Trust in a No-Fall Zone

At nine years old, I signed up to climb Mt. Tumbledown during my first summer away at camp. The day hike came on the heels of a rainy canoe trip down the Saco River. The double play prompted Justin, the trip counselor who always wore what I now know are Chacos, to remark that I was “quite the outdoorsman.” Considering I’d signed up for the only two off-campus excursions just for the chance to get ice cream on the way back, I didn’t think I deserved the honorific.

During mid March, my pal Jonah from Williams suggested we take a backcountry ski trip to descend Tuckerman Ravine, a ravine on Mt. Washington known both for its steepness and block-party style spring skiing. Due to its east-facing position and Mt. Washington’s notorious weather, Tux accumulates some 40-60 feet of snow per season. At age twelve, I had a snowball fight there in July.

As we drove up Thursday, following a summer-Friday amount of traffic leaving the city, we got a call from our guide, Josh. Josh had grown up around North Conway, NH and followed scholarships to a series of ski high schools as a mogulist. Two surgically repaired knees later, he would self-consciously acknowledge that Jonah perceived his caution as “dad skiing.”

Josh asked a bit of our background and plans for the weekend. I’d expected to spend Friday getting acquainted with the gear and avalanche safety. The equipment, different from alpine skiing, reflects the twin dangers in backcountry. First, the beacon, shovel, and probe are used to search for people in the event of an avalanche. Second, the skis, poles, and boots keep skiers upright on the way down.

Avalanches are a big deal. Avalanche risk is never zero, but it can be greater at angles between 30 and 55 degrees and depends on snow conditions often referred to as “avalanche problems.” Opportunities to safely ski a 50˚ slope in the backcountry are therefore relatively limited. By April in New Hampshire, the snowpack is isothermal: the temperature is consistent all the way down, and a slide is less likely. This opens the door to some steep, steep gnar.

Intent on maximizing our hour-dollars with the guide, we decided to ski Tux on Friday. We wanted to get into some more out-there stuff Saturday. We explained our skiing background and that we were in pretty good shape but by no means olympians.

This last caveat turned out to be a critical piece of beta, as information is known in this world. Just a week prior, Josh had taken out a group that included a ski instructor who lacked the fitness for the hike.

It turns out most people think highly of themselves. Folks overestimate their fitness and skiing abilities. Our acknowledgment that we just might have limitations in the face of all possible mountaineering activities earned us street cred and opened Josh’s trust and creativity.

This facilitated a Saturday varied and intense enough to make the guys at the ski shop say to me “Holy shit. And you’ve never backcountry skied before? Josh is nuts.”

Friday was a sunny day in the mid 60s in the valley, by far the best weather I’ve had in my three tumultuous visits to Mt. Washington. We hiked the first mile or so of the trail in ski boots, looking hopelessly lost with skis on our packs and mud as far as the eye could see. At a certain point, though, the snow covered the trail and we put on our skis to skin up.

Skins are strips of fake animal hide that glue to the bottom of the ski. The hair is oriented so the ski glides with the grain uphill and digs in against the grain to prevent slipping downhill. It’s the kind of design that tells you that whichever group figured this out a few thousand years ago got it right on the first go around, unlike the early bicycles with the tiny rear wheel.

Eventually, we made it to Hojos, the Hermit Lake Shelter rather than the motel chain, and it became time to throw on our crampons and walk. We assessed the situation at the Lunch Rocks, the base of the ravine, and decided to head straight for the top. It's just skiing, let's go ski.

It was therefore to my immense chagrin that I looked down in the middle of the uselessly labeled “no fall zone” to see the rear piece of my uphill binding had rotated off to the side, and my heel had come loose. Just as Wile E. Coyote doesn’t fall until he looks down, I’m almost certain I would have skied my way to the bottom without event had I not thought to take a peek.

While nobody ever wants to fall, a no fall zone denotes an area where a minor fall could have major consequences. To the extent that falling is within skiers’ control, they should avoid it. To the extent that it’s not, skiers on alpine skis can increase the DIN setting to avoid an accidental ejection. AT bindings work differently, but an accidental ejection is basically what happened to me.

I found myself sliding down the mighty steep Center Gully, grasping at straws to stop myself before I went over a set of rocks or who knows what. My ski, for better or for worse, was lodged above a small cliff off to looker’s left from my precarious landing spot. Jonah assessed the situation and began the fool’s errand of side stepping back up to this traitorous piece of equipment.

A skier named Lincoln came by. As though sent by divine intervention, he was impossibly well equipped with both a great attitude and whippets, poles that have small ice axes on the handles. Each of these two items are helpful when one clings to an isothermal snowpack for dear life.

I dug in with a whippet as we tried to get my other ski back on. In the process, Lincoln discovered, to my immense gratitude, that the binding wasn’t adjusted correctly. The heel piece was far enough back that enough stress would dislodge it, but it was close enough that the untrained eye would miss the issue.

This had two implications. First, I was elated to discover that I was not a reckless idiot, as even a practice run might not have included enough force to uncover the issue. Second, I would not be able to get it back on and ski the rest of the way down this very cool, very steep slope. Lincoln, a pilot, was a consummate professional of an outdoorsman. He spoke in “we” sentences and was rather focused on having a plan but revising in the face of changing circumstances. He asked me to trust him, and I would have even if I’d had a choice.

Though thrilled to ski out intact, I was shaken up. When Diego took me up my first multi-pitch climb, the Via Miriam on the Dolomites’ Cinque Torri, he recognized my fear and said it was good to have “respect for the mountain.” In Kentucky, I clung too tightly and pumped my arms out on my first climb. Wherever I fell along the fear-respect divider previously, I was at this point safely on the fear side.

Fear became inconvenient Saturday morning when we roped up to cross a break in the snowpack and pass over an icy section of the Central Gully in Huntington Ravine.

Mountaineering axe in hand, quaking my way up the rear, I looked up to Jonah and Josh and announced that mountaineering was the worst possible sport for a neurotic. Josh offered to take our photograph.

Josh, noting the combination of the challenging Tuckerman run we’d done Friday, our relative fitness humility, and our A+ attitude, suggested we get into some “ski mountaineering.” Stoked that anybody would trust us enough to mountaineer, we leapt at the opportunity. The word “mountaineering” is slippery enough that we weren’t airtight on what we had signed up for: more than a hike, but less than a multi-pitch climb, maybe? Worthwhile regardless.

The morning had started well. The Pinkham Notch Breakfast Buffet was almost as good as I remembered. Josh brought me a fresh pair of skis. We hiked and skinned efficiently. We planned an ambitious day: a mountaineering ascent through the Huntington Ravine, a ski down some north-facing snow in the Great Gulf Wilderness, a hike out of Great Gulf, a summit tap, some blue-square turns in the upper snowfields, and a descent down either Huntington or Tuckerman, depending on snow cover. I got my money’s worth from Josh as soon as he told me I’d slip less if I used weight in my heels to to press the full skin against the snow. I hadn’t understood when Jonah tried to give me the same advice Friday, but that’s why Josh makes the big bucks.

Rather than skin to the last possible moment, Josh made a point of stopping where we could sit, take a breather, and give ourselves a ramp-up with crampons and ice axes before the steepest part of the boot pack, the footprints we’d follow up the gully. Mountaineering comprises skiing, skinning, ice climbing, climbing, walking, hiking, scrambling, and more. These activities require different equipment, and all are best suited to daylight. Lackadaisical transitions and unplanned breaks may not seem so crazy, but they can add up to a nighttime ski into the parking lot.

We reviewed some basic mountaineering principles. Only move the axe when in a balanced position if doing a French step. Hold the axe with your thumb under the adze so that if you fall, you’ll naturally stick the pick-end into the snow to self arrest. In crampons, keep your weight on the ball of your foot for optimal stick; don’t try to stay on your toes like in climbing shoes. Communicate.

As the slope steepened, our axes began to feel less and less cosmetic. The technical ascent also helped justify our wraparound sunglasses, which were less than fleeky. At a certain point, I all but forgot that we were not moving up a vertical. My heart rate was through the roof and, though I trusted Josh and Jonah with my life, as it were, I felt less trust in my own two feet.

To train for this kind of thing, Josh said, the best thing to do is to gradually increase the pace at which you can run while keeping your heart rate at or below 70 bpm. I could do five hours of meditative yoga, watch four nature documentaries, pop three Xanax, and in my twelfth hour of sleep my heart rate would be 85 or higher. Were I wearing a monitor, it would’ve needed scientific notation during the crux of this trip up Central Gully.

Josh belayed us, and technically, we ice climbed. Several times, I worried my toes would give way. In each instance, I took a breath, remembered to move weight to the ball of my foot, and proceeded safely. After a second belay, we returned to a reasonable boot pack, but I would’ve sworn it was vertical. The final insult was the scree pile at the very top, where not even microwave-sized rocks could be trusted. The second belay and scree pile were bigger obstacles than we’d hoped. Josh said this was probably his last time up this route for the season. He congratulated us on an intense, technical ascent.

Sunday, when I took out my camera, Josh made the usual comment interesting people do about 35mm film, and Jonah said he had been wondering why I hadn’t taken any pictures the day before. Among other things, I said, I didn’t want my heart palpitations to make all my photos blurry.

We skinned a bit, ran out of snow, and began to hike. We had briefly flirted with skipping Great Gulf due to time and energy. When we saw it, Josh and Jonah’s mouths watered. I was reprimanded for floating the idea that I could wait up top for them; mountaineering is a team sport. So, we scoped out a route to descend, one with space for a couple of easier turns before its crux, unlike the more famous Airplane Gully. We tested my binding with great rigor, and in those turns I remembered that I know how to ski!

The ski was as fun as the hike out was exhausting. Though we didn’t need axes, I couldn’t shake this idea that I might just fall over backwards off the mountain. It was nothing that a Cool Mint Chocolate Cliff Bar couldn’t fix, and, once we made it to comparatively flat ground, I wheezed something about the most difficult physical and psychological challenge I’d faced.

I caught a second wind when we took a photo in the parking lot that is the summit. The ski through the snowfields was even more fun than promised. We found ourselves looking over The Lip, another run in Tux that’s potentially steeper than Center Gully. One or two inconveniently placed moguls prompted a touch more side slipping than I’d brag about, but eventually I pointed the tips downhill and followed them.

The whole outdoors communication bit comes in three phases. We had made our morning plan. We reviewed conditions as we saw them, adjusting our plan by adding a second belay, deciding against skiing out via Huntington’s South Gully, and checking on energy levels. Finally, we debriefed. A bit of banter about beer and whiskey, and some genuine reflection on equipment (we planned to bring fewer layers Sunday but could have used ski crampons), communication (I was grateful we decided to ski Great Gulf), and after-school-special lessons.

Entering Saturday, my respect for the mountain had crossed the line into fear. Skins and crampons work best when their user trusts them enough to move weight back into the heel and ball respectively. Pausing to calm down and trust the equipment made each piece of the mountaineering puzzle easier. On Friday, Lincoln kept a level head and adjusted his plan as needed. He maintained respect for the situation without slipping into fear.

Once Josh clocked out after a lower-key Sunday on Gully 3 in the Gulf of Slides, we shared a beer. We talked about this and that, mostly his sweet van renovation. Josh is an outdoorsman. We talked as peers and friends, so perhaps Justin was right, fifteen years later.

I thought about the times at summer camp when we would spend the “ropes” activity doing some hokey trust exercise instead of rock climbing as I then wanted. None of the counselors ever explained why we spent an hour weaving a table top by leaning backward against each other’s thighs until we supported ourselves, floating without our hands. It always seemed like it would never work.

Trust, however, need not be all warm and fuzzy. Whenever either of us fell behind or needed a moment of levity, Jonah and I quoted the pro callouts from G.N.A.R., a ski movie I haven’t seen, and accused each other “You’re a pro dude? I can’t believe that. I’m wayyyy sicker than you!”

With an ice axe in hand, it almost sounds true.