Childhood potty training did little to prepare us for pooping in a snowstorm at 17,700 ft. on the south side of Denali. I was packing up my backpack for the remaining 2,600 ft. slog to the summit when I saw Zeb walk to the edge of our tent platform and prepare to go number two. He faced into the driving snow, loosened and lowered his puffy insulated pants to the top of his boots, unclipped the leg loops of his climbing harness, unsnapped and unzipped the butt flap on his windproof pants, pulled down his fleece bottoms and underwear, tucked the butt flap away from the line of fire, and assumed a half crouching half squatting position. Then, amidst the continuous sandblasting of snow and wind, he paused. His butt was freezing quickly and snow was accumulating on all of the abovementioned clothing. He concentrated, making a frumpy face that was visible even through his goggles, and released number two into the cold mountain air.
This is a story of Expedition Frumplestiltskin, our attempt to climb Cassin Ridge.
What is Cassin Ridge?
Joe Puryear, in his Alaska Climbing guidebook, describes Cassin Ridge as the elegant line that perfectly splits the enormous south face of the biggest mountain on the continent.
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| Cassin Ridge follows the red line. |
Summary Statistics
23 days on the mountain (June 14th - July 6th)
66,000+ ft. gained and lost
102.25 hours walking/climbing
250,000 calories of food
9 hour approach to Cassin
4 days on Cassin
Bailing Before Beginning
After finishing Michigan finals and packing up all of my possessions, I left for Seattle, as a "master of science" at 7AM on May 4th, the morning after commencement. Several days later I woke up in Wyoming to climb the Grand Teton. After slogging up mushy corn snow in double boots for a few hours I stopped in my tracks. I couldn’t go any farther. I was pondering: Why climb this mountain? What do I want to get out if it?
I sat on my pack for an hour watching snow accumulate on my parka and the clouds move in and out, obscuring and then revealing the valley below. Going up the Grand felt pointless. I had been up it before; why do it again? Why did I put off the job search in favor of two upcoming trips to the Alaska Range? Was climbing worth all the time I've put into it? I’d leave for Mt. Huntington in four days—why?
I turned around, feeling grateful that I could have finished going up the Grand if I had wanted to, and returned to my friends to chat about the purpose of climbing. We walked the dog up a logging road and, after chatting for a long time, I decided that I’d give Huntington a go and then see if I felt motivated to get on Cassin.
Chris and I did the Harvard Route on Mt. Huntington. It was the scariest thing I'd ever done. Afterwards, I was mentally exhausted and couldn’t fathom returning to Alaska to get on Cassin—for a longer and harder trip. Spending several weeks on a glacier living in smelly clothes, melting all of our water from snow, and eating water-soluble food was the last thing I wanted to do.
Deciding whether or not I wanted to bail on Cassin, which I was supposed to do with another friend, Zeb, consumed my mind nearly all day for an entire week. Did I want to throw our Denali permit and plane tickets into the wind and go home to my parents and eat real meals and relax on the beautiful Maine coast? Absolutely!!
I called Zeb from Anchorage to tell him I was no longer psyched on Cassin. He was speechless: “Ugggghhh.” Long pause. “Uuummmm.” Longer pause. “Ugggghhh.”
What would you do if someone bailed, just two weeks before departure, on the dream trip that you’d spent countless hours and a few thousand dollars on?
Conversations with family and friends reinforced my feeling that bailing was a fine decision. If I didn’t want to do it, I shouldn’t do it. Ben & Jerry's: "If it's not fun, why do it?"
After more thought, however, I realized that the underlying cause of my hesitation was fear. The Harvard Route had allowed me to build a better mental model of what Cassin might be like. (On the summit of Huntington Chris and I starred in awe at Denali and the Cassin looming 8,000 ft. above our heads.) As a result, I was afraid of it. Getting up the 4,000 ft. Harvard Route was hard enough. Getting on an 8,000 ft. route that was far more committing and had a 10+ day, 130 lb. approach seemed terribly unappealing. I was near the “Reality” stage of the Psyche Level chart below.
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| Photo: Chris McNamara |
Ultimately, I recognized that fear was a poor reason for bailing. I also assumed that eating real meals and being off a glacier for two weeks would boost my psyche level. So I ponied up and called Zeb to tell him I was back in the game.
West Buttress
We followed the typical strategy for Cassin: fly in to 7,300 ft., slog with sled and pack up the West Buttress route to 14,200 ft., acclimatize as well as possible there by doing day trips to higher elevations, and get on Cassin. The majority of this went smoothly.
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| Lower Kahiltna Glacier. Denali at right. |
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| Zeb looking up at a mess of guided parties. |
We reached 14 camp in five days while dodging the myriad guided parties and carrying tons of food, an extra tent, an extra stove, an extra sleeping bag, and ice and rock protection—all for Cassin. From 14 camp we hiked to the West Rib Cutoff (15,700 ft.), hiked to 17 camp, and tried to reach the summit from 14 but turned around at 19,500 ft. because we felt terrible (headache, nausea, and we were worried that if we kept going we might not have the energy to descend).
Life in 14 camp became stagnant over time. Our bodies got progressively dirtier and smellier, and our big bags of food became less appetizing. We ate relatively little for about a week because our stomachs felt bad. One night Zeb woke himself up farting. This is from my journal:
Life in 14 camp became stagnant over time. Our bodies got progressively dirtier and smellier, and our big bags of food became less appetizing. We ate relatively little for about a week because our stomachs felt bad. One night Zeb woke himself up farting. This is from my journal:
Last night I lay awake in the tent, blinded by the midnight sun and plagued by an upset stomach, as Zeb farted himself to sleep. He was farting consciously as he fell asleep. Then he farted unconsciously through the first few hours of sleep, releasing gas in between and occasionally in conjunction with snorts and snores. He farted so much and with such intensity that he woke himself up. Bolt upright around 2:00AM.
We chatted groggily for a few minutes.
“I think I just woke myself up from farting.” He said half surprised and half embarrassed.
“Yep,” I replied. “You’ve been going at it for a few hours.”
“I’ve never farted this much in my life.”
“And I haven’t been able to sleep. I’ve just been listening to you, and farting, too.
After a long period of silence, I mused, "I wonder if it was the powdered eggs.”
Then I lay awake looking up at the tent’s yellow nylon interior, listening to Zeb fart himself back to sleep.
We adjusted to life on the glacier, which was, among other things, filled with floaties. The water in our bottles had leftovers from the previous meal. Oatmeal, pancake batter, cream of wheat, seven-grain cereal, and granola. Mac and cheese, couscous, polenta, soup, and tuna. My clear Nalgene provided an unobstructed view of the floaties. Looking into it was like visiting an aquarium, except the animals were remnants of lightweight backpacking food.
We talked with several other parties that were on the mountain to climb technical routes, but were departing after going up the West Buttress or, for some, the Upper West Rib. A few of the people looked destroyed. They had sunburnt faces, peeling noses, and deep mucousy coughs. They gave us their extra food and fuel. I wondered why people would spend a month on the mountain trying to climb some extra, special, even more difficult route. What was the purpose? What were we all trying to prove/learn/get out of this?
When Zeb and I were feeling acclimated, and were ready to launch for Cassin, it snowed four feet overnight. Our tent was completely buried and, due to drifting, our walled compound with a kitchen and bathroom was completely filled in. We spent the day shoveling and trying to find our sporks, which I had mistakenly left out after dinner.
The next night it snowed another two feet. While shoveling in the morning Steve House, a pro climber who was in the adjacent site, threw his arms up into the air and shouted, “What the hell!!”
The search and rescue crew told us this was the largest storm since late April or early May. Worse, zero of the previous six feet of snow were forecast.
Lots of new snow is bad for climbing because it increases avalanche danger and, most relevant to Cassin, makes for slow climbing. The final ~3,000 ft. of Cassin are moderate snow slopes on which conditions determine difficulty. Hard packed snow makes for easier, West Buttress-like walking. Several feet of powder makes for epic wallowing. I feared that all the snow would make the route too difficult for us.
Snow slid off the mountain in impressive avalanches while we relaxed in camp. We consumed hot drinks rapid-fire (when you finish one you start another because that’s the only way to justify being outside of your sleeping bag) with Steve and his partner Rafael, also a veteran alpinist. As the snow and wind were blowing into our faces and melting on our parkas, we compared alpine climbing to other sporting activities and concluded that alpine climbers are weirdos. What we were here to do was difficult, dangerous, and mostly Type II and Type III fun. At one point Rafael said, “The thing about alpine climbing is you can make up for so much with your mind.”
Our conversation made me think about all the things Zeb and I needed to make up for with our minds: rapidly declining motivation, heaps of snow, and tremendous uncertainty about everything from the forecast to our abilities.
Our conversation made me think about all the things Zeb and I needed to make up for with our minds: rapidly declining motivation, heaps of snow, and tremendous uncertainty about everything from the forecast to our abilities.
Steve and Rafael bailed the next morning in order to catch a flight home. I wanted to either get up the mountain or get off the mountain. We received forecasts via text from Chris in Seattle and Emma in New York, and decided to give it a go the following day.
Cassin Ridge
"It is exactly that of a bull in the arena. Confused and tormented by something far beyond their understanding, they react to the sight of the cliff as the bull to the cape. Not knowing why, they charge."
-Steve Roper
"It is exactly that of a bull in the arena. Confused and tormented by something far beyond their understanding, they react to the sight of the cliff as the bull to the cape. Not knowing why, they charge."
-Steve Roper
Day Zero
We left camp around 12:30pm and slogged, for the fourth time, up 1,500 ft. to the Cutoff. When we got to the ridge I told Zeb I wasn’t sure I’d be able to do Cassin if the conditions were like what we had just walked through. Even with our bootpack mostly intact it felt HARD for me. It was also storming and we couldn’t begin to descend the Seattle 72 ramp (we needed to descend 3,700 ft. to the base of the route) unless we could see where we were going. So we put on our insulated pants and parkas and waited.
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| Waiting for the storm to clear at the West Rib Cutoff. |
After an hour of trying to stay warm by sitting on our backpacks and walking around a six-foot by six-foot area I proposed that we do the Upper West Rib, a much easier route. It was right in front of us, we could camp a few hundred feet up on a flatish area, and we had an excess of food and fuel for that route—we would make it to the top of the mountain. But Zeb wanted to wait a bit longer to see if the weather cleared.
A recurring and highly beneficial pattern on the trip was: When I was frumpy or wanted to bail Zeb would be happy and want to charge forward. And when he was fumpy and wanted to bail, I would be happy and want to charge forward.
The snow stopped. We began to descend the ridge. With Zeb leading, we jumped over a few crevasses. These weren’t the typical Washington State crevasse jumps, where you hop over a crack in the summer snow pack. We needed to span six ish feet over a similar drop. I unintentionally did a barrel roll flip while leaping over the first one. Zeb thought I was going to die when he saw me moving, partially inverted, over the crevasse with crampons and ice tools flying. But the many feet of fresh snow made for a great landing. I thought I jumped normally, straight ahead, but when he looked at me with a wide-eyed glare and asked, “Are you OK?!” I could tell something didn’t go as planned.
When landing, the buckle on my shoulder strap broke. (The backpack was designed for ultralight backpacking.) I tied the webbing strap to a point above the buckle and we continued downward.
The second crevasse jump was not as large, but I also managed to botch it. While approaching the crevasse, perhaps too fast and with too much confidence, the snow beneath me disappeared and turned to blue ice. I slipped and skidded and then, at the last minute, JUMPED!!
The second crevasse jump was not as large, but I also managed to botch it. While approaching the crevasse, perhaps too fast and with too much confidence, the snow beneath me disappeared and turned to blue ice. I slipped and skidded and then, at the last minute, JUMPED!!
All was well.
I took the lead for the remainder of the descent and we enjoyed sliding on our butts and crawling on hands and knees over snow bridges, and doing about a thousand feet of face-in down climbing on rotten ice.
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| Scouting the Seattle 72 ramp. The Japanese Couloir is the rightmost gully. |
We dug out a tent platform near the base of the route, and observed that it was easier to breathe at 12,000 ft. I was melting snow for dinner when I turned around to see Zeb sprint and dive off the platform after one of our tent poles. He missed it and it rocketed down the snow slope into a crevasse. He looked up at me with a sad puppy dog face and moaned, “Does this mean it’s over?” which I interpreted as meaning: we spent two weeks getting to the base of the route and now we aren’t going to be able to get on it because I dropped a tent pole into the crevasse!!
Thinking it unwise to climb the route without a functioning tent, I calmly responded, “yes” and suggested that he eat some dinner and then take a look to see if the pole was recoverable.
Secretly, part of me was thinking that we now had an excellent excuse to bail. I imaged myself telling others, "We got to the base—perhaps 80% of Cassin attempts don't even make it to the base—but couldn't go any farther because we dropped a tent pole into a crevasse. Yeah, it sucked. We TOTALLY would have sent if we had gotten on the route."
Secretly, part of me was thinking that we now had an excellent excuse to bail. I imaged myself telling others, "We got to the base—perhaps 80% of Cassin attempts don't even make it to the base—but couldn't go any farther because we dropped a tent pole into a crevasse. Yeah, it sucked. We TOTALLY would have sent if we had gotten on the route."
As I was thinking about this and other future scenarios Zeb built an anchor, rappelled into the crevasse, and ascended out with the pole in hand. We went to bed around 12:30AM, ecstatic that we could continue onwards and upwards.
Day One
The Japanese Couloir (1,000 vertical ft. of ice and snow climbing) was a calf burner. We swapped simul climbing blocks, pitched out the crux, and then resumed simul climbing. About 200 ft. beneath the top-out ridge I knocked off a large chunk of ice that hit Zeb in the forearm. He temporarily lost his vision and sweated profusely. I built a belay at the ridge and he climbed up with one arm.
He was in a tremendous amount of pain and was making terrible, agonizing grimacing faces that I had only before seen in movies. He couldn’t even hold a water bottle. Watching him experience so much pain made me cry.
It took us a modest four hours to get up the Japanese Couloir and it was still reasonably early in the day. We had two options: (1) Descend immediately and camp where we did the previous night. We had one 45-meter rope and estimated the descent would require 20 rappels, potentially taking 12 hours to get back to our previous bivy. Then, the following day, we could climb 3,700 ft. back up to the Cutoff, and then drop 1,500 ft. down to 14 camp; or (2) Sleep on Cassin Ledge, one of the few good bivy spots on the route, which was conveniently only 100 ft. from where we stood.
I rigged up anchors on the ledge, made a platform, and pitched the tent while Zeb sat on his backpack, moped, and examined his partially functioning arm. After a few hours and a few pain killers he was feeling better and was more talkative. We ate dinner and lay in our double sleeping bag while we listened to the 8PM weather forecast on our radio. Lisa, the basecamp manager (7,300 ft.), said, “Lower mountain forecast for 14,000 ft. and below: 12 inches of snow tonight and 12 inches of snow tomorrow.”
Between Zeb’s arm and the expected two-feet of snow, we thought it was over.
Between Zeb’s arm and the expected two-feet of snow, we thought it was over.
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| Crossing the bergschrund below the Japanese Couloir. |
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| Zeb in the Japanese Couloir. |
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| Zeb prepares for bed on Cassin Ledge. |
Day Two
We heard from others that it was wise to either bail at the top of the Japanese Couloir or commit to going all the way (about 6,000 ft.) to the summit. It wasn’t snowing when we woke up and it only snowed two inches overnight. Zeb’s arm was feeling a bit better. Thus, we decided that I’d lead us up through the 5.8 mixed section and then, based on how we were feeling, we’d either go to the top or retreat.
The 5.8 mixed section would have been easy if it weren't covered in two feet of snow. I had to scrape off all of the powder with my tools and hands in order to see what I was climbing. I moved through this section while we were simul climbing and then put Zeb on belay. He pulled through most of it using the rope and muttered something like, "That was hard!" Then he presented me with the findings from his previous 200 ft. of climbing: he couldn’t swing an ice tool with his left hand, but he could pull down reasonably well if he was holding onto something.
Zeb is such a good climber that when you remove something that normal mortals deem essential for climbing he still CRUSHES IT. For example, in the fall of 2009 he rode his bike 115 miles from Dartmouth to Hampshire in a day. Going light, he brought only a pair of underwear. (I outfitted him with street clothes.) When we went bouldering one afternoon he opted not to use others’ climbing shoes, but rather to go barefoot. He climbed ten or so problems up to V6, including my project. Barefoot.
When he told me that he couldn’t swing a tool with his left arm, but could still pull down on a tool, I knew Zeb would be able to get up the rest of Cassin. We decided that we’d continue onwards and upwards, and commit to the route.
I led us up the knife-edge ridge. There was snow, sometimes a few inches and sometimes six or more feet, on top of ice. We didn’t place any protection and were both scared shitless the entire time--constantly thinking that if one of us fell the other would need to jump off the other side of the ridge so the rope would catch us.
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| Knife-edge ridge. |
The visibility turned poor as we got up higher and into the clouds. Zeb led us up the “easy glacier”, and to my amazement, directly to the base of the first rock band (roughly at 14,500 ft.). When climbing ice he swung both tools with his right arm. This worked as follows: match both hands on right tool, swing left tool with right hand, place left hand on left tool, swing right tool, match hands on right tool, and repeat. It was amazing to watch. It was also very slow.
We swapped leads through the rock band, which took at least six hours to move through. Scraping the snow off the rock took ages and, even when it was mostly off, the climbing felt hard. After one simul block I belayed in the shade and, despite eating a lot and wearing my fleece and parka, I got so cold I turned into an evil witch and couldn't think about anything other than moving my body and reuniting with the sun.
The Type II and Type III fun climbing contrasted with the Type I fun vistas that pulled my jaw down with magnetic force and literally made me to stop and stare in awe. I had never seen anything this beautiful before in my life. Every once in a while I would pause and laugh in disbelief because I would realize the gravity of the situation--where I was, what I was doing, and how absolutely wild the experience was. We were in a wilderness, an uninhabited and rarely visited place, that was tremendously gorgeous. My definitions of mountain, beauty, vista, commitment, vulnerable, etc. were being rewritten with each step.
We reached the 15,700 ft. bivy at around 11:30 PM. While eating dinner we watched the clouds as they settled like cotton balls, making a lumpy white carpet over the mountains below us.
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| ~15,700 ft. bivy. |
Day Three
As we entered the second rock band we achieved a major milestone: we climbed above our previous high point at the Cutoff—two and a half days later. The second rock band felt shorter than the first. I led one remarkably fun and very long simul block. Zeb led us up a difficult mixed section, likely marked “mixed alternative” on the topo, during which he was petrified. He made one committing step-up move and then clawed around desperately in the snow hoping for some ice or a decent hook on a semi-sold rock.
The snow made it hard to balance (a) the desire to swing into what you think might be ice, thereby saving a lot of excavating; and (b) the need to preserve the ice tool’s sharp pick. (We didn’t bring a file.)
At the top of the second rock band we unroped, put all the gear away, and brewed up. Zeb then led us, post holing through one to three feet of snow, across an exposed traverse to the Big Bertha glacier. Then I led the way, post holing up about 1,000 ft.
Our hands were in snow much of the day and the leather on our gloves absorbed water. At night our gloves didn’t dry thoroughly; they had become progressively wetter over the previous four days. During the final 1,000 ft. of this day’s climbing we were in the shade and it was very cold. Consequently, our gloves gradually solid froze with our fingers inside of them.
My gloves had a thin layer of leather on top of a waterproof Gore-Tex Pro membrane; only the tips of the fingers froze. Zeb’s gloves, however, had thicker leather and an elderly waterproof component—they froze completely solid. Frozen leather scraping against granite equals shredded gloved. He was forced to put on his Alti Mitts half way up the couloir and was tempted to toss the now heavy and never to be used again gloves into a crevasse, but chose instead to carry them up 3,000 ft., down 13,000 ft., out ~14 miles to basecamp, and back to the east coast where they were likely incinerated in a waste to energy facility.
Our bivy had perfect bluebird skies, almost no wind, and phenomenal vistas of the Alaska Range and beyond. I was elated.
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At the top of the second rock band. |
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| Dinner at 17,700 ft. |
Day Four
The weather turned sour overnight and wind gusts and spindrift pummeled the tent. Frozen condensation rained down on us, landing on our faces and waking us up with a chill. The double bag had lost a significant amount of loft from getting wet during the previous nights, and was no longer as warm. We both slept in our insulated pants and parkas and put Alti Mitts over our feet. In addition to our bodies and our clothing, the sleeping bag had four sweet-scented boot liners, two water bottles, our cameras, and the radio—all of which bounced around in the bag as we tossed and turned. And, of course, there was the farting, which seemed to get worse with altitude.
In the morning Zeb told me he got about one hour of sleep and felt hung-over. He pooped in the snowstorm and used the shovel to chuck it over the edge. I imagined it rolling down the mountain, sliding over hanging glaciers and huge seracs, becoming airborne, zooming past steep granite walls, and landing in a crevasse. There, the poo might sit for hundreds of years while being consumed by the glacier and traveling downhill, being crushed between ice and bedrock, dissolving into water, flowing into rivers, and out to the ocean.
Throughout the entire morning—it took us about two hours to get ready—I was thinking about “The thing about alpine climbing is you can make up for so much with your mind” and hoped that my mind would transport me to the summit.
Zeb started the wallowing. There was a thin wind slab that made things worse because he had to punch through it before dealing with the powder beneath. About an hour into the party, Zeb pointed upwards and shouted to me, “I’m going to stop at that rock!” This meant that I would need to take the lead. After two minutes, during which he appeared not to make any vertical progress, he yelled back, “I’m going to stop here!”
I came up to him and we drank some water and snacked. Then I started off.
No wonder he stopped. It was soul-sucking wallowing. I struggled fruitlessly to move up, gasped for air, then looked back at him for help. He offered none. Again I threw my arms forward and, laying the ice tools horizontally and pressing down, I kicked my right boot into the snow, but it punched down through the powder and settled back beside the other. The only way to move through this section was with the “standing tunnel” method, which entails breaking through and scraping away the wind slab and compacting the chest deep powder enough to stand on it. …Burrowing with your head exposed.
Things got easier farther up. Then harder. Then easier. Then harder.
The storm began to clear and I got extremely excited when we passed 19,500 ft., our previous high point. We could see wind whipping over the ridge 500 ft. above us, and I knew that was where we would meet the West Buttress—where we could drop our packs and head up to the summit on the hard packed trail.
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| Wallowing at approximately 19,500 ft. |
Our pace was very slow, but the altitude wasn’t wrecking us like it had on our previous West Buttress summit attempt. I was making up for so much with my mind by telling myself, “I have lungs like Ed Veisturs.” “I have legs like Lance Armstrong.” And the post holing continued. One step. Three breathes. One step. Three breathes.
Joining the West Buttress at Kahiltna Horn felt similar to returning home after the first semester of college. We left the scary route and entered a familiar place where life was easier. We secured our packs to the mountain and slowly meandered up the remaining 200 ft. to the summit. The weather was perfect. Splitter blue skies and no wind. It was 7PM on July 4th. We were alone. Zeb laid down on the summit for a while and then sat up partially, crossed his legs in a feminine fashion, and stroked the USGS marker with his Alti Mitt.
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| Approaching the summit. |
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| Summit selfie. |
We had the upper mountain to ourselves for the 6,000 ft. descent to 14 camp. I felt deeply satisfied while ambling down, looking out at the peaks as they appeared to grow larger, and the tundra as it came into focus. I placed one foot in front of the other and made up for my exhaustion with my mind. “I have amazing balance.” “I am an expert at walking down snow slopes.” “I do not trip or fall.”
I couldn’t believe that we had climbed Cassin. It felt like such an honor and a privilege to be on the route, on the mountain, in such an amazing location amidst such beauty and such power. The feeling of overcoming such uncertainty and putting so much effort into one thing, and being successful, was and is still indescribable.
We reached 14 camp at midnight, watched the sunset at 1:00AM while eating dinner, and crawled into our individual sleeping bags and our normal sized tent around 2:00AM. Luxurious.
Departure
The next day we slept in, told the search and rescue folks we were back, made cornbread to accompany our smoked salmon, and packed up all of our gear. Even though I was so exhausted, I couldn’t fall asleep that night because I was so amazed that we got up the route and was so excited to get back into town.
At 4:00AM the watch alarm went off and Zeb awoke in a frumpy mood. I was already wide-awake feeling happy and ready to charge forward. We made breakfast and put on all of our clothing and gear for the last time. Then we stumbled down 7,000 ft. over 12 miles, passing campsites that were fortress-like and filled with anticipation on our way up, but were now abandoned and melting in the hot, lower elevation sun.
We checked in with Lisa at basecamp. Expedition Frumplestilkskin was back. She said, “I’ve been expecting you.” And told us we were one of three parties and the only Americans and to do a technical route on the mountain this year. Much to our delight, she fed us grilled cheese sandwiches and a powdered electrolyte drink, and we talked about climbing. Afterwards, I retired to our pile of duffels and backpacks and napped for a few hours. When the plane arrived I was angry and confused, and wished it were gone so I could continue sleeping. All I wanted to do was sleep. Sleep peacefully. In perpetuity.
The flight out was too gorgeous to be asleep. We floated above endless fields of crevasses, sinuous rivers, and green hills back to Talkeetna.
That evening we showered, consumed big burgers and delicious milkshakes, and went promptly to bed. We slept for twelve hours. At 10:30 the next morning, while walking downtown to the Roadhouse, where we would consume a gigantic breakfast, a random stranger yelled to us from a restaurant porch, “Didn’t get much sleep last night did ya?!”
Apparently we looked like we were ruined from a sleepless night of partying. I almost gave the man a proper verbal walloping and a detailed explanation for why we might still look tired after getting 12 hours of sleep, but replied, "Actually, we got 12 hours of sleep."
And we walked onwards toward our 2,000 calorie breakfast.
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| The 'Full Standard' at the Talkeetna Roadhouse: 6-8 eggs, 4 pieces of bacon, a pile of potatoes, and 2 pieces of toast. For an additional $4 you can substitute the toast for an entire plate of biscuits and gravy (left). |
I don’t yet have a well-developed answer as to why people pursue things like alpine climbing. Going into Cassin I told myself that being in the Alaska Range, seeing stunning sights, and spending time with Zeb was why I wanted to do it. But those factors offer only a partial explanation. Perhaps more accurate is that the higher purpose of sporting activities is to affect some type of mental and spiritual gain. What I gained, I don’t fully know. Whether I have more to gain from alpine climbing, I also don’t know. One thing is certain, though: I’m very glad I didn't bail.
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| Denali looming above its surroundings. 2017 update: If you're considering the route, I made a list of the best gear for a Denali expedition (updated with Fall 2017 collections) here. |
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