Getting Out

11th June
Marcus’s point was that the snow down here in the valley was clearly in much worse condition than it had been in on the way in over a week ago. If we rested for the night and tried to haul our sleds out in the day time, the crevasses field would be far more dangerous and the 10Km ski back to base camp would be really tough work….. He was definitely right.

So, after some discussions and a rest for food and drink, we loaded up the sleds and headed off again at 2am.

There was a good crust on the snow at this hour and Marcus was a far better skier than I was. So, I went first and he went as anchor at the back of the rope as we wound our way down through the crevasse field.
He did a great job though and I think it was the right choice. If we had done it the other way around and Id been at the back. If he went into a crevasse id have had no chance of arresting the fall. As I said the snow was very firm and thus very slippery for our skis… We nearly lost a ski pole in a crevasse after one tumble but we made it through without going into any crevasses and we were then out onto the flat area of the glacier.

We decided that it was safe enough to take the ropes off (form what we knew of the rout from the trip in and the current snow conditions). So, now it was every man for himself and we all moved at our own pace skating along over the frozen snow and towing our sleds.
Predictably Marcus beat us all back to base camp with the rest of us coming in within an hour of him.

Marcus idea of skiing this section at night with the hard freeze was an excellent one and even though it was hard work and we were very tired, it made this 10Km section far easier and it only took a couple of hours.

The night was clear and fine. The temperatures were not even that cold compared to higher up the mountain (maybe neg5degC) so we just didn’t bother with setting up the tents and slept out in the open with our sleeping bags and mats on top of ground sheets.

In the morning we broke out the Sat Phone and made the necessary call to the pilot to say we were down and ready to get picked up. The weather stayed good and we were all picked up and flown back out to the airport again by mid afternoon!

This was very quickly and the four of us were a bit stunned to be so suddenly back in relative civilization and moving amongst normal people who had no idea about mountaineering or the types of things we had been doing. – Very strange!

I don’t even remember the details of getting back to Vancouver but it took us a day or so to get transport back to Whitehorse and after a single night in a hotel (with a nice dinner and a few beers) there, we were on our flight and then back home in Vancouver before we knew it.

It was all a blur but we were all basking in the pleasant glow of our successfully achieving our goal.