North Face of Athabasca

The North Face of Athabasca

North Face: October 1, 2001

It was a little over a year since I had first attempted to climb Athabasca's North Face. On my previous attempt, we had turned back after a couple of pitches due to threatening weather and poor conditions. For this attempt, I was teamed up with a new partner. Not really new, actually, as I had first climbed with him some twelve years earlier. We just hadn't done any climbing together for a long time. After our near-disastrous climb on the Middle Teton Glacier, Brian and I had sort of lost track of each other. I often wondered what he was up to, but didn't really know how to get in touch. Then, late last Summer, I saw a post on an internet climber's bulletin board that I suspected might be from him. I sent him an inquiring e-mail, and sure enough, it turned out to be my long-lost climbing buddy. I had a desire to head back to the Columbia Ice Fields to give Athabasca's North Face another shot, and it seemed like a good objective for the two of us. Brian agreed, and we picked a mid-September date and began planning, training, and dreaming. The terrorist attacks on September 11 just about derailed our plans. We ended up moving our trip two weeks, to the end of September, when air travel was returning to normal.

The Slog

We arrived at the Columbia Icefields center Friday night, and spent Saturday relaxing, as the weather was supposed to clear on Sunday. Checking the log at the ranger station, it appeared that nobody had climbed the North face route in about a week and a half. The rangers told us that there was a fair amount on new snow fall in the past week, that might make the route a bit more difficult than usual. We were up early Sunday morning, and were on the approach trail by 2:15 a.m. The night was clear and cold, and the hiking went quickly until we reached the snow. On the glacier, there was a fair amount of new snow to contend with, and we found ourselves slogging and post-holing through ever deeper snow. We tried to keep to the more wind-blown areas where the snow was not so deep, but most of the time we were hiking through snow that ranged from calf-deep to waist deep.

Our progress was painfully slow and strenuous, and it took us forever to wallow through the snow to the base of the route. We had planned on beginning the climbing before dawn and getting established on the face before sunrise, but with the slow arduous approach, it was 10:30 by the time we crossed the bergshrund and began the actual climbing. We had been going for eight strenuous hours, and we hadn't even done any real climbing yet, just lots of wallowing. We had a short discussion at the base of the route, wondering whether we should go on or turn back, but it seemed like we had come so far, that it would be a shame to turn back now. We figured we would be able to cruise the face in good time, simul-climbing to stretch out the pitches.

The Climb

Conditions on the face were a strange mixture of cool-whip snow plastered over brittle ice. Sometimes the snow would support your weight, sometimes it would break loose. Both crampons and ice tools felt pretty insecure. Getting good sticks with crampons or axe in the ice involved a fair amount of whacking/kicking to get past the cool-whip layer and down to the ice beneath. To add to the fun, there was a lot of spin-drift coming down the face due to wind whipping over the top of the mountain, so we were glad of our goggles. We simulclimbed the first three pitches, but as the face got steeper, we no longer felt that the conditions allowed for the security necessary for moving together. We began "pitching"it, although to save time, we tried not to place more than two or three screws on any pitch. Placing protection and establishing belays was quite strenuous and involved a lot of excavation to get down to solid ice. The ice was quite brittle, and tended to shatter into large dinner plates that would come pin-wheeling down the face like ninja throwing stars aimed at the belayer below. Both Brian and I got pegged with several good sized ice chunks in this manner.



The face gets gradually steeper and steeper as you get higher, but the upper steep sections were actually easier to climb, as there was less of a snow layer over the ice to contend with. Without the dreaded cool-whip, the steeper sections actually felt more secure and went faster than the lower angle pitches below. The crux of the route came near the top, where the route jogged right up through a rock band. It was my turn to lead, and I spent some extra time putting in a couple of solid ice screws below the rock section. The climbing was mixed, with some very thin ice and hooking on rock features that seemed somewhat insecure. I was encouraged immensely by a couple of fixed pitons, which provided the only viable protection for that section. After a bit of hesitation, I went for it, scrabbling up the narrow slot. I kept moving, and after a few hooking moves, the ice became thick enough to get some good sticks with my picks. It was with a great deal of relief that I set up a somewhat precarious belay and brought Brian up. It was only two more pitches to the top. I pulled the summit pitch, and ran it out in one long, unprotected push, fighting my way up through rotten sugar snow plastered over ice. It was 7:45 in the evening by the time that Brian joined me on the summit.

The Descent

We quickly traversed along the West ridgeline to the Silverhorn. After a bit of confusion regarding the descent route, we located the obvious downward path off the Silverhorn summit and began our trudge back down the mountain. It was now night, but the full moon was beginning to rise. Even more of a treat, I got to see the Northern Lights for the first time in my life. They took the form of delicate streamers of white light, falling from the sky like a huge, noiseless fireworks display seen from a distance. Descending from the mountain's shoulder, we initially missed the descent gully, and spent an hour or so backtracking here and there, searching for the correct route down. Once back on track, the descent was a seemingly unending journey down trails, gullies, glaciers and scree slopes. We were pretty wasted by now, and if it weren't for the need to phone home to let our wives know we were ok, we probably would have simply laid down on the glacier and fallen asleep. After what seemed like forever, we finally reached the snow-coach road, and soon thereafter our car. It was such an amazing luxury to be able to sit and not have to walk anymore. We reached the car at 1:45 a.m., twenty three and a half hours after we had started, and we had been pushing almost non-stop that entire time. The bad news was that we had to be up at five o-clock in the morning in order to get back to Calgary to catch our plane home. We were exhausted but happy, and I had satiated my alpine climbing need for quite a while, at least until I lost the soreness in my legs and got feeling back in my little toes again.

Equipment Notes

Clothing and equipment for Athabasca's North Face in Fall

This is the gear I took with me on a route up Athabasca's North Face. October 1, 2001. Temperatures on the route ranged from the mid teens to mid twenties, farenheit.

Clothing:
Lightweight Lowe "Dryflo" underwear top
Marmot windshirt Worn directly over the dryflo top, underneath other layers
Patagonia R1 "Flash" regulator fleece pullover
Mountain Equipment Co-op "Pamir" powershield fabric jacket A nice softshell layer with a little more warmth than typical Schoeller fabrics. Nice double chest pockets for easy access to GU, camera, etc.
North Face "Cerro Torre" polarguard 3d jacket Low bulk, decent warmth. Not for super cold environments
Thermax boxer briefs
Patagonia R1 regulator fleece bottoms
Cloudwalker "Ama Dablam" schoeller WB400 fabric farmer john bibs Excellent alpine pants, good drop seat design (I added a little more velcro to the top to seal out drafts better.)
Homemade lightweight powerstretch headband
Capilene balaclava
Cloudveil schoeller fabric hat
HB Dyneema Helmet
Smartwool midweight ski socks
Scarpa "Alpha" plastic boots Very sensitive and light. Flexible uppers good for low angle climbng, excellent heel cup retention makes them good for front-pointing too. Mine fit a little tight and my toes got a bit bruised on the descent.
Mammut short gaiters. Velcro kept getting iced-up and tops wouldn't stay closed. Need to add a snap to top for security.
Granite Gear "Ice Sparring" gloves Excellent gloves. Warm, good dexterity, good knuckle protection
Dynastar spring ski gloves
OR powerstretch liner gloves

Notes on the clothing used: This system was about right for the temperatures encountered. A few degrees colder, and a heavier belay jacket might have been in order, particularly late in the day when energy levels were low, and temperatures dropped.

Personal Gear:

Osprey "Aether" pack This is the old-style super lightweight climbing pack, not the newer, heavier version.
Cebe sunglasses
Uvex "pocket" goggles These goggles really shined, venting well, and keeping the spindrift out of my eyes.
Camelback 3 liter bladder with drinking tube (contains Gatorade sports drink) The on/of valve freezes badly.
Black Diamond "Moonlight" Headlamp A great piece of gear. Bright, long-lasting batteries, light weight. Probably better options now, but this was my first experience with an LED headlamp.
Suunto Vector altimeter watch (worn around neck)
Small swiss army knife
Climbing Food (18 energy gels, 1 cliff bar, 1 large slim jim meat stick)
Nikon 28ti camera, film
Stripped down first aid kit
Toilet paper
Sunscreen

Personal Climbing Equipment:

Carbon Fiber Black Prophet ice tools (aermet picks) with extra pick and wrench The perfect alpine climbing tools. Their light weight makes them easy to swing all day long.
Cassin "Eolo" Harness Super light weight, Coordinates well with drop-seat pants, a good alpine ice choice
Black Diamond Tool Holsters
Charlet moser ice screw racks
"Jaws" belay device, locking belay biner
Black Diamond "Sabretooth" Crampons with antiballing plate Excellent all-around alpine ice crampons
locking carabiner
Small piece of a file

Group Climbing Equipment:

9 ice screws We brought extra for protected simulclimbing. Black Diamond express and Grivel 360 worked best.
Camalots sizes .5; 1; 2 Not needed on this route
Tricams sizes .5; 1 Not needed on this route
Frost nuts sizes 1; 2; 3; 4 Used one for constructing a belay above the rock band
3 titanium pitons Not needed on this route. Fixed pitons already in place
30 lightweight carabiners
Pair of 8.5 mm edilrid ropes, 50meter Should have brought a single, 60 meter 9.4mm rope.
4 screamers
5 slings
2 quickdraws

Images

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