In many places I could use the narrow tip of my hammer to bash out the grit from the crack in front of me and place tiny wires, while in others I hammered birdbeaks straight into the muck. Like all such climbs, I knew if the wall were to be beaten, the battle would be fought one placement at a time.
The crack closed down and I switched to copperheads, tiny blobs of aluminum that could be hammered to fit any holes or weaknesses in the rock’s surface, each one a little time bomb, their holding power only bodyweight. The copperheads ranged in size between the width of a triple-A battery and a Tictac, and were all about a centimetre in length, formed from a hollow tube of soft alloy and crimped to a length of wire, a clip-in loop swaged at the other end. I knew that so far few climbers had used them on the Troll Wall, and I hoped they would open up some of the wall’s blanker sections.
To place one I’d find a spot where there was a slight constriction, a corner where the two sides pinched down, but not enough to hold a normal nut, a spot that may one day evolve into a placement, or else be washed away by time and the elements. Eyeing up the shape of the void it would fill, I’d bash the head to fit, shaping it, making a customized nut, a key to fit a lock, which I hammered into place, trying to get every molecule of alloy in contact with the rock. It was like smearing decorator’s filler into a crack in your wall, only less forgiving and about as strong.
I moved up on a sequence of copperheads, testing each one with hard tugs, aware that if I was to fall, the gear below me would rip out and I might hit a ledge below.
‘Just don’t fall then.’
Rescue would be difficult, if not impossible, and would take days not hours, due both to the wall’s steep angle and because the face was deemed too dangerous for helicopters, their rotor blades a target for the ever-present rock fall. I thought about Phil Thornhill, a British climber who had attempted a bold winter solo of the wall in the 1980s but had fallen close to the top and broken his femur. He had sat there for days waiting to be saved, the rescue team lowering a climber down from the top. For me there was no real chance of immediate rescue. If anything happened I’d have to rescue myself.
I crept up a corner to what looked liked a good crack, each placement a dose of fear, but found instead the crack was formed by a loose skin of rock overlaying solid rock beneath, the whole lot looking like it was ready to peel off, its edges sharp and toothy, a new booby trap set by the trolls. I didn’t want to touch it, but knew I had to get past it.
I lightly tapped it with my hammer.
It sounded like a vase: hollow, fragile, and easy to send crashing to the ground.
I gripped its edge and tried to flex it, and thought I felt it move. I imagined what would happen if I placed a cam between it and the wall, how it could so easily be prised away, sending us both crashing down.
The wind grew, buffeting me as I hung there, flecks of snow sticking to the wall. I shifted in my aiders, feeling exposed and in danger, the trolls waiting for my next move. They had been here forever, and neither the flake nor I could wait. One of us would have to yield, and it could only be me.
To beat the wall I mustn’t charge headfirst. I would have to sidestep its traps, and outsmart it. I backed off and moved back down the crack, taking out the gear I’d fought so hard to place as I went.
I guess you’d call it a tactical retreat.
It would soon be dark and I’d made less than a quarter of a rope’s progress.
Down I went to the portaledge.
Gathering up snow from the ledge, I cooked some pasta, finding it gritty but welcome. I felt disappointed at my progress, but knew I had my food and Paul’s too, meaning I could probably stay up here for a month if need be, which was great logistically, if worrying emotionally.
The wind had increased during the day and I pulled out my mini-disk player to record the flapping of the portaledge.
Being inside the ledge reminded me how as kids Robin and I would spend hours camping out in a duvet cover in our bedroom, imagining that beyond the thin cotton stood a vast wasteland rather than our bedroom. Now it was true, but I was on my own.
I wondered what Robin was doing; flying over the Hindu Kush, perhaps, or camped out on some smashed-up Iraqi runway.
No doubt both of us were in harm’s way.
The wind died in the night, and next morning I made my short commute back to the highpoint, having had an idea how to get round the loose section by traversing across the wall to another corner I’d seen from below. This would mean very little height gain, but would get me to more promising new ground. This new corner led up to another area of hanging death, but it looked as though before reaching it I could make another rising traverse to a ledge near the edge of the buttress. What lay beyond that I had no idea, but it seemed the best thing to do at the moment. If in doubt, just keep climbing.
I moved left across the wall using a series of poor cracks, and found the corner itself just as poor, taking birdbeaks, the whole affair horribly marginal. I got as high as I dare and knew I had to move left again, out onto the blank wall, which I hoped would offer some edges for my skyhooks.
The holds were there, and I moved from the bleak crack with its poor gear, to the bleaker wall where there was none, simply trusting that each hook I hung from would hold and the rock wouldn’t break. If I fell I was in no doubt I’d be smashed to pieces crashing back across the wall, having no gear that would hold a fall until Paul’s old highpoint.
Hook.
Move up.
Hook.
Move up.
The edges ran out.
My only option was to drill tiny holes – called bat hooks – on which I could hang a filed skyhook. The idea was distasteful ethically, but had been used on the Troll before on new routes, and was a way of crossing blank sections without placing a line of bolts.
I wanted to beat the wall so much I was prepared to do anything.
I pulled out the drill, a five-millimetre drill bit attached to a rubber-handled grip. Stepping as high as possible on the hook I was on, I began hammering.
Tap, tap, tap, I went, twisting the bit after each hammer-stroke. The rock – like most rock – was bullet hard, but I only needed a hole a few millimetres deep to take my weight.
I’d never drilled a bat hook before, or placed a bolt on a climb, and it seemed like a hell of a place to learn, but what could be so hard about drilling a hole?
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
The hammer blows echoed around the wall, backwards and forwards, overlapping each other over and over again, calling and answering, one dying tap overlaid by another.
I was a medieval siege-miner, digging away with pick and shovel beneath the castle’s wall.
I would bring it down.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
The hole was drilled, a hole no deeper then the head of a match. I placed the hook into it, its tip filed to a sharp point, then slowly weighted it, ready to drop on the hook below if it ripped.
It held.
I waited for my heart to settle.
I moved up, creeping up the steps of my aiders one at a time, until my waist was level with the new hook.
I tried not to dwell on how it could hold my weight, or why the rock didn’t chip off under such a load. It just did.
Taking off my gloves, I reached up and swept the grimy rock looking for another edge. There was nothing positive, so out came the drill again.
I drilled another hole and hooked on.
In my pocket I had several bolts, brought along because I knew there would be places where I’d find no good anchors for belays, or a good runner on a pitch. I knew placing a bolt mid-pitch would lower the grade of the route, but I couldn’t afford to fall, and felt I’d pushed it far enough after hooking high on the wall, telling myself that anyone repeating this pitch would be as glad of it as me. I also needed to have something
to safeguard me on the next section.
Out came the drill, only this time the hole was drilled with an eight-millimetre bit, and ten centimetres deep. It was hard going, hammering and twisting, blowing the dust out, all the while trying to remain aware that I was standing on a tiny hook barely touching the rock’s edge.
After twenty minutes it looked like the hole was big enough and I fished out a bolt, careful not to drop it. The bolt was a round length of steel bar with a slight kink in it to hold it into the hole. The idea was to slot it through a bolt hanger, slide it into the hole until the kink, then hammer it home, giving me a runner that could hold a car.
I slid the bolt onto the hanger, then pushed it into the hole, but found it was a little too big to fit easily, so tapped it in with my hammer. I felt it trying to resist, but eventually felt it begin to give way. Then, after only a centimetre, it started to bend.
I tried to hammer it out to try another, but it was no use. It was stuck.
I’d blown it.
My first bolt was a dud.
I knew I should start again and drill another hole, but thought it would look a mess, and felt guilty, cursing myself for not practising this at home.
I felt that peculiar male shame of DIY gone wrong.
As punishment I looped the cable of a nut over the stem of the bolt, telling myself it would be strong enough to hold me, and stepped up.
It held.
More hook moves followed, but I now felt in harm’s way, my brain screaming for another bolt, the crap one below only amplifying my fear. I hooked again, and then, past caring, pulled out the drill and started hammering.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
This time I took more care, each hammer blow well placed, knowing my life depended it on. With the hole drilled, I spat on the bit and twisted it in the hole to dig out every grain of rock dust, then fished another bolt out and pushed it in.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
The bolt bent again.
I screamed in frustration, the sound echoing around me, the wall shouting back. I felt like a bomb-disposal man clumsily cutting all the wrong wires. Hanging there below the bolt I tried to consider what was going wrong. The only answer was that the bolts were an imperial size that did not match my metric drill and were consequently a fraction too big. I’d been given the bolts for free and now I knew why.
Not far above was a ledge I guessed would be the size of an ironing board. If I could reach it perhaps I might find some gear.
On I hooked.
Just below the ledge I looked down at the rope feeding back to the belay, passing a lot of blankness, two crap bolts hanging out like crumpled cigarettes and then, far below, just the birdbeaks. If I fell now that would be it.
I imagined the fall, weightless, dropping, uncaring – my life in flight.
You can never be sure, something might stop me, but the wall was well featured with slabs and ledges, and wherever I stopped my body would be a mess.
I grabbed the lip of the ledge and carefully mantled up, wishing I had my rock boots on, or trousers with more grip than slick Gore-tex, as I rocked on, ending up on my knees and off balance. I needed to sink some gear, but the only thing that was sinking was my heart. There was nothing. Nothing at all.
I knelt there terrified.
A large rock boomed down the wall behind me. It sounded house-sized and hit the slope somewhere below me with the dull impact of a hollow punch.
My heart was beating fast.
This is it.
I thought about Ed Drummond calling this wall ‘The Altar’, and saying that only those who’d knelt before it would understand.
I understood.
I couldn’t go on.
I couldn’t go back.
I didn’t feel as if I even dare stand, terrified my plastic boots might skate off the greasy rock and pitch me off.
My knees started to hurt.
I felt the trolls watching. I eased the drill out and began my third hole, taking the utmost care. It really had to be perfect.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
My knees began to throb.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
I adjusted my balance with each hammer swing, never striking too hard in case I toppled off.
Tap tap tap.
Twist.
The hole was deep enough. I spit on the bit and twisted it in the hole to remove the dust. Out came the bolt.
A magic bullet.
I held it up against the hole and tapped it – just a little – striking it as if it was made of glass. Gently. Carefully. With love.
As if my very life depended on it.
The bolt bent.
I couldn’t feel my knees.
Unclipping the haul-bag, the bag I’d travelled so far to find again, I gave it a little push and let it fall from the ledge, watching it spin for a second before disappearing beneath me and then listening for its impact. It thudded dully, and I imagined it shooting down the thousand feet of snow to the river. This was the third time I’d thrown it from the Troll Wall.
If it was lost I didn’t care.
I’d made it back to the ledge the previous day after abseiling from that single terrible bolt. I knew I was defeated. I told myself that without bolts I couldn’t carry on. Without them I would find myself marooned. But the defeat was more than a technical issue.
The trolls had broken me.
I checked the anchor, then set off down with the rest of the gear: two haul-bags and the ledge, the stuff that I couldn’t throw off. Getting down was as hard as the way up: rappel without anything, attach the ropes to the next belay, jumar back up, rap down again with all the bags, pull the ropes and repeat.
With much relief I reached the snow slope once again, only now without the fire escape of ropes above me. I couldn’t down climb with all the bags, so just cut them loose and watched them tumble away, hoping they’d make it down in one piece, then followed after them, each step taken as if crossing a minefield backwards.
The trolls had beaten me, but I was still alive, and if I could get down that would be my triumph.
Down down down.
One thousand steps.
Down down down.
The snow wet and sucking.
Down down down.
Shards of rock sticking out here and there like sharks’ fins.
All the strength left me on the last hundred feet before I hit the forest, my bags sat waiting for me like dogs, always eager for more. I looked at the biggest one, the one I’d left on the wall all those weeks, and saw that its indestructible shell, which had probably been full of ice, was threaded with cracks, vinyl fibres bursting out like white hair, shattered by the impact.
I sat down beside it.
I noticed the sun was shining on me.
I didn’t care.
Instead of rock fall and the weight of the wall there was now the chatter of birdsong and the murmur of the river.
I didn’t care.
I emptied out the food from my bags onto the floor, a big pile of ambition now become bird food, and torched my rubbish with my remaining fuel.
I felt let down. Let down by myself, for my weakness and lack of forethought; for being so bold and ambitious; for not thinking things through; for thinking too much.
I felt rejected by the wall.
I felt rejected by myself.
All my hardware was piled in front of me, all those little bits and pieces I’d accumulated over the years, bought and scrounged and given, used on El Capitan on a dozen ascents, the Lafaille on the Dru, three trips to Patagonia, all that weight carried on my back, saving my life and the lives of my friends countless times. They were the tools of my trade, but I despised both them and that trade.
I had the urge to throw the lot into the river. To go home unburdened by climbing. To open
the door and hug my kids and tell them I’d never risk it all again.
Just throw the lot in the river.
No.
I packed up my haul-bags, creating one giant knee-grinding load, a load too heavy to bear, and resting it on a rock so I could strap myself to it, I staggered all the way back to Åndalsnes.
I didn’t look back.
TWELVE
Breathing
Someone coughed, waking me instantly. It was a little cough from little lungs, breaking the quiet of the dark house.
I’d been asleep on our shabby red settee under a grotty sleeping bag, forced out of bed, probably due to my snoring, or heavy breathing, or some minor annoyance. You’d think the longer you were married the easier such things would become, but generally it seems the reverse, and so I was sleeping in the living room. Ella was in the room above me in her child-sized bed, Ewen in the room beside hers.
The cough came again.
The settee was old and comfortable, worn by our weight and the brush of hands and feet and backsides, its edges, like those on a badly packed haul-bag, exposed to their woody bone. The kids jumped on it, the family crammed together on it, and drinks were spilled on it. A friend had handed it on. I think we did him a favour taking it off his hands. Still, we weren’t proud. Our house was usually a tip anyway, and so it fitted in well. I loved that settee, and I seemed to spend more and more time on it, especially at night, bivying out in my own house.
I didn’t really mind, imagining myself on some mountain instead, a small adventure, the smell of a well used sleeping bag pulled around me, cushions like soft heather, car headlights passing the window like distant lightning. It reminded me of camping out under my bed as a kid, something my mother thought worrying, but under the mattress, with a ceiling of interlocking wire, I would imagine I was in a cave, a snow hole, or stowed away in the hold of a starship. I guess even as I kid I was never happy to simply be where I was.
A third cough.
It was Ewen. Only they weren’t normal coughs. The sound was different. It was only a half-tone from normal, but it was undoubtedly wrong. Ewen’s cough had brought me from deep sleep to total consciousness, as if I’d heard a bear prowling through the house. I opened my eyes and lay there, wondering if I’d dreamt it, one part of me saying go back to sleep, the other that I must investigate, the part of you that asks if the gas is off or the candle blown out. The neurotic part that is nearly always wrong. Nearly always.
Cold Wars Page 18
