling back down. However, going down was all we could hope to do, and so we set about hooking the rope over Aaron’s football-size boulder.

  He set up the ropes while I balanced without any protection, then watched as he slipped both ropes through his belay device and prepared to abseil down. I swapped my gaze between his eyes and the boulder, as he started to weight the rope. ‘At least if the anchor pulls and he falls I won’t be pulled off,’ I thought selfishly. ‘Go on Aaron,’ I said. ‘It looks good,’ I lied, thinking that if it held Aaron it should also hold me.

  Down he went, totally dependent on the rope, yet trying not to weight it, slithering down until finally he reached the snow at the bottom of the face, where he stopped and waited.

  I shifted over, clipped into the rope and set off down after him.

  I reached Aaron after a scary ride down the slope, and with relief pulled down on one of the ropes, but brought them both down in the process. It would soon be night, and without shelter we wouldn’t survive long. Zig-zagging through the crevasses we headed for a large boulder, hoping we could hide under it, only to find the house-sized block seemed to form a wind trap, curving the snow around it into crazy waves. The only option was to use our new-found snow-holing skills and dig some shelter.

  Kneeling down we took turns, shovelling like crazed animals, desperate to get out of the wind and the storm. After an hour we’d dug a coffin-shaped cave, just big enough as long as we left almost everything outside. I was putting the finishing touches to our temporary home, scraping any irregular lumps in the roof so water wouldn’t build up on them and drip onto us, when, as I was leaning against one wall, my hand shot through and I fell onto my shoulder. I rolled away and realised we’d dug through into the side of a crevasse. It was so late that I just filled in the gap and climbed back out into the storm. I said to Aaron that he could sleep on that side, neglecting to tell him why. He was lighter anyway.

  Inside, we got the stove going and tried to warm up, both of us seriously chilled by the storm. As the temperature rose in the hole all the snow and ice that clung to us began to melt, until puddles had formed on our sleeping mats. The air became a thick moisture-filled fug. After half an hour the stove went out, and refused to light. Then the lighter stopped working. I felt dizzy, and looked at Aaron lying beside me, already asleep. I flicked the lighter again and wondered why it wouldn’t work. My head began to throb. I looked at the doorway, it was full of snow. I punched a hole in it with my ice axe and, as the spindrift flew in on the draught, I flicked the lighter and it sprang back to life.

  That night I slept badly, imagining we would either suffocate, fall into the crevasse below us, or be buried alive. I thought my nightmares were coming true when we woke and tried to get back out again. I had to dig for several more feet than expected until thankfully I thumped through into fresh air and squeezed out on my stomach.

  The storm had cleared. It was cold. It was colder than cold. My clothing went stiff immediately, and all the gear we had left outside was frozen together in a big lump. Aaron’s Gore-Tex jacket stood stiffly to attention. The mountains all around us were magnificent, perfect, immaculate. Terrifying. We had no right to be here. They knew that. We knew that. These giants didn’t suffer fools. It was time to go. We went.

  We staggered up the trail back to the ticket office and cafe at Montenvers later that afternoon, looking as if we’d just returned from some mighty north-face success, not a frozen-mud-pile failure. It didn’t matter to us what we had done and what we hadn’t. We had been somewhere amazing and, more importantly, we had found our way back to tell the tale.

  Leaving our rucksacks outside, we shuffled into the cafe, the tables empty because all the people were crowded outside to photograph the mountains. We would be going home in a few days, and we thought we deserved to splash out on an expensive cup of coffee. After all, we had made it into the mountains.

  Leaving Aaron at a table, I walked up to the counter where a large bearded Chamoniard stood, his blue jumper with white stripe signalling him as a climber.

  ‘Deux cafés au lait s’il vous plaît,’ I said, proud of my only words of French.

  Silently the man made the coffees, then slid them towards me.

  I pulled out a plastic bag with our francs in, ready to pay.

  The man looked at me and shook his head, pushing the coffee forwards.

  ‘There is no charge for Alpinists.’

  Solo

  Pitches 3, 4 and 5 New Dawn

  CLIMBING A WALL takes commitment, but once you are committed this becomes less important, as the steepness of a big wall, together with the difficulties of being alone, generally mean retreat isn’t an option. I knew that once I started up the Reticent from Lay Lady Ledge there would be no turning back. It would be like jumping from a great height into a river. It takes balls to jump, but once you’ve stepped off, all you can do is see it through. On a route like the Reticent the only way to escape was to climb the route, a terrifying prospect.

  This was my first thought, as I woke in Camp 4, and knew that I couldn’t put it off any longer. Today I would have to cast off and begin the route. It had been good having this time on the horizontal, sleeping without wearing a harness, treating myself to pizza, Coke and ice-cream, having people to talk to, shade, all the things I would miss.

  Time away from the wall had been good for my morale, making me believe it was possible. The fear and the difficulty of those easy pitches receded and were easily rationalised as stage fright. Of course it felt hard, I hadn’t been climbing for a long time, but I would get back into psychological and physical shape quickly. I’d have to.

  The one thing that had turned my mood was that I had thought of a strategy for hauling, which I knew would make or break the next few days. I had had a choice: either to dump water and hope I could make it to the top sooner, or create a new pulley system that would increase my pulling power. The first op
tion was high risk, as running out of water could be fatal. Dehydration had contributed to several deaths on El Cap. The second would be slow. Then I thought up another option. I had a spare rope that I planned to carry in case my haul or lead line became damaged, and I could use this to split the load, hauling twice. I’d used this system in the past when climbing in a three-person team, and knew it would work. Using my red and yellow haul ropes, I knew I could do it.

  I walked back up to the base of the route, to my rope, where I had tied jumars and harness to the end of it so that the wind didn’t carry it off onto a distant flake, and started jumaring up, my only load being my sleeping bag. At the haul bags I dug out my spare rope and rearranged everything, then carried on up to the second belay and hauled the two loads. The difference was remarkable. Both bags jerked up the wall at twice the speed, and soon I was ready to climb the next pitch, knowing that this was it. No going down.

  The pitch went slowly, but smoothly, and so did the next, my body and mind finding a little more rhythm, the hauling in between hard but do-able.

  It was late in the day by the time I reached the final pitch below the Lay Lady Ledge, hauled up my bags and readied myself to lead. I was feeling pretty done in, hands cramping from dehydration, my harness leg loops digging in, sunburn on my neck throbbing away. The next pitch was a wide overhanging slot which proved strenuous and claustrophobic, the back choked with several kilos of bat shit which drifted down into my eyes and mouth and stuck to my skin. Sweat stung my eyes as I fought and kicked and battled my way up, half aid climbing, half free climbing, pushing my largest cams ahead of me as I went. My mood began to sour. The vast amount of energy required just to move up an inch sapped the last of my strength.

  This is hopeless.

  Just keep going, you always feel like this at the start of a climb.