Certain Death from Wind, Heights, and Dall Sheep - AKA AK pt. 5

The tiny little specs?  Our competition!

One thing about Captain is his determination.  He is very determined to get to the end goal, no giving up whatsoever, head to the finite point in the distance.  I, on the other hand, like to enjoy the scenery, and would spend hours soaking up the wild if I could.  Captain will not let me however.  We must always go at a brisk pace.  So when I went on a day hike with my friend Lady S, the difference was astounding.  Though very difficult, this hike was enjoyable, breathtaking, and awesome.

The Lady S and moi!

Lady S and I began with the bus ride - we were determined to hike Igloo Mountain, a mountain that goes up to 6,000 feet next to the Teklanika River on the North Side of the road.  We got off the bus, ignored the path to the right, and headed straight up the side.  The willows were packed tight near the bottom, but since the direction we were going was up, we used them to get up the mountain.  Little did we know that we were in the lee of the mountain.  As soon as we got up to the top of the ridge, the wind grew fierce and gusty.  We literally had to crawl, clinging to the bare rock and weak moss up the ridge.  On either side was precipice and we hugged the terrain, thinking of loved ones.  The wind would blow, and we would stoop down in a crouch and wait till it abated.  It stopped suddenly, and we, leaning into the wind, almost fell over the other side.  This occurred repeatedly.  Finally, we got to a point where we could hide in the lee of the wind.

As we sat there, contemplating the view and the wind, Lady S and I agreed fervently that "No way are we going to the top with that wind!"  We took our "summit" pictures, looked across the ravine and saw two fellow travelers, on the other ridge of Igloo Mountain.  They were clinging to bare rock and were about an inch tall from our perspectives.  Seeing them make progress spurred us to try to get to at least the middle of the ridge we were on. We saw a waterfall, which was absolutely beautiful, and about thirty Dall Sheep grazing on the ridge opposite us.

Encouraged by our courageous competition, we kept going up the ridge, on the lee side.  We discovered a bear cave, but did not venture in and saw many little marmots and ground squirrels skittering about.  We had a delicious bagel break at the mid-point.  During this lunch, the food gave us courage and we became determined to climb to the top.  The views were fantastic, Cathedral Mountain was perfectly lit by the sunlight that day, and the views of the wild were breathtaking.  Green, blue and gold, the Teklanika vibrant in her rock bed, the willows waving in the wind, and the distance dimmed into blue horizon.  We could see for miles.  The top was windy, but not too bad, thankfully the wind was broken somewhat by the lesser summit.

We decided to go down to the base of the mountain by way of the ravine in the middle.  It was Lady S's idea, and I agreed because I wanted to check out the waterfall closer up.  We stumbled down the steep ravine, and followed the run, seeing Dall sheep really close up.  We turned a corner and there was the waterfall.  A very literal dead end.  We conferred.  We cast about looking for an exit other than up.  Then, we discovered a pair of awesomeness that Lady S said we should take with us.  So we put ** in the packs, and much more loaded down, we climbed, literally climbed up the cliff face.  Lady S's pack got stuck on a branch, so I had to go down again and unhook her while clinging to cliff face.  We wandered a few yards more, looking for a safer descent, and found one that was just in the realm of possibility.  The rock was shit, crumbled in your hands, and was extremely dangerous.  So I went first.

Find Lady S

I've been in some scary situations.  When I'm in a situation like this (heavy backpack, crumbly rock, certain death below) I focus.  I trust no foothold/handhold, move slowly, and swallow the rising fear.  At one point, my handholds collapsed.  All that kept me from falling was my balance, leaning into the rock that wanted to kill me.  We were pretty high up, at least 30 feet or so.  From the top, we couldn't see the bottom.  It could have been shear.  It was close to it, but still passable.  I finally got to the safe bottom ledge and yelled up at Lady S to start down.  No movement.  I heard her yell faintly that she couldn't do it with her backpack, as a rock the size of my head flew by me.  I put my backpack down, and climbed back up.

Lady S's backpack was a regular school backpack, so there's a lot more horizontal capacity than vertical.  Her balance was destroyed by such a pack.  So I took the bag from her (which contained her very expensive camera) and she went down.  She's shorter than me, so a lot of the footholds were a far reach for her, and it was slow going.  I was saying to myself, no fear no fear nofear....  Then it was my turn again.  With the heavy, unbalanced backpack.  The second time was much worse.  A lot more rock collapsed under my hands.  I froze on several occasions.  I made it down.  Alive. 

Deadly Dall Sheep

We followed the creek back up to the base of the waterfall, and took the necessary photos, then realized we were surrounded by the Dall Sheep.  They were above us, and glaring down on us.  They knocked stones loose towards us, one headed for Lady S, but I blocked it with my leg.  We took one look at them, turned, and headed downstream, where we could wait for the bus in safety.  Our competition, from what we could tell, got off the mountain first.  Shout out to those anonymous ones for encouraging us!

Cathedral Mountain

False Summit - see the wind in my hair?

The Real Summit Pic!