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Note 44.259 MOUNT-L 259 of 517 CUPIDO::STRITAR "Andrej Stritar,IJS,(61)-371-321" 113 lines 30-NOV-1993 08:13
CUPIDO::STRITAR "Andrej Stritar,IJS,(61)-371-321" 113 lines 30-NOV-1993 08:13
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Subj: Climbing Grand this Thanksgiving

Date: 29-Nov-1993
Posted-date: 29-Nov-1993

By request, I am posting this story of trying to climb Grand Teton
this Thanksgiving week. It is rather long but I think some of you
will enjoy it having had similar experiences yourselves:

By Friday, Nov. 19 the weather forecast wasn't looking too good.
Forcasted low were in the 0's F and some snow was possible. We
weren't too concerned but I was not too optimistic that we would make
the summit of Grand. Alex and I both agreed that we would have fun
anyway, and we could always go for Middle or South Teton which both
are much easier. Saturday morning we started the 1600 mile drive out
there arriving Sunday at 10 AM. We stopped at a local outdoor shop to
pick up a topo map and Alpenglow route pamphlets. The Alpenglow
pamphlets have a few photos and route description. They are quite
nice compared with the usual worthless information. The guy at the
store got us some current forecast info via phone. It was forecasted
that Monday should be OK, but by Tuesday the weather was going to be
bad.

Hoping to use Monday as best as possible we decided to hike in that
day. After organizing our backpacks they both weighed in at over 70
lbs each. We hiked in starting late afternoon from the Bradley lake
trail head. There was about 1 to 2 inches of powder snow which was no
problem to walk on. After 4 hours and 6 miles on trail going from
6700 feet at the car to 9200 feet in Garnet Canyon, we decided to
camp, since it was dark, the nice trail became a path across serious
talus, we were tired from driving for 24 hours, and it started snowing
lightly. We setup camp in a small flat spot in the talus pile next to
a large rock that had a small "cave" under it.

When I woke up Monday morning there was a foot of snow around the
tent. The temperature was around 20 F. Snow was still coming down
and visibility varied from 100 to 1000 feet. After shoveling out the
tent, I put on my snowshoes and scouted up ahead. It was obvious that
any progress from this point was going to be slow going. Alex slept
in quite late and the storm didn't let up, so we decided not to move
the camp forward that day. I was busy and entertained with wintering
camping details since I really haven't done this type of camping
before. After dark, I took a trip ahead to get some idea how
difficult it was going to be to move the camp. It took 30 minutes to
climb up the canyon about 1/2 mile and 10 minutes to come back down
with no pack. It was surreal snowshoeing with a headlamp in the dark,
in a strong wind with poor visibility.

By Tuesday morning there was even more snow and it was still snowing
but not nearly as hard. We decided to pack up camp and move forward.
The first mile went fairly well but required much effort because we
were sinking as much as knee deep in the snow. The average grade
wasn't very steep. We reached the Meadow and started up the steeper
part of the north fork by Spalding Falls. The snow was even deeper
and looser because it was blown in. After 7 hours of knee to waist
deep snowshoeing with heavy packs and climbing up on pieces of talus
that stuck up through the snow, we were exhausted. Alex had hit the
wall. We both suspect he had depleted his muscle glycogen. I was
doing better but not by much. Alex and I both agreed that we had
never exerted so much total effort before. It made our hilly 90 mile
bike rides look pale by comparison.

Since it was already dark we needed a campsite fast. I found a
relatively flat camp spot on the steep slope below the glacier at
10300 feet. We set up camp quickly, and jumped in bags to rest and
warm up. The temperature had dropped all day and was down to 5 F. By
late evening it was down to -5 F.

By Wednesday moring the storm had picked up again. Snow was coming
down at a good rate, and temp. was 0 F. Thanks to the wind and slope
we were on there wasn't any accumulation at the campsite. By
afternoon, it had let up some and I snowshoed with no pack up to the
glacier at 10800. As the storm varied, I could see the lower saddle
at 11200 feet. I had to retreat because my double boot liners were
still wet from the day before. I forgot to keep them in my bag the
previous night. By evening the temp. dropped further. By midnight it
was -15 F. Just before daylight it was -20 F.

Everything had so much ice on it. There was over a pound of loose ice
in the tent. The only thing that dried out was stuff we took inside
our bags. Fuel use for melting snow was substantial. Alex always
says that groups take way to much fuel, so I left it up to him to
decide how much to take. It was obvious to me by Thursday morning
that we had at most one day of fuel left at these temperatures.
Alex's -30 F down bag was also not keeping as warm as it should. I was
doing very well in my -30 F synthetic bag even though it was covered
with ice and wet on the bottom agaist the rest. We agreed that it was
time to hike out. We packed up camp and headed down the steep snow.

I was concerned that while breaking down camp my feet would get too
cold. They were getting quite numb, but after we started moving
downhill they warmed back up. The temp also warmed up some as the sun
started poking through the clouds. After a few hours the it was quite
sunny and we could see the valley and sometimes we could see Grand.
Getting down proved to be serious effort. The steep snow slopes were
awkward to snowshoe down. Both of us fell over many times buring
ourselves in snow. By the Meadows travel was much easier. The talus
pile near the end of the good trail was like probing for crevasses on
a glacier. One wrong step yeilding falling though the snow. Alex fell
though in one place and bent the frame of one of his snowshoes. After
that it was relatively easy snowshoeing back down the trail in about 1
foot of powder. Skis would have been nice at this point. After 8
hours we were back at the car. Alex was wearing pretty thin the last
mile. We were both glad to get back to the car and let it do the work
for a change.

Willie Hunt

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