July 20, 2010

Saturday, July 17th, at 1:00am, Alexey and I awoke once again at Camp 3 on G1. The forecast for the mountain that day was to be almost perfect - if not a little cold - but low winds and no precipitation. We quickly ran through the morning rituals of alternating swinging arms through down jackets and pulling on boots in tandem. It's kinda like synchronized swimming - except at altitude, and not in a pool, and without those gross nose plug thingys, or the forced smiles. Come to think of it, it's not like synchronized swimming at all, but you get the picture - and it makes a pleasant visual reference for something not so pleasant.

Shoveling down the usual handfuls of cereal - this time a chocolaty delight called "Milo" resembling dry dog food - we drank a cup of lukewarm water each, pulled our packs out of the frosty tent, and headed up once again into a black night.

This time we would have company. The South American contingent had left 2 hours or so earlier, and we could see their headlamps as they danced against the icy slopes far above us. The dancing lights better resembled synchronized swimming than the tent thing. Never-mind.

After the first steep step, we fell into a rhythm, our crampons crunching the hard snow beneath our feet as we climbed higher and higher, hour after hour. Just past the first rock ridge we caught up to one of the South Americans who joined in behind us, while another sat in the snow, obviously struggling with the altitude. An hour later the slopes turned blue in the morning twilight, and as we turned off our headlamps, we caught up to the rest of the climbers who had now reached the final long couloir, winding up and right toward the summit.

The next few hours we climbed in a broken line amongst the Columbians and Brazilians, but none of us spoke much - we were all too busy focusing on every move. The snow was extremely hard in places, and it took careful concentration for tools and crampons. I kept thinking, "Better keep some in reserve for the way down, buddy. It's gonna take a little effort to reverse climb all this."

I stalled in the same spot, not moving for a few minutes, hoping the snow wouldn't notice me and forget I was there. I then swallowed hard and began traversing left toward the first serac, hoping to find something shallow and stable. No good. Alexey urged me to reverse my steps carefully. The avalanche conditions were definitely bad. I looked up to the ridge above and checked my altimeter; 7970 meters. With a (now different) sinking feeling in my chest, I thought to myself, "What? You've got to be kidding me! We're going to get stopped here? After all this?" I reversed down to Alexey.

Alexey climbed down our trench as I followed, and then at a juncture began to climb back up and right, following the footsteps the Columbian climber who had made the attempt there earlier. As he started up the tracks, I surveyed the slopes above in the direction of the chute. The surface texture of the snow beside the rocks above was exactly the same as the slope I had just "checked my shorts" on. It would be bad beside the rocks also, I assumed. I called to Alexey my observations, but he wanted to check it out. The 2 Brazilians followed him. "OK. I shouted, I'm going to start heading down then, k? That slope is not for me."

So, we were close to the summit. How close? Check out the image of the summit ridge behind the Brazilian climber, and the 2nd image of the summit ridge rocks just above and out of reach beyond the end of the trench. So, I ask you, if there is only a few meters above you, have you reached the summit? And if yes, what is the relative cutoff of a "few" meters? Ten? Twenty? Thirty? Fifty?

John Wayne once said about K2, "If you can't ride that thing like a pony, you ain't on top!"

Ok...I just made up that John Wayne quote, but if John Wayne were ever a climber, he would have said that for sure. Imagine what Chuck Norris would say.

***Please submit your Chuck Norris quotes to info@calpinist.com. If you don't understand this, google "Chuck Norris Quotes".