Out On The Green.
‘I love You Mum’- A lightning bolt couloir on the Hubbard Glacier, Alaska.
From ISSUE 105 2023
Words Emily Jones | Images Mathias Gruber
Oh f***!
I take a sharp shot of breath, duck my head, and press my body tight against the steep snow slope, preparing for the imminent impact of the rock I thought I’d heard dislodge above us.
But nothing happens…
I stand back up and look around. Mat is perched comfortably beside me, failing to hide his amusement behind a wry smile.
“Good to know those will be your last words, Em.”
“Well, I’d probably yell -I love you Muuuuum- as I fell.”
That’d be a good name for this line.
We laugh and I take in our surroundings. Stacks of rusty orange and rich ochre rock extend above us in thin pillars, balanced on larger, darker blocks that wall in our ski objective. Below us, the couloir plunges directly to the frozen sea of Alaska’s Hubbard Glacier.
"the most prominent ski line around, a lightning bolt pointed directly at our camp."
Yawning slots, larger than we have ever seen before, are masked by sastrugi frozen in the shape of breaking waves. We’d navigated these unknown waters early this morning, delicately tip-toeing our skis over smaller gaps and giving the large ones a wide berth.
The slope we’re perched on drops away in a sheet of white, broken only by several slots in the bergschrund more than five-hundred vertical metres below. Above, and to climbers’ right, there’s a narrow, benched gap where snow has gathered in an inward-facing trough. The outer edge of the trough falls away to massive cliffs in the same broken, brindled hues of rock.
“It’s not exactly a no-fall zone, but I wouldn’t want to fall here.”
“Mat, that’s exactly what a no-fall zone is!”
We’re aiming up the middle of the trough to some short snow slopes that cap the peak. It’s unnamed, but stands out starkly from our camp on the glacier below. The top sits just above 2700 metres, and our couloir marks a distinct dog-leg line down the face. Mat spotted this couloir the minute the ski plane had touched down. It’s the most prominent ski line around, a lightning bolt striking north-east, pointed directly at our camp. From face-on, it’s so steep you’d question if it’s skiable. He certainly has a type.
I feel like we’ve snuck away for a day of fun, a ski day disguised as a data gathering mission, but it’s impossible to forget the presence of our main objective, Mount Vancouver.
In the soft azure light, seracs crash and the rumbles echo across the glacier. The ridges, peaks and faces of this massif extend toward us and in all directions. His saturnine face and dark, watchful eyes overshadow everything else on the plateau. It’s only day two of boots-on-the-ground, but so far we’re finding snow conditions that bode well for the climb. The only natural activity is Vancouver grumbling again as he shakes off blocks of ice from impassable steeps.
We leave at dawn and are treated to a candy floss sunrise that lights up the tips of all the surrounding summits. We’re dwarfed by these giant figures and my brain is still struggling with the scale of things up here. Logan presides over the end of the valley, more than 50 kilometres upwind of us. His bulk is so large that, to me, it looks like a brisk walk would take you right to his southern flank. The sugar coating of sunshine oozes down the eastern faces of Vancouver, George, and lights up the top of our comparably humble peak.
In awe, we wander past holes that would fit a blue whale. Distracted enough, the morning pilgrimage passes without effort, and soon we’re gathering our first observations in a snow pit on the approach slopes.
We find 20 centimetres of soft snow overlying the old snowpack, the remnants of the storm that had delayed our flight by several days. We have no concerns with the layering below this; we know it’s been a little windy, so our plan is to turn around if we find significant wind effect in the surface snow.
We leave the rope waiting for us snug in a small crevice below a rock at the ‘schrund. Today it’s solo or ski, which is just how Mat likes to play the game. Right now, I’m glad for the lack of weight. We know we’ll be happy for cold, soft snow on the way down, but the boot-pack has been soul-crushingly direct and we’re working hard as we take turns breaking boot-deep trail. You can’t buy a ticket to the top.
We chatter occasionally about snow conditions, our turnaround time, and yodel and laugh to some bluegrass, but mostly we’re pushing upwards, not needing to speak. Four feet in perfect 4/4 rhythm. As we gain height and exposure, the possible outcomes of a misstep gnaw at the back of my mind, sharpening my focus.
When your existence is peeled back to one upwards step, then another, all complications fade away. The exposure calms and energises me.
"I find comfort and flow leaning into the rawness, as if slipping on a well-worn boot."
My thoughts are then broken by the random creaking of the towers above us. No rock falls. Safe passage for now. We continue cramponing up the trough of our couloir before we break out into the snow slopes capping the peak.
When one of us fades, the other takes over the boot-pack, not allowing time for our breathing to slow or to consider quitting. Mat leads the boot-pack above the sloping trough. I’m looking at my axes when I hear him yell, “Left! Left, left, left!”
Without looking up, I barrel left into the protection of the rocks on the side of the couloir. Raising my head, I see a crack formed at his raised axes in the slope above. He checks I’m out of the way before taking another firm step, axes plunged and braced.
The crack propagates and spreads across the width of the narrow shoulder. Luckily, it’s only 5cm deep and slides away with- out shifting either of us. Still, this is evidence of the wind effect we’ve been mindful of, and even though the summit slopes bench away gently just 30 metres or so above us, we know it’s time to turn around.
Ä́ ’sía Keyi, or Grandfather’s Land, to the Southern Tutchone people, we leave the very top of our peak for the ancestors’ spirits and transition to skis.
I perform the ritualistic locking of my toe pieces to quiet my mind. At midnight, before road-tripping the 1500 kilometres to Silver City, we used a drill and some wood glue to attach these measly pins to my skis. They’ve barely made turns on snow, and I struggle more than usual to calm the jitters at this plunging drop-in.
Really, it’s just a test to the thighs, which have burned all the way up and will now carry us, ankles locked, toes locked, straight to the bottom. Ladies first, I drop in and make five hesitant jump turns in the variable snow. Arriving at the trough, I relax a little and open up my turns slightly. Mat follows, ever at ease in steep terrain, and we begin to leapfrog through the choke and down into the wider couloir below.
The snow improves as we descend and our whoops reach a crescendo as we drift our way down, flowing with the moving snow that cascades down the mountain with us. We regroup above the rocky buttress just above the bergschrund, then thread our way through the broken section, and down and out into the fans.
“when your ship can’t handle the heavier seas, your spirits will get you through.”
Mat gathers our rope and we ski together, even faster now, without a care for the crevasses that nagged so loudly only hours earlier. Wildly and foolishly, we weave with the speed and confidence of seasoned whalers riding the harpoon out, as far down our skin track as our speed will take us.
We collapse onto the glacier, a bed of soft, moist snow in the beating afternoon sun, a perfect cadence.
A great New Zealander once sang, “and when your ship can’t handle the heavier seas, your spirits will get you through”. We embody that mentality for the hot slog home. Camp is a distant mirage for our parched throats and swollen feet. Torn between ecstasy and aggravation, with skins clumping awkwardly and hearts pushing strongly, we limp home with heads high.
A great start to a long voyage.