Homeward bound

Matt and I are back in our camp in the Ruth Gorge. Yesterday we made a traverse of the Sugar Tooth and hoped to carry on in the footsteps of Freddy and Renan who have probably by now made the first traverse of the Tooth skyline traverse. We abseiled off from the Sugar/Eye Tooth col after the weather deteriorated and had received a forecast suggesting stormy weather incoming. As it turned out the skies cleared and the pressure stabilised but we just made the call on the information we had at the time.

It's been a fun two weeks in the Gorge but we are now out of time and will start our journey home. More thoughts to follow.

Time to descend

Adrian and I have long finished camp festering. Its too cold. Little sun equals no power equals text blog only. At 5pm Bang on schedule the radio sparks up: "John, its Matt... We're on the summit of the Sugar Tooth and can't see a damn thing. Plus it's snowing."

I give him the forecast which is promising cloud and precipitation plus a full on meltdown at the start of the week.

I guess they take 5 mins to discuss through the options and the radio comes back to life: "Jon here Johnny- we're coming down - get the kettle on."

With his 400mm lens Adrian spots them a little later- tiny dots dots descending an ice colour that runs from a notch left of the summit. I take a look and see one dot of a person abb to another on a belay below a spur of rock in a sea of ice. I imagine them shoulder to shoulder pulling ropes through working hard to set up the next abseil.

I light the stove and wait...

Here we go now!

1am. Adrian and I boot up, unzip the frozen tent and sneak out into the cold Alaskan night. It’s not dark! Just the mountains in battle ship greys and blues; in Dartmoor speak its still dimpsey. We cook up a cheesy muff and Starbucks Pike Place coffee and then shoulder our Osprey Mutant packs, tie off coils and skin off up the glacier.  An icey wind is rushing down off Denali.

We have to beat the boys to the col on the ridge below the Sugar Tooth – an Alaskan version of Skye’s Clach Glas and Blaven, but pumped up on steroids. Ade’s aim is to film them from above and then moving on upwards in their quest to traverse the ridge of the Moose Tooth Group.

I follow some wands through the crevasses – they lead to a blind alley and a series of collapsing snow bridges. I switch to intuition and head off out left and follow a spine like lateral moraine. Its steep, icey and we move fast over good ground, the sun climbing and signs of life surfacing back at our camp way below us.

At the steep ground we dump our skis and switch to crampons and axes. It is Adrian's first time using these tools and with an 800ft 50 deg snow slope it is a veritable shove in the deep end. We tie the rope between us very short and I poon my way up tractoring away. Ade shouts: They’re here already!   But we get to the col, belay the rope to a granite spike and Ade springs the cameras into action as Jon and Matt sprint up and move on through, scratching their way up a mixed ramp and out of site around the cathedral buttress above us. It is like being overtaken in the French Alps.

Ade gets his shots and we descend. At our skis we watch for the others above us and see them moving fast 400m above. So far so Good.

Back at camp we fester, watch an avalanche charge down Blood From A Stone on Mount Dickie and dream of climbing the unclimbed Laser Line - a sabre cut runnel of ice that drops vertically from the summit to the glacier for a clean mile. In my mind its got be the cleanest, most awesome climbing objective on the planet.

We keep watching The Moose group of mountains, but cloud has been building all day and they soon disappear into cairngorm type clag. Not good. The recently arrived Mountain school students disappear into their tents. A flurry of snow falls and we look down the gorge to see dark clouds building…

Rhythm is a mystery

K-Klass in their 1993 house hit wondered about the power of rhythm:

I cannot begin to understand the things this feeling does to me, the feeling takes the lead and controls meÉ

Even in this land of ice and granite there is rhythm. With modern life we see planes fly in, drop climbers off, tents go up, tents go down, planes come in climbers fly out.

But as we spend more days out from Talkeetna we get in step with the Rhythm in the mountains. Catabatic winds warm up and cool and rush up and rush down the glacier, it is if the mountains are breathing throughout the day. Snow falls, builds up into lung busting depths. Then the sun cooks it down to form a tough carapace that provides a wind polished surface of ivory pewter. Its then like walking on a giant crme brulŽ. I see Gaia even here, we are all one and indivisible.

In the afternoon snow heated slopes wake the mountain and the granite grumbles around us sending down cascades of blocks and stones, ice and snow. We watched the serac at the top of Mount Bradley crack in the afternoon sun, sweep down the route Spice Factory and blast its way across the glacier towards our camp. Mount Bradley had got out of bed the wrong side that morning. Looking on we think we are spectators, but really as John Muir said: We are not going out into the mountains but we are going in. And as time passes we are going in deep.

Yesterday Matt and Jon went out into the mountains and came back. It started off as a 4.30am alarm from my iphone like a U-Boat preparing to dive. I slid silently under the waves of down and pretended to hide until my own self-inflicted depth charge roused me up and out. I hate mornings moaned Helliker hunkering in the Megamid gulping coffee and trying his best to ignore the minus ten deg c temps.

After coffee they both look razor sharp as the ski off for their climb. Adrian and I disappear back to our pits and follow a little later towing a pulk for a two night bivvy to watch them on their chosen route. It's an awesome wall. As Adrian and I pick our way through sagging snow bridges we watch the two struggle as the arcing sun transforms ice to water and cascades down the cracks they are climbing. In the bright-day-light it looks Dark-in-bad. As K-Klass sing - Rhythm can be dangerous.

We soon hear on the walkie-talkie the right decision and they abb off and we ski back to camp. Our rhythm repeats itself as the evening wind rushes past our tents - coffee, cook, eat, banter, coffee, bed and fart ourselves to sleep. This morning we are back on form with sorting gear, drying gear and packing gear, a new mixed objective in sight - Jon says it going to be an integral traverse of a big ridge.
IÕm handed a coffee and its time to go off-line, drink the java and watch the mountains deep in the Denali range. We are moving to the Alaskan rhythm of alpinism. Move your body to the Rhythm.

Johnny.

Round 1

Myself and Jon are Back in BC, we left this morning at 5.30am to try a route on the West Face of London Tower. We had already sashed our haul bag and ledge at the base of the route the day before, so this morning we got suck straight into the climbing.

As it turned out we decided to descend due to the fact the rock was poor in places, with loose gravel and verglassed rock first thing this morning.

The route quickly turned into a waterfall as all of the snow patches above melted down on us. We where soaked through, as was all our gear. So there was no point in battling on.

We will try and dry out our gear tomorrow and come up with a new climbing plan, if the weather allows.

Matt

Listening to the sixth sense

In the world of alpinism there is so much going on behind the scenes. Having been shut down for eight days with constant bad weather, we finally have good weather with us and although we are desperate to get climbing it is time for careful contemplation. There are a lot of unstable snow slopes with significant avalanche hazard, huge cornices, and on most of the faces it's very difficult to read the conditions.

After our recce mission yesterday down towards the Lower Ruth Gorge, Matt and I still had some doubts about possible lines to try. Hence today we took another day to check out an idea of a new route on Mt Bradley that we had noticed two years ago. The line is climbable for sure, but conditions are less than ideal. We took a look at the initial snow cone, which is heavily loaded at present and a bit spooky.

Shortly after arriving back at our basecamp in the afternoon the sun hit the summit slopes of the West ridge and a sizable avalanche ripped down the 1000m line..one less option to think about then.

After a quick chat we have now decided to focus our energies on a line on the 1000m West face of the London Tower. Its going to be a fun adventure with some cool looking mixed climbing, followed by a bit of big walling, and then more mixed above. With the funky conditions it feels right in our heads to go for this line and its always so important to listen to your sixth sense.

We also have some new friends in camp after a day of being the only people in the Ruth Gorge, a mate from New Hampshire, Freddy Wilkinson has flown in with Renan Osturk and they are hoping to have a shot at the 'Tooth' skyline traverse. They came down to our camp with a rucksack full of beers and we had a good catch up.

Spirits are high and it's good to finally have a cool objective to focus our energy on. We will probably take all our kit down the glacier tomorrow and hope to get a really early start on Thursday.

Bye for now,
Jon

Enjoy the silence

After a cold night we woke up to bluebird skies. Together we've endured 8 days of drifting snow, low cloud and winds backing from south to north to south and back again.

At Breakfast we took our pleasure and drank tea outside the megamid emerging like bears coming out of hibernation, our paws scratching bearded muzzles, That's the most hair you've had on your head in years Baker - quips Bracey. We watched the last team take the Talkeetna Air Taxi out of the gorge and silence with isolation returns to this veritable wilderness. But not for long: Helliker pipes up - Get some tunes on boys - so I slap on Ewan Pearsons remix of Depeche Modes Enjoy the Silence and Jon and Adrian start bouncing. We soon get a grip and pack our Osprey Mutant rucksacks with gear and food for a days recce down the glacier to take a good hard look at London Tower.

Despite a downhill ski it is heavy with powder snow on a shallow pitch, so we stick skins to the base of our skis to get the necessary traction. My job is to rope Adrian safely down the crevassed glacier so I sort out the rope and after tie-ing off coils around our chests we ski off - approximately 20m apart on the rope - chasing Jon and Matt who are already distant dots below the massive granite London Tower.

Finally we catch them up and under a burning sun in a lego blue sky I dig in a deep horizontal ski anchor as Adrian sets up his camera kit. We tie in for a margin of safety. There are sagging snow bridges all around us and I cant fully relax. Meanwhile Jon and Matt, totally in their comfort zone - are eyeballing THE line of London tower as it follows a curving roof. It's an option but I assume its not really their style. Minimum mixed climbing and maximum aid climbing says Jon.

To get a closer look they ski off and find their way though a maze of open crevasses and get onto the lower slopes about a kilometre away. They look tiny underneath the wall, which Adrian and I estimate is the height of 10 Cheddar High Rocks stacked on top of one another.

Soon they come back and after some grub we skin the 45mins back up the glacier. It feels like a good tempo run. Everyone is looking to the left of the glacier into the deep icy recesses of Mount Bradleys north face Ð there is more of the fire in Jon and Matt's eyes for this, and I too feel the familiar urge for this type of terrain. Tomorrow we will check this out, we still have enough time and its important that Matt and Jon choose their line and their time correctly without rushing into things.

Back at the tents its shirts off in the sun for a much needed bit of hygiene maintenance. In the heat we stink. So itÕs a wet wipe each and a splash of sanity oops sanitising - gel. Admin done the sun slips behind the South East ridge of Mount Dickie and the temperature nose dives so we dress for dinner and disappear into the megamid.

Changes

Last night we were tent bound yet again with heavy snowfall and high winds, snow drifted and we woke up in buried tents and damp bags. It felt like groundhog day.

But after digging out the tents the skies cleared. The forecast is for a change in the weather but still no high pressure is on the cards. The mountains are caked in snow and even thinking about getting on anything in the fall-line of any major snow slopes would be suicide. Today we broke trail through deep powder up glacier uptowards the mountain house weaving our way through Cathedral size buried crevasses - WHOOMPH - an area the size of a football pitch settles, we all stand stock still waiting for one of us to disapear into a bottomless hole. The Bridge holds out and we continue.

We have spotted a possible unclimbed line on London Tower a 1000m west face, which seems to fit the bill as objectively the line looks safe to attempt in these conditions, That said its starting to snow outside again now as I type this...Keep your fingers crossed for good weather tonight and will go scoop the possible line out in the morning

Oh yes on a lighter note, Johnny Boy Baker managed to leave his boots out in the snow last night, school boy error or what. Today he's been a broken record, moaning with - my feet hurt, give me some dry socks, you dont care, I hate you bla bla bla bla.....Whatever Baker.

Matt

Still storm bound...

In a short weather window yesterday, we ventured down the Ruth glacier to check out other possible objectives for when the weather clears.

Conditions are still very snowy. Over 1 metre fell at Khiltna base camp and at the Root Canal Camp. Here we've had about 2ft over the last few days

Teams in the Root Canal were flown out by Paul, because it was too dangerous to return to the Ruth Gorge.

It's still snowing here now and we are just biding our time, fending off the boredom with the hope of climbing soon...

The weather forecast suggests a slight improvement over the next three days so fingers firmly crossed.

Matt and Johnny have been doing P90X workouts with Coleman 1gallon fuel cans as dumbells.

Shutdown

Barometric pressure is rising but we are in a full on blizzard. We must be on the cusp of some high pressure weather, but right under some gnarly weather front butted up against it. It is not blowing a gale, but we had to dig the tents out twice in the night and a couple of times this morning.
We have not had any sunny spells for three days so battery power is getting low. We may be a bit later with the next blog due to this.

Despite the shut down our spirits are high, we are methodical in our day to day work and Adrian is diligent in getting his camera work done even in the filthiest of weather.

I am reading Laurie Lees "As I walked out one midsummer morning" If only..!

Johnny.

Tent and stir crazy

Helliker has lost it. Too much coffee and too much time sat on his ass. He is singing Mano Chau at the top of his voice and between laughing til tears steam down our face the rest of us are wondering what our chances are if we escape this blond polar bear and walk out to Talkeetna and take our chances with the Grizzlies in the tundra...

The weather isnt really bad - if this was the 'gorms" we'd be out there aving it. But it isn't. It's the Ruth Gorge and even the lightest snowfall transforms the surrounding towers of granite into cascades of powder charging down the gullies and drifting in waves down the steep slabs. It was truely awesome sight this morning with the powder plastered mountains looming malevolently above our base camp.

After a caffeine come down we pull our socks up and re-pitch the Megamid. This is now harboring a subterranean palace dug deep into the bowels of the glacier with a tight weather proof slot to access the womb like interior.

The barometer has bottomed out but we might be waiting a bit longer for the quest we have come for.

Fat Flakes!

We are all sat here in our megamid BC Cook/social tent and outside its snowing, the tunes are being drowned out by the roar of the stove melting snow for a hot chocy before bed.

Johnny Boy Baker is playing some old skool beats from my iPod, some that I didn't even know existed! I hate Jon Bonjovi and listening to Baker recite the full Living on a Prayer album is pretty painful. Not too many folk know, he worked in Minehead's Butlins hoilday resort as a entertainer for 5 years and boy are we paying for this now!

Weather here at the moment is not being kind to us. We woke up to cloud and light snow, which has been here for most of the day, watching spindrif pour down the East Face of Dicky, adding to the large snow cones at the base is less than ideal.

To Fend off Cabin (tent) fever we all skinned north up the Ruth Glacier for 5km in a whiteout conditions, but we were treated to a short break in the weather where views over the Mooses Tooth, Mt Barrill, and Mt Dicky where breathtaking.

Our climbing plans are still to be made, we need some high pressure to build to burn off all the snow that is plastering the peaks and for the snow pack to stabilise before we start getting onto something big. Alpinism can't be forced, it is a waiting game, and we are pretty good at waiting!!

Matt.
(Photo) Matt on the Ruth Glacier in a brief clearing this afternoon.

Shelter

With cloud descending, temperatures rising and snow falling, the occupants in the Ruth Gorges base camp are motionless Ð horizontal even.

Sat in the oven that is my tent I look out the door and view our clagged-in home. Our base camp is a well-organised fortress that has taken some hard graft to prepare. After the tiny single prop plane had dropped us off on the glacier deposited all our kit into one giant heap and taken off to disappear into the bluebird sky the sense of isolation two days ago was very real.

With Jon and Matt this was nothing new and they quickly galvanised us all into action with the most important job of creating some shelter. We started by humping loads down the glacier for about half-a-k to a spot that would be home.

The perfect camp is a recipe that takes several hours to prepare:

1. First probe the site methodically to test for any hidden crevasses. The last thing you need is for a tent companion with a Òhot-seatÓ to melt through a snow bridge and deposit you into the depths of a glacier.

2. Dig off all surface snow, shovelling up the sides of an area about the size of a squash court. Stomp down surface to create a rock hard base, preferably by line dancing in your skis.

3. Pitch tents with their butts in to the wind. Matt and John have their own tents. Adrian and I are sharing. Adrian doesnÕt snore, toss about, talk in his sleep and use his pee bottle every five minutes. He is the perfect tent companion. All three orange tents are very regimented and provide a friendly warm glow inside and out.

4. Down tools, brew up and drink tea and discuss at length how the Black Diamond Megamid cook tent should be pitched. This requires a lot of thought, a subterranean pit with the snow cut into foot wells, benches for food and a table for cooking on and supporting central pole. Inevitably this will need some substantial snagging work.
5. Dig latrine area some way from camp. This needs a clean-cut corner to pee in and a small igloo to store the stinking Clean Mountain Cans (Your personal port-a-potty that must be appropriately named. Someone - no guesses who - has labelled mine ÒJohnny Badass BakerÓ).

6. Create a small quarry off site and cut snow blocks with snow saw and build fortifying wall around camp to keep the keen wind and drifting snow at bay. MattÕs way is blast the quarry into some open cast Armageddon, JonÕs approach is that of a stone mason with perfect blocks laid with spirit level eyes.

7. Stand back wipe the sweat, put some layers on and admire handy work.

8. Call back the contractors and work through Magamids snag list.

Something blonde sticks its head out of the middle tent: ÒCheesy Muff?Ó shouts Helliker, disturbing me from my bubbly-blogging. Time to eat, skin-up the skis and head out on patrol and see what lies beyond the fortress.

Recce Mission.

Our first night in the Ruth Gorge was a bitterly cold one with an unrelenting northerly windy blasting our camp. To add to this, my thermarest has sprung a leak, so I had a less than perfect nights sleep.

We woke this morning to clear skies and took the opportunity to go for a recce mission down the glacier to check out the conditions on Mt Church, Mt Grosvenor, Mt Johnson, Mt Wake, and Mt Bradley. We also spent a while studying the mile high East face of Mt Dickey which we are camped beneath. Locals in Talkeetna weren't lying when they said it had been the snowiest winter in a long while. There are exceptionally big cornices and heavily loaded snow slopes all over the place, which is less than ideal!

Whilst skiing across towards Mt Church I nearly had a close encounter with a crevasseÉ.there was a loud, deep 'whooomp', before a big snowbridge collapse just to my side leaving a gaping cavern inches from my feet. The snow pack seems quite poor too in places so we will need to give things a while to settle.

Just in case you haven't noticed yet from the blog, we have along with us two other team members. Firstly Adrian Samarra, a cameraman who has joined us from Hot Aches, who is hoping to capture the essence of attempting new routes in Alaska on film. Secondly, Johnny Baker has escaped sunny Dartmoor to be our basecamp bitch, cook, and also rope up to Adrian so they are mobile on the glacier. Johnny is normally a devout and committed vegetarian but the cold conditions have driven him back to the ways of the carnivore after only one day in the hills.
Tomorrow we may go and check some other ideas out, so fingers crossed we find some good stuff.

Jon

The eagle has landed!

With the cumulous clouds and marginal flying conditions Paul Roderick the owner of Talkeetna Air Taxi, thought flying us in to the Ruth Gorge was more of an attractive proposition rather than staying at home to groom and shovel up after his appaloosa horse.

So there he was on the airfield organising pass the parcel to load up the mid size Beaver plane. Each pilot loads his plane differently. ÒOnly 10 gallons in the middle tankÓ and Òlight kit in firstÓ. I seriously doubted we would squeeze all our gear along with four of us and Paul into the tiny cabin; but we did. Tossing a 40lb transporter duffle into my chest a Matt asked about the weather for flying: Ò I love a bit of cloud in the morning!Ó Paul replied wickedly.

The flight into the range is very exciting, racing over the tundra and the transition to the glaciated edge of the range. Before long we disappeared into a bank of cloud and dodged under it to get a better view of the glacier and some of the potential climbing on offer. Huge towers of granite plastered in powder snow appeared out of the mist and slipped back into the ming behind us. Then we saw the snowy landing strip adjacent to several tents buried alongside. The plane landed gently on its skis and ploughed through the fresh snow that had fallen the night before.

Unloading we were greeted by the occupants of the tents including Mark Westman the Denali National Park Ranger. Mark gave a quick up date on conditions and then Paul was back in air leaving us to haul our kit a little way down the glacier and dig in our camp.

The cloud has lifted and the temperature has dropped. WeÕve eaten a good meal of fresh veg and rice and are now in our pits. Our plan tomorrow is to ski the area and assess the conditions and lines of climbing on offer.

First impressions; this place is massive! We're camped about 800m from the base of Mount Dickey, the Ruth Gorge's largest mountain, towering over us for a mere 1 vertical mile!!

"No jump this morning!"

Talkeetna is indeed a quaint little drinking town with a climbing problem. We've been here less than 24 hrs and completed a lot of admin in terms of weighing kit, visiting the ranger station and paying for our permit to the park, picking up our Clean Mountain Cans and signing in to Talkeetna Air taxi. 

At the moment the range is socked in with cloud and were waiting for the pilot to give us the thumbs up to jump on board. There are plenty of climbers here waiting, stalking the dirt road of second street like bears on the prowl. 

This morning before we tucked into our half stack of eggs and french toast Matt suddenly started talking about climbing with Jon and the atmosphere has suddenly started to take on a serious air. The rat is in need of a feed...

Arrived in Talkeetna

We've just been shown the plane for flying on to the glacier tomorrow... Think it's in need of a service - anything missing?

Sat Phone Test!

This message is being sent via the satphone and is how we'll be updating http://thegreatgorge.blogspot.com from base camp.

Adrian and Matt sorting out the sat phone with Greg from Anchorage Satellite Phones
Check them out here http://www.anchoragesatellitephones.com/

Northern exposure

Today we caned the cards shopping in the Northern Lights district of downtown Anchorage, stocking up with enough supplies for four hungry lads to last 3 weeks out in the wilderness.  The taxi ride back from the supermarket was more like a stormy crossing of the English Channel rather than an easy drive back to 12th avenue. The clapped out motor's suspension was clearly shot - being packed to the gunnels with hire-skis, bagels and granola probably didn't help matters.

For the moment Alaska looks grey. The weather is fairly benign, but we've heard there has been a record winter here this year. A thousand inches of snowfall has been recorded in Valdez. Unphased by these big numbers and the numerous tales of cold conditions up high, Jon and Matt have been busy in the lounge of the B&B where they have transformed an avalanche of Black Diamond gear into well organised duffles. We are pretty much sorted now, just waiting for Greg to turn up with the sat-phone and Adrian's lap top which should now be fully configured to upload posts and photos from our planned base camp deep in the Ruth Gorge.

Tomorrow we head out to Talkeetna.

Johnny Baker

Matt and Jon demonstrate their affinity with nature

Some words of wisdom from the late Joe Puryear

The late Joseph Puryear had this to say about the unclimbed East buttress on Mt Johnson in his book 'Alaska Climbing':

"Quite possibly the most beautiful unclimbed line in Alaska, this perfect flying buttress is not without attempts. Renee Jackson and Doug Chabot reached a height of 38 pitches and speculated another 15 or so. The route is destined to become climbed, but short of a massive siege attempt it will require some very modern climbing".

Cafe Latte in the Pacific North West

Sat in Seattle, the Ruth Gorge 2012 expedition has got off to a flying start with a smooth Atlantic crossing and views down over a frozen Greenland and the wilderness of the Hudson Bay.

The team are now drinking mug-fulls of real Starbucks attempting to beat the clock and stay awake for Pacific North West time and waiting for the connecting flight to Anchorage.

8 Osprey duffles carrying 200kg of kit have been checked-in; Jon is revisting his extensive kit lists and Adrian Samarra, the filmmaker for the expedition from Hot Aches Productions, is creating online repositories for the team to store and share an already fast growing number of files and photos. Matt is deep in his comfort zone back at the coffee counter ordering more latte for the four of us to share.

The next stage? The team are due in to Anchorage at 1am - some 18 hrs after leaving Heathrow....

- Johnny Baker

Matt crashing after 7 lattes!!

It's that time of year again for Matt and me, AK time!

Today we are flying off to Anchorage for a three week trip into the Ruth Gorge. The Great Gorge is a unique landscape with it's mile wide glacier and mile high big walls. We were there two years ago and made two cool first ascents. We can't wait to get back in there.
We would love to try a new route on the 1400m high East face of Mt Dickey if conditions and weather allow. Another possible objective is the still unclimbed East ridge of Mt Johnston. This has been tried by many climbing legends including Yvon Chouinard, Mugs Stump, Doug Chabod, aswell other American hardnuts!
Fingers crossed for some stellar weather and good ice conditions....

We will try and keep the blog updated daily over the next three weeks so stay tuned !