My Journeys from Sea to Sky - Zeke's Stories & Essays: 2015

Welcome!

A month-and-a-half of procrastination (read: laziness) and finally I’m writing a trip report for my mid-July attempt on the Torment-Forbidden Traverse with my friend Stephen Williams. This post is divided up into three parts; starting with the back story, the gritty details of the climb itself, and finally the lessons I learned.

- Back story -

Since I began climbing back in late 2010, I've wanted to climb in the alpine and become an alpinist that thrives in the mountains that inhabit my "backyard". I don't remember exactly when I heard about or saw Colin Haley's name and story, but I was instantly drawn to the fact that he had grown up in Seattle and had been climbing from a young age throughout the Cascade Range. By climbing so much throughout Cascades, he was able to amass the skills and experience necessary to progress into the "greater ranges". It was this success story, and many others like it, that helped kindle my dreams of one day climbing in the "greater ranges". Colin's first real alpine climb was the West Ridge of Forbidden Peak, a mountain that Fred Beckey and party made the first ascent of in 1940, and that is also one of Steck and Roper's "Fifty Classic Climbs of North America".

So I reasoned that I should start in the on the same route and the same mountain. Forbidden's West Ridge requires a vast array of mountaineering and alpine climbing skill, and the experience to be confident and efficient in those skills, therefore, if I could climb it, then that would mean I had the experience to do bigger stuff, a way of testing my skills.

Between my “start” and last winter I had finally found a place I could call home, and people I could call friends and partners. I joined the Skagit Alpine Club, and I started volunteering at my local climbing wall for my naval base's outdoor recreation program. I bought an ice axe, and got to use it. I started sport leading then trad leading in the span of a year. I discovered the American Alpine Club at their annual Craggin' Classic in Smith Rock, Oregon where I instantly fell in love with the community and the opportunities they accommodate. I climbed with my "hero", the one and only Colin Haley at Index. Probably most important, I met Dave and Kari; two people who have done so much for me, perhaps being the only reasons why, or at least the catalysts, I've been able to live my dream.

A lot happened in those years, but the goal remained the same, with the help from so many people. There were two important things happened last winter that enabled me to realize this goal: one, I saw an ad on Facebook talking about the AAC's and The North Face's "Live Your Dream" grants; and two, I met Stephen, who would eventually become my partner for this climb. I had tossed around the idea of applying for a grant, but I always thought that bigger and badass expeditions would get funding before someone like me, until I read accounts and stories from other “LYD” awardees. The sponsors actually want people like me to apply and receive these grants, because not everyone lives an economically privileged or financially secure life and they deserve the chance to live their dreams too. So with support from my mom and friends, I applied for this grant with the West Ridge of Forbidden as my goal. After submitting my application, I needed to gain a huge amount of experience in the few months leading to summer. Even if I didn’t win the grant, I would still go through with my plan to climb it. I then asked around in my group of friends and started to make plans. I climbed my first mountain with Stephen in April, Sahale Peak via the Quien Sabe Glacier. I learned crevasse rescue and how to climb steep snow on the climb. That was also the first time I saw Forbidden Peak as a climber, I'd previously seen it from Cascade Pass in 2008, and it was intimidating to say the least.

Soon after this climb, I received an email stating that I had been selected as one of the winners of the 2015 Live Your Dream Grant. At this point my training kicked into overdrive, with long days and alpine finishes most weekends. I thought I as in a pretty good position to attempt the climb when I heard that Stephen was talking about the TFT, or the Torment-Forbidden Traverse. I had read about the traverse previously and instantly said we should do that too, as it was a "simple" rock traverse and climb with sections of snow and ice, which also avoided (for better or worse) the loose approach gullies to the West Ridge. I thought it was a good decision, until I saw the steep snow sections and poor rock quality of Torment. I was on a mini vacation for a week from late June till July 8^th. During this time, every second I was not devoting to something else was used to plan and get ready for the traverse. Stephen and I hashed out a rough plan over email and set the dates for July 11th-13th.

The TFT.

- The Climb-

We both checked the weather often in the days leading up. Unfortunately, it did not look like the "best" sending conditions, lots of cloud cover, some rain, and the potential for lightning. I certainly was a little apprehensive when it came time to get on the road on the 11th. The three days prior, I had been grabbing last minute gear and food, packing and repacking gear, and nervously waiting. I was scared of the steep snow traverse, about 1/3 of the way across, that might not be in condition due to the bad snow year, my inexperience on snow was definitely going to show on that, and the fact that we and to move past compounded my fear that I might endanger the team on it. I was really concerned about that, so I spent time learning about the bypass route around the opposite side of the ridge, and I only hoped that Stephen wouldn't want to traverse the snow either.

The pack, maybe a tad too heavy.

Weather Report...

The night before was a little nerve racking, I had to take two sleeping pills just to get to bed at a reasonable time. I had to wake up at 5:30 AM and meet Stephen at the Burlington Haggen's parking lot (the start point for many of my adventures) at 7:00 AM. I woke up on time and I set off for Burlington. Stephen is a guide with Alpine Ascents International and had gotten off Rainier the day before, so with only a little rest he met up with my mom and I. We talked a little bit about the weather and rescue/SPOT stuff, and then we went to get permits at the ranger station in Marblemount.

I'm a little scared at the moment.

The TFT's in there somewhere (some stuffs mislabeled).

TR from MBMG manager John Minier.

Stephen packing and dividing group gear (the rain started right about now).

When we arrived, we got our permits and had an "interesting" conversation with the head climbing ranger. Since we couldn't get permits to camp in Boston Basin the first night the ranger suggested we get a permit for the Torment Basin and then Boston permits for the next two days. Approaching Torment via the Torment basin requires going up a different climbers trail near the winter closure gate on the Cascade River Road, it is not nearly as defined and traveled as the Boston Basin trail, even though the ranger assured us it was defined and easy to follow, citing his own "recent" experience. Armed with knowledge, permits, and some new gear, we set off for our trail head about 21 miles up the Cascade River Road in a torrential downpour. Let’s just say the weather was not on our side while we drove up the gravel roads to the TR; psych-up music definitely helped ease the uncertainty.

It only just stopped raining.

The packs.

Boots are gonna get worked!!!

It was still pouring when we arrived at the trail head, so we waited around thirty minutes while thunder boomed and rain pelted around the car. We changed clothes, got our rain jackets out, and started up the Torment Basin Trail at 11:10 am. The trail ascends quickly up the steep mountainside. The tall cedars and firs rained water onto us, even though we were shrouded in mists. We stopped for a quick break after climbing about 1500 feet in an hour and ten minutes. We were making good time; the trail was nice, defined, and even fun. This is where the ranger's beta started to fall apart. Within 15 minutes of leaving the break spot, we were lost. The trail terminated at a huge fallen cedar which made no real way over or around it without traversing far to one side, so we traversed to the west. For a while we just followed trees that were marked with pink survey tape and signs of a trail, but those eventually petered out and we were lost again. We bushwhacked and cussed our way up stream beds, ridges, and a couple miles of soggy forest until we busted out onto a talus field. We tried to wring out our socks and shirts at this location. Our boots and clothes were soaked, the theme of the day, and we were both pretty miserable at the moment, the heinous bushwhacking is one of the few times I've seen Stephen legitimately irritated, this is not that his frustration was not well founded. At this point we had an inclination of where we were, so we climbed steep slopes of talus and heather slopes until we got to the crest of the ridge separating the Torment and Boston Basins. We tried to dry out some more, and then we embarked on a wet fourth class scramble down into the Torment Basin, passing the escape route down into the Boston Basin, a shitty gully rappel from slung blocks. For the next hour we scouted around the basin for a bivy site, settling on a small ridge between two snowfields. We set up our tent and lounged around while drying out our gear and clothes. We ate dinner and talked about our chances of climbing in the morning. We came to an agreement that if it wasn't raining at 4:30 AM, then we would go for it; however if it was raining, wait to see if it cleared up later in the morning. Alarms were set and we shrunk into our warm sleeping bags for the night.

Up we go.

Wetness.

Looking around for an "obvious" trail.

Break time.

Trail?

We can't see shit!

Having fun!

Wet scrambling... Fun?

The bivy site.

Stoked to be at camp and somewhat dry.

We scrambled down from the ridge crest in the center of the photo.

Stephen soaking up the sun.

First view of Torment.

The South Face of Torment.

Torment's SW Ridge (?)

Part of Torment showing through the clouds.

WE CAN SEE STUFF!!

Just before we went to sleep...

When we awoke to our alarms at 4:30 AM it was pretty apparent that were weren't going to go for it at that moment, noise of the rain hitting the tent was louder than our alarms, so we settled back in for what would be another 7 hours of sleep. We woke again at about 11:00 AM to an awesome view of the South Face/Ridge of Mount Torment; the ridge being our intended line of ascent, and the notch that enabled us to access the ridge. The weather looked like it was on our side for the moment so we decided to go for it. We could always just climb Torment and descend it if the weather turned south. We ate breakfast, packed up our bivy gear, and got our snow stuff on, finally leaving at 12:56 PM. We would approach the notch via a 700 foot snow field that was about 500 feet from our camp. We drank water from the runoff stream by the snowfield, and topped off our bottles. From there, up we went, donning crampons about halfway up, and negotiating the moat to get to the notch and the rock climbing. Things were going smoothly and the going was fun, I got to swing two tools into nice, hard snow during the moat shenanigans, my crampons and approach shoes were working well. I was feeling good! After that, we racked and roped up, and then Stephen led off, up a small, low-fifth chimney to the first belay. We agreed beforehand that he would lead everything to the West Ridge notch on Forbidden, for the sake of speed and time; then the actual West Ridge would "be my dragon to slay". I followed him, and he led up a low fifth dihedral to an exposed belay above the South Face. At that point we switched to simul-climbing, and dispatched a couple hundred feet quickly, until I hit a steep spot where I was belayed up. We did some more simuling across more third and fourth class terrain, until we crossed over onto the Boston Basin side of the ridge. We took a break at a sweet ledge. We unroped there and scrambled a couple hundred feet of third and fourth until we dropped out packs and continued up some third to the summit of Mount Torment, a couple thousand feet above the ground, only my second successful summit, at 4:09 PM.

Gearing up!

Time we left.

Getting water.

Pitch 2 low-fifth dihedral.

Our approach snowfield and the SE Ridge's terminus.

Almost to the summit. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Lets sign the register!!

Summit #1.

The scramble up/down to the south side.

Proof. Lol.

We signed our names in the summit register and made the decision to continue with the whole traverse, the weather had cooperated up to this point while climbing, and with that in mind we decided to climb onward to the bivy sites at 1/2 mile across the ridge. Personally, I did not want to descend Torment; it looked a little hairy to say the least. The sky started to clear up as we descended down to our packs and then east towards the rappel point onto the north side of the ridge in a notch, on third class ledges. Once we got to the rappel point, there would be no going back. Total commitment would be necessary since there would be no escape route until we got to the West Ridge notch of Forbidden, the end of the traverse and the start of the standard descent off the peak. After donning our crampons and beefing up the tattered mess of an anchor, we began the free hanging rappel onto the north side glacier. Stephen rapped first and was able to avoid moat shenanigans by kicking away from the wall at the last moment onto a nice snow ledge. I then rapped and Stephen pulled me over to the ledge. We pulled the rope and noticed the snow picket anchor at the top of a mandatory rap free hanging rap over a crevasse. A trip report at the ranger that the manager of Mount Baker Mountain Guides, John Minier, let us know of this little obstacle. To get there involved a bit of steep snow climbing, I was a little scared of this, so as I lead out with Stephen belaying me, I was pretty hesitant and slow. Stephen kept telling me to go faster and with his insistence I finished the rope length. Stephen down climbed to my position where he re-buried the picket, tested it, and rapped off it to another snow ledge. We repeated the same thing we did on our first rap, and soon we were off on mellow snow towards a rock band. The mellow snow quickly turned into steep stuff, and suddenly one of my footholds sheared and slid about 20 feet until I arrested myself and climbed back up. My heart was in my throat and I was shaking with adrenaline. Scared shit-less, and with another slip on Stephen's part, we climbed down a moat onto the rock band we needed to cross. I wanted a break, but now was not the time for it. We put the snow gear away and racked up for more simul-climbing. Stephen led out again and soon I was following. Dropped but retrieved gear, terrifying loose rock, and wild exposure over Moraine Lake were the highlights of this rock band. We moved further east onto some polished slabs, where we took a short break and discussed the next part of the traverse that had come into view, the steep snow traverse.

Rapping into Commitment. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Almost down the first rap. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Starting the second rap over a crevasse. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Pulling me across. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Down climbing the moat (pretty gripped). Photo by Stephen Williams.

Route finding in this...

Switching gears.

Exposure.

Before we had the conversation about the traverse. Photo by Stephen Williams.

Cool view.

Awesome stuff!

THE STEEP SNOW TRAVERSE.

The combination of my slip on snow and Stephen's intention to simul-solo the traverse, I had to state my mind and say that we should do the bypass route over rock, not the steep snow traverse. I rationalized my thinking in this regard due to how slow I had moved on less steep snow with a rope. I felt that the exposure would get me pretty quick, and how the traverse was showing signs of hard ice near the end, stuff I couldn’t/shouldn’t do in my approach shoes. We had committed both routes to memory at the off chance that the snow traverse was out of condition. It was probably still in condition, but I was scared of doing it unroped or roped (I fall, I screw us both); but really I was scared of disappointing Stephen by showing him that I wasn’t ready for this. I also told Stephen that we didn't have to do Forbidden that I was content with what we had done, this was mainly out of just wanting to end this so I wasn’t scared anymore. Stephen hushed those thoughts up and said that we should focus in the present, and not in the past or future, boosting my morale slightly. My inability to attempt the steep snow, led us to move around a rock ridge, up a gully, face, and across the crest until we reached a rap station that deposited us, in two raps, onto third class ledges that Beckey and Steph Abegg describe in their respective route descriptions.

When we started dinner.

SWEET SLOPING BIVY!! (Excited to be warm)

It was about 8:00 PM when we took a break and had this discussion at the polished ledges. The sun came out and we saw some pretty cool stuff, like the Thunder Creek valley and tons of peaks I don't yet know the names of, while I was feeling a mix of terror and nervousness, I was still smiling and I was happy that I could see these sights. This last photo is the last one I took until we reached the bivy some hours later, sorry for the lack of documentation; I was in full survival mode.

Stephen left the break spot to scout out a route to the ridge crest. I followed him a few minutes later by traversing a section of easy snow (scary, I think the reader has gotten the hint that I have and will continue to be scared during most of the climb) and scrambling down to Stephen's position. He found a way down one gully and up another, in order to bypass a small gendarme. Lots of loose, second, third, and a bit of fourth followed, a highlight being a foothold breaking under my feet, and myself running up the gully to the top once I cleared the hard bits. It was about 9:00 when we got there and I suggested, naively, that we should bivy here so we avoided climbing in the dark. Stephen quickly shot that idea down by showing how this spot was unsuitable and how it would only be detrimental for us to stay there. Stephen re-racked the rock gear and he lead off up a low-fifth loose and dirty face, the only way we could gain the ridge crest. It was about a half hour until I was able to start climbing. All the while, Stephen was cursing and yelling into the clouds that enveloped us, as I began climbing. This lead was the most impressive and potentially dangerous that I've ever seen. He ran out the first 30-40 feet and the gear was not the best at that. I climbed the face to the rock ridge and then up a smooth chimney with a huge slung chock stone to his belay. He led off again, the rock quality improved, and the stars came out. It was surreal. Wind howling through me, clouds obstructing my vision, then quiet and clarity, the only sounds were the jangling of Stephen's gear on his harness and my breath. I could see across the valley towards Johannesburg Mountain and the Cascade Pass trailhead, where a car was running. I broke out my headlamp and soon was following Stephen, while a cloud quickly surrounded us again. I reached Stephen's belay which turned out to be the rap station to get off the crest onto easy ledges. We rapped down and mused that I would have to teach Stephen some more French besides "très bien". We were soon on the ledges and we kept moving in the cold, windy night. After covering lots of ground, we eventually started to look for a bivy site knowing the route finding and technical cruxes were out of the way. Our morale was good as we climbed wet heather and boulder slopes to the notch at 1/2 mile that also hosted out bivy sites. We set up our tent on a too small platform and got into our sleeping bags as soon as we could. We started melting snow for dinner at about 12:35 AM on Monday July 13th, almost 12 hours, on-the-dot, to when we left our previous bivy. We got water for dinner and we relished the feeling of warmth the hot water brought to us inside our sleeping bags. I think we both passed out from exhaustion and we woke up some time later to eat our dinners. After, we set alarms for about 4:30 AM, and we quickly passed out. I awoke with a panicked start to our alarms blaring music.

The bivy's water supply.

Boston Basin FAR below.

The route from the bivy.

Mountain Man Stephen

The Rap.

Almost done with the traverse.

Stephen started the stove, while I gathered snow for oatmeal and water admiring the pretty cool scenery about that early in the morning. After eating and breaking camp, we began simul climbing, at about 6:50 AM, around a tower to the ridge crest, which we would follow directly or on the north side to a rappel point that would take us to more ledges and the West Ridge notch. The ridge climbing was really solid and wildly exposed, with thousand foot drops on either side of us. We dispatched the second half of the traverse in a couple hours, arriving at the single rap around 8:00 AM on the really cool "sidewalk". After rapping, we traversed across easy ledges until we hit the West Ridge notch at 8:30 AM.

We took a break at the notch, and I suggested that Stephen lead Forbidden, he would climb it faster because he knew the route and the stuff it entails. Alternatively, Stephen said that I should lead it. I couldn't believe it, after all that had happened, after all the mistakes and general inexperience I had shown, he still wanted me to lead the whole West Ridge. It shows how he has the patience for teaching and inexperience that makes him a good guide. He also suggested that we simul climb everything but the two cruxes, and I agreed knowing that it would take a long time to pitch the long ridge out. So, for the first time on the trip, I racked the rock gear, laced my boots tight, and entered the leading mindset. I have photos from the notch and the summit but none in between, I was pretty focused at just climbing and not falling or being slow.

Lets start simuling!!

On belay!

I started my first simul lead by leaping across the gaping crack in the ridge right out of the notch. I climbed on the crest and within 50 vertical feet of the crest on the ridge's north side. A couple hundred feet of terrain was dispatched and I built an anchor and brought Stephen up. We re-racked and I led off again and I was quickly able to glimpse the technical crux of the route; the "tower". I built another anchor and belayed Stephen up to a nice ledge at the base of the tower. I then led off up the crux, clipping a fixed piton and plugging solid 0.75 and 1 cams above the crux. I topped out and built another anchor in a jumble of large blocks. Then Stephen followed and soon enough we were back to simul climbing. One simul lead on the crest brought me to the false summit and I was shocked at how fast the whole climb had gone. Here I was less than 100 feet from, as Stephen would say, "Living the Dream". I slung a horn and I brought Stephen up, and then used my lankiness to execute the "high, down step". I walked across the ridge and onto the 8815 foot summit of Forbidden Peak at 10:50 AM on July 13th. My four-plus year old dream had finally been realized. Stephen came over and we took a break at the summit. I'm sure I was smiling the whole freaking time!!!

Stephen's second time to Forbidden's summit.

The false summit.

Living my dream!

Cumbre! Photo by Stephen Williams.

An two hours after leaving the notch we're on top!!

Summit #2

The iconic Forbidden photo.

It's starting to clear up!!!

We ate, drank, took photos, and talked for about 20 mins until we decided to start the long descend to the car and home. I want to say that standing on the summit was eye opening and such, but really I was too dumbfounded to really think about anything else. There was no room for reflection at the summit. There wasn't much of a view either as we sat on the summit. The REAL view came when I crested the false summit.

My first summit is over there, 3 and a half months later I'm here.

I like the way the Quien Sabe Glacier and how the moisture is condensing across the peaks.

Boston basin's bivy sights below Forbidden's forbidding South Face.

Way over there is the ridge we scrambled down on Saturday.

The TFT, or from whence we came, this is the one view we got of the traverse the whole weekend.

The Cascadian Ice Cap draining into Moraine Lake a couple thousand feet below.

Peaks off to our North and Northeast.

We continued simuling down until we hit the tower where we made a short rap down and then we switched back to simuling. We only stopped to get swap gear, until we made it back to the west ridge notch. In descending one spot, I took a wrong way down and ended up doing a 5.7 unprotected down climb instead of the fourth class scramble around a small arête. That was a "fun” and intense little detour, as it started to sprinkle a bit on the way down. Once we got to the notch we unroped and took a nice break. We hit up the bathroom, ate food, and then repacked for the final stretch to the flat ground of Boston Basin.

Me and the West Ridge above me.

Me at the West Ridge Notch with the wild North Ridge of Forbidden in the background.

After getting ready for the raps down to the infamous and deadly loose descent gullies, we embarked on the last hard leg of the journey. We scrambled to the first rap anchor (huge slung block with 10 mm rope protected by 2 inch webbing, the NPS had done some work!!) and rapped down. Four or five raps followed with varying amounts of loose rock, until we ran out the rope on the last rap and had to scramble down fourth class, which was polished granite to the next and final rap station. Stephen was scrambling and walking down, pulling the rope along the way. As I am not even close to as fast as Stephen on that moderate terrain, I was trapped as the rope came down and with that a flurry of small pebbles and stones that rained on top of me and I was very lucky that nothing big came down.

The final rap was from a bunch of shitty anchors strung together to make a "good enough" anchor, over a face and onto the unnamed glacier that guarded Forbidden's West Ridge. That glacier was a mess; it looked like an earthquake had come through and tossed the whole thing like a salad. Huge sections of it were sticking out in jumbled mess; only a week prior a three football field sized chunk broke off and slid a ways down (holy shit!!). All that separated us from the safety of Boston Basin was a 1/4 mile long, 20-30 degree sloping snow field. And that was when the psychological barrier and charisma I had tried to keep up began to break apart.

Stephen started down the line of steps from a previous party as I slowly followed him. The previous days fall, my inexperience, and the fear of falling led to the worst thing I could have ever done in the mountains; panic. Everything compounded as I reached my mental breaking point. As I reached a flat spot, Stephen called out for me to hurry up, saying it wasn't safe where we were. This was further exacerbated by the fallen rock strewn across the slope we were on. I weakly replied that I couldn't go on, that I was gripped with fear and panic, that I couldn't even convince my body to take a step forward out of the "safety" of the flat spot onto the "danger" of the slope. Stephen started yelling that I was in a dangerous spot again and said "Do you want me to call a fucking helicopter to rescue you?!” I realized just how stupid my current situation was, so I attempted to move. Stephen, seeing that I wasn't moving fast or even in the correct form, came up and put me into a short rope and explained to me how to properly descend the snow with an ice tool, not using the ice tool as a crutch but as a spot to balance on when I needed it. I was fearful of my footholds shearing away and leading to a fall. As I was using my ice tool as a crutch, it was actually making it easier for my holds to shear not keeping my knees-nose-and-toes aligned over each other, encouraging grip and keeping my body in balance. We moved in unison down the second half of the snow field. The last hundred feet Stephen was literally pulling me down as fast as possible. I think he was pretty frustrated at my inexperience and the fact that I allowed panic to control me, and rightly so. We took our crampons off and we sprinted down wet granite and small snowfields, using my new technique, to the Boston Basin bivy sites by a creek.

My fear and Stephen's frustration had lessened, as we took a nice break and took off our harness for the first time in 28 hours (besides sleeping of course). We waited there for about 20-25 mins while a rain squall passed through and started down the climbers trail at a (hehe) appropriate 4:20 PM.

What ya call a goat on a pile of cats?

Forbidden's an elusive mistress...

I was scared a ways up there.

The crest of the ridge in the center is where we descended into the Torment Basin on Saturday.

J-berg.

It's raining.

LIFE!

Hidden Lake Peaks (?)

Yay water!

Still elusive TFT.

The long march home.

We then started the "home stretch", about 6 miles and a couple thousand feet of descending to the car. Following the trail we passed through nice smelling flowers, saw huge marmots scurry under rock, and crossed multiple creeks. We entered the tree line and passed a couple parties on their way up. We talked gear, climbs, and strategy for more peaks. We took a break at a big stream crossing where we drank a gratuitous amount of water and ate a bunch of food. We continued down, legs burning from the endless impacts and descent, until we finally broke out of the trees onto the Cascade River Road. A pretty silent three miles of road walking ensued, with every bend and hill hurting more and more; my body was wanting nothing more than to collapse under its own weight. We reached the car at about 7:00 PM, got in and sped off down the road. We listened to music and started talking about stuff, mostly about my inexperience and psychological/emotional breakdown on the snowfield. We talked about guiding, Mark Twight, and Himalayan ascents. Eventually, we hit Hwy 20 and Marblemount and we gave the all clear signal to our respective contacts. My mom and my little brothers were staying in Sedro-Woolley to pick me up due to the Deception Pass bridge being closed for repaving purposes, so we invited Stephen to stay there instead of driving all the way back down to Seattle for guiding in the morning. Food, showers, and a place to sort gear that was warm and lit influenced that decision (haha).

The post trip gear pile.

We got to Sedro, ate, rested, showered, and finally sorted/exchanged gear before going to bed. Before we turned in, Stephen said something that really eased my thoughts of this being our last climb together. My thinking was of all the mistakes I had made would be too much to handle again. But, he told me that if I had any more ideas for climbs or adventures, to let him know. I think he realized the true extent of my inexperience and his ability to help me along my way. I really respect him for that. I fell into a very sound sleep at around 11:00 PM that night. I dreamt of the incident on the snowfield and the terror it caused.

-Reflections-

Since completing the TFT, I've looked for the reasons why things happened the way they did, both inwards and outwards; and I think I found them.

I wasn't honest with my partner because I wasn't humble enough to admit my faults, my inexperience, and my fear. I was never humble about my experience level or humble enough to heed to other’s warnings. I pushed myself far out of my skill level/comfort zone and paid for it in fear. There's pushing yourself out of your comfort zone to progress. Everyone would agree with that. However, there's also pushing yourself too far out of your comfort zone, and that is stupid, immature, and dangerous. I cast myself into the fire, and I was lucky to escape without getting burnt, only a little heated and singed. I would say that the only two reasons I was able to complete the climb was “beginners” luck, and a capable partner named Stephen. They are the only reasons I was able to do it. I could not do it with any other partner than Stephen, and I was so inexperienced that I needed luck just to survive the alpine realms.

What this climb taught me, more than any skill I could ever learn, is to have humility, to be humble, and to be honest. I have a long way to go to achieve my dream of climbing in the greater ranges, and I realize that. I know that it will take years, thousands of days on snow, hundreds of bivies in the mountains, and a shitload of mistakes to make it there. And that's alright. To understand is to perceive problems.

The journey there and back is more important than the dream itself.

Thank you to all who have and will help me on my journey, no contribution is too small.

My Journeys from Sea to Sky - Zeke's Stories & Essays

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Into the Mind

Sunday, September 13, 2015

Torment-Forbidden Traverse: The First Post!