Chamonix-Mont Blanc Massif: June 2009

prino said:

You mention the pre-dawn sky being an awesome and humbling experience and after having made an early start on Cascade Mt. in the Daks this week couldn't agree with you more. It truly is the best time of day to be in the mountains.

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Lies, lies.
If you were up there at that time I would have seen your headlamps from Big Slide.

well done, folks. what an accomplishment, what an adventure... giggy, thanks for taking the time to tell the story in such detail.

giggy said:

Its odd, I haven't seen Tmax in a while (too long actually!), but we got this bond from being rope up together on Rainier 4 years ago...

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Can't agree more Gig! How about roping up this winter? I want to get my significant other trained in doing some serious winter climbing so I have someone else to drag up the big mountains with me. I'd love it if you would be willing to help me teach him the skills.

Superb trip report and spectacular photos, Giggy (I will check out other photo links later), and congrats to all on the crevasse rescues and working as a team, especially at decision time to bail on summit day. Taking the long approach up the rapidly disintegrating glaciers of the Alps was certainly bold and unconventional, as those glacier routes must be much more dangerous now than they were even a couple of decades ago (see warming in northern New England thread ).

Giggy's trip report reminded me of Joe Simpson's story at this link:

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1105-03.htm

Here is a related link:

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSL1451393120070522

Climbing etiquette in the Alps (and apparently also the Cascades, according to cbcbd) certainly does not sound good; I wonder if the Tetons are also like that now, as I never recall experiencing anything there in the 1970s like you guys describe. No more "After you, Alphonse. No, you first, my dear Gaston," old 1930s cartoon lines adopted in some alpine literature from the 1970s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphonse_and_Gaston

Suebiscuit, I think that you are onto something about the ginkgo biloba and retinal hemorrhaging; I tried gb for altitude acclimatization when I was living and climbing in Colorado and found that it caused too much nose bleeding. Here is a link to a nice summary on altitude sickness, but I seem to recall that the research in the 1970s by Drummond Rennie and others was inconclusive on the specific cause or rh, other than the general association with altitude sickness.

http://www.basecampmd.com/expguide/snowblind.shtml

Thank you a few hundred times over! For a handful of fun-loving friends around the bonfire you folks transform into extreme adventurers and go on some very gutsy exploits. Meanwhile you never forget where you came from and give us a near breath by breath detailed account of the highlights along with terrific photos so that we may all feel a bit of your venture. Very well done report Giggy and sorry I am so late to throw in a reply that it deserves! There are many of us very envious of you but all of us are glad you made it back safely and we can share local paths with you. Seems to me that it must be tough deciding who you want to rope up to - someone heavy enough to arrest and anchor you yet light enough to leave the snowbridges well intact. Kudos to all of you for roping in with people you trust and keeping your heads to avoid an injury!

Don't know if you guys had a team name going but I'm sure there're folks over there that won't forget your visit!

Wow! That was quite the adventure. Nice job, way to stay cool when things hit the fan.

donna said:

WOW! Best ever!

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Dito! Great stuff Giggy!

Congrats to the team, once again you guys bring back the best stuff from the mountain :

fun, new experiences, great pictures.

Giggy, it took me a full week to go through the whole thing, it's a freaking long TR JK. it's the best trip report I've read.

Sue, don't you know by now that drugs are BAD for you ? Sorry about your eye.

Arm : you are not a serious person (c'mon, taking your camera out during a crevasse rescue ?!!), but stay the way you are, you provide entertainement here on vftt, and that's GOOD !! Good job down there

One word about the cultural (mountaineering) differences between the US and Europe : I heard about a guy from France, very used to the Alps, who climbed Rainier in one day by himself, small pack, with just basics climbing gear, and he didn't do much planning before going up (it's true that Rainier doesn't require much routefinding). Things and people are different when you travel, and we expect that.

Also, I believe Mont Blanc is a very popular climb, it's like climbing Lafayette, you see a lot of ''tourists''.

Giggy- You have great writing skills in addition to the great experiences to write about it. Loved reading about your trip and glad you all made it back safely!

i get by with a little help from my friends

great trip report and pics ! it was a privilege to travel with a great team of friends

many people go through life without experiencing anything like we see on trips like this

it seems easy to take life for granted sometimes ... experiences like this help us realize just how lucky we are

can't thank the team enough for allowing me to tag along on this trip, and for helping me climb out of that crevasse

might have climbed out on my own ... could have climbed down to the bottom, crossing to an edge, then up and out ... or via texas sling, crawling through snow bridges above ... but our best course of action seemed to make the most sense: sit tight, relax and wait for the team to set up a proper z-pulley rescue

had plenty of time to come up with alternate lyrics to "sitting on the dock of the bay" while i was hanging out in the crevasse:

sittin' in a crack in the ice ... watchin' the time roll away
sittin' in a crack in the ice ... waitin' my time

i left my friends up top there ... headed for china yeah
guess i could texas my way out ... or wait here for the z-pulley

looks like nothing's gonna change ... icy walls still look the same
should i drink this mini heiny keg ... or save it for summit day ?

tough to describe what went through my mind as i was falling into that crevasse ...

they say your life flashes before your eyes as you realize your time has come ...

the best-looking snow bridge looked rather grim, but i figured i'd try to skip across it, planning to sink my axe in once i crossed the crevasse

as soon as my crampon touched the snow bridge, it collapsed ... the earth seemed to fall away ... i plunged my axe in deep, hoping it would hold me, but a sinking feeling set in as i realized the snow resembled mashed potatoes ...

"falling! i'm going in!"

random thoughts flooded my mind all at once:

"how deep is this beast, anyway?"

"i hope this crevasse doesn't go all the way to China, because i left my passport in the car"

"i wonder if Giggy and Leaf have practiced the fine art of not stomping on a rope mate's head while wearing crampons, if i drag them in with me"

"does this frozen turd in my pants make my butt look big?"


i looked down into the crevasse as i broke through the snow bridge, hoping to gain some idea of how deep i'd go, but the snow bridge burst into a cloud and blurred my vision ... i tried to self arrest against the blue icy wall, hoping to arrest my fall before i disappeared forever ...

those few seconds really felt like slow motion ... when my fall stopped, i was wedged between blue icy walls, panting hard and fast, briefly testing the tautness of the rope to gain confidence that i wouldn't fall further

a quick look around my new temporary home helped me spot an icy "fin" ... i had to remove my backpack to reach it, and i was eager to climb onto it, feeling as if time was important somehow

i quickly girth hitched a runner to my harness and binered it to my pack, then let my pack slip off my shoulders, hanging below me, while i scrambled onto that icy fin

once i stopped panting, i let the team know i was alright, and we came up with our course of action: pull my pack out using Frodo's rope, which helped clear the lip above, then hang out until the team set up a proper z-pulley

our friend Guinness (who led our Rainier trip in 2005) has a good guide to setting up a z-pulley here:
http://www.highpeaksclimbing.com/Training/ZPulley.htm

the team was at least as calm setting up the z-pulley as i was playing crevasse victim ... they pulled off a textbook crevasse rescue, showing how worthwhile it was to practice ...

funny that Jason mentions Neighbor's Tecumseh report in this thread ... Giggy, Tmax and i first practiced crevasse rescue on Tecumseh's summit in 2005, joking that we'd earned our crevasse rescue certification from Tecumseh Mountaineering Academy

we could have saved time dealing with crevasse rescue, if i had emergency posthole gear with me:
http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/2648056650099907974jvnhdP


Giggy summed up the Mont Blanc part of the trip well ... i'll post something about the rest of the trip soon, rock climbing in southern France and the Alps, and chillin' like a villain in Chamonix and Annecy

i added rock climbing pics to the Mont Blanc album here: http://community.webshots.com/user/armtrips

holy crap, Arm..that's quite the first hand account of falling through! So glad for all of you that this was a textbook rescue success!

Nice one duder! Now when are we grabbing an afterwork beer????

What an amazing trip you all had, giggy! Have to stop reading it and finish it at home as I am at work but I had to read through the crevasse rescue. You all worked so well as a team and Arm took the most chilling (literally) photos from inside the crevasse.
Will delay gratification and further drooling until tonight......