Monte Montepare
Appearances
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
Which I hope they told some people because that is one doozy of a first time camping tale. I myself didn't tell anybody for years I was so ashamed of this incident. But these days I own that guide service and I tell all the new guides this story under the heading, the glacier does not care how full your beard is.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
Because the truth is we all do make mistakes and the real shame is not being able to admit them and share them with others so that we can all learn. Thank you.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
At 23 years old, I was in my third season working as a glacier guide in Alaska. I took people hiking on glaciers, ice climbing on glaciers, and that spring I had successfully summited the 16,000 foot glaciated volcano that looms over town. I was feeling very confident in my skills in the mountains, and I could finally grow a full beard.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
So when my friend Elizabeth asked if I wanted to be her assistant on a fly-in base camping trip, I said, oh yeah, that sounds super chill. She told me the four clients were the women that I had met that afternoon on the deck of the guide service. They were decked out head to toe in brand new Arc'teryx rain gear, which is a red flag.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
Not only is Arc'teryx the Prada of outdoor equipment, but generally speaking, the newer the gear, the less the experience. Which was exceptionally true in this case. They were from New York City. And had never been camping. They had never slept in a tent. I lived in a tent. Elizabeth said, yeah, that's why they want you along.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
She said, they really like the idea of a full bearded Alaskan along to protect them from the wilderness. How could I say no? Flying base camping is like car camping with a bush plane. So all six of us get into an airplane the size of a minivan with wings. We fly for 40 minutes over forests and rivers and mountains and glaciers, some of the wildest landscape on the planet.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
and the plane lands on a little gravel strip in a giant valley next to an even bigger glacier. We're surrounded by snow-capped peaks, dripping with ice. There's these babbling creeks, beautiful green alpine. I'm pumped, because I just got a free plane ride to a place I've never been before. Our clients are in a state of shock, and awe and stimulation overload.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And as the plane leaves and goes out of sight, I watch all four of them have the gut-wrenching realization that they just paid somebody to strand them out here. They wanted their own personal space because it was the end of a long trip, so they each wanted their own tent. But they also wanted to sleep next to each other because they were afraid of camping.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
So I set up four identical tents, wall to wall, like a nylon apartment building in the wild. And that night, Elizabeth cooked dinner and I entertained, and their first night out was like an REI ad come to life. The goal of this weekend was to have a relaxing trip, maybe take a couple day hikes, so the next day we set out to hike to this area of Alpine on the other side of the valley.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And it was a beautiful, sunny summer day, but after a couple hours of rocky walking, morale was low. This was the end of their whirlwind, let's go everywhere in Alaska trip, and they were kind of over it. And I'm pulling out all the stops too. I'm doing interp on geomorphology, pointing out the patterns glacial output streams carve, telling lichen jokes. Fun stuff. None of it is landing.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
We get to the head of the valley and we see that the easiest way into the Alpine is over this glacier. And Elizabeth and I take people hiking on glaciers all summer long. We don't have our full kit, but it's good weather, good hikers, we're good to go. And when we get up on the ice, everything changes. Summer glaciers are alive. The ice is sparkling.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
There's these creeks carving these beautiful channels. There's these blue pools of water that are reflecting that glacier blue from the inside. It's stunning. And our clients start enjoying themselves. They're engaging with the environment. They're taking selfies. Doing yoga poses. This is what they're here for. And then we encounter a little bit of snow and then a little bit more snow.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And when you are on a winter glacier that's covered in snow, it's customary to rope yourself to each other in case somebody unexpectedly breaks through the snow and falls into a crevasse. In the summer, the snow is gone and you can see all the crevasses and just walk around them. This is a summer glacier, but there's some patches of winter left over.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
So Elizabeth goes ahead to scout our way off of the ice, which can be problematic. And I stay behind guiding our clients. And I've got them behind me in a single file line, and I'm making sure to stay as much as we can on the exposed ice. And if we have to step on snow at all, I use my ski pole to probe it first to make sure that it's snow over ice, not snow over air.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And now I'm having a good time. I'm moving my clients through terrain, I'm picking lines that are mostly ice. If I gotta deal with a little bit of snow, I probe, I step, I probe, I step. I'm thinking, I am a good guide. Then the next step I take is just in front of my probe pole. And the snow beneath me disintegrates instantly. And I begin to free fall into the glacier. Immediately.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And for long enough to think a few things. First, I'm gonna die. Followed by, what an embarrassing way for a glacier guide to die. And then, hey, let's try and not die. And I put my arms and legs and ski pole out to try and slow me down. And I come to a stop on this rotten pile of snow. I'm 20 feet below the surface of the glacier. It is dark and cold.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
It's like a long, narrow hallway with tall ceilings and a single skylight. I have been inside glaciers before but never involuntarily. Not to mention that being swallowed whole by the earth is an immensely humbling experience.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And I just left the four New York never campers who had just spent their first night in a tent after being flown into the middle of nowhere and then watched the guy they brought to protect them from the wilderness vanish into thin air. I assessed my situation and I was not injured besides my ego. I couldn't see or hear my clients. I didn't know where Elizabeth was.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
So I decided the best thing to do was to wait. My mind was racing. How was I ever going to get out of here? How was I ever going to live this down if I did? How big of a mistake did I just make? I knew that I was already starting to get cold and I knew that our emergency equipment and technical gear was over a two hour hike from where we were.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
I knew that even if we initiated a helicopter rescue, it can take up to eight hours for them to show up. I knew that this was not the bottom of the crevasse. I guessed the ice in that area was anywhere from 600 to 800 feet deep. And what I was standing on was just rotten snow bridges that had collapsed from two or three years ago and gotten lodged in this constriction.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
I started to do some like preliminary investigation of the snow beneath me, but I didn't want to poke on anything too hard, feeling like I might trigger a second trap door. And that's how most people who perish in crevasse falls go, is they fall down to a point where they get squeezed by the walls of the ice and are slowly crushed. Glacier ice is so dense that it eats sound.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
So I sat there in the quiet with just my thoughts. constricting and releasing my muscles to try and stay warm without moving. Finally, Elizabeth looked down at me through the hole that I had punched in the snow. We made eye contact and neither of us needed to say we should have brought a rope.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
We went into problem solving mode and I told her I thought that I could climb up a ways but I didn't know how to get past the overhanging lip of snow at the top of the crack. It's hard to get past the snowy lip even if you're roped in and you fall into a crevasse. By punching through you create this overhang that you have to somehow get over.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And Elizabeth's eyes lit up and she said, if you can get up here, I can get you past that lip. And then she disappeared.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
By the time I started climbing, I had been in this crevasse for at least 20 minutes and I'm cold and I'm stiff and it was narrow enough that I could touch each wall and I start pushing and pulling on the walls with my hand and using smaller cracks as hand holds, improving tiny ledges with my ski pole and I climb up five feet and 10 feet and then I look down and I do not like what I see.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
This snow I had landed on looks like cotton candy, and there's darkness through the holes, and any time that I knock an ice crystal through them, I cannot hear it hit the bottom. I climb up five more feet until I'm finally right below the snow, a place that I can't go any further by myself. And I establish this icy stance and the reality of the situation hits me really hard.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
I have just turned a relaxing weekend in the wilderness into a life or death situation. And I'm terrified. And just then, I hear the flap of fabric and a flash of color. And the first of four brightly colored brand new Arc'teryx rain jackets. Tied sleeve to sleeve is lowered down in front of me. And I had never been so happy my clients had brand new rain gear.
The Moth
Bonus Episode: The Moth Wrapped
And I grab a hold of what is at least a $3,000 robe. And Elizabeth and those New Yorkers pulled me past the lip and into the sunshine. And when I got there, I was embarrassed. But they tried to soothe me. They said things like, we're just really impressed that you climbed out of there. And you know everyone makes mistakes. They even swore themselves to secrecy to hide my shame.