This is a little write-up from Daan Nijs. Last summer I took him alpine climbing for the first time. I might have taken him outside of his comfort zone, I guess...
Hi everyone,
Hi everyone,
Let me
first introduce myself. My name is Daan, I met Bart last year at Don Bosco
Wilrijk at the rope-access course. Me and Bart got along very well right from
the start of the course. Bart and I share the same love for the mountains and
climbing, though he is much better at it than I am.
Last summer
Bart and I went to Chamonix together. It was my first time in Chamonix and my
first real experience as a mountaineer. Bart was planning on staying for two months, but because I had to work, I only had one week to climb.
The first
week of July we drove from Belgium to Chamonix. Once in Chamonix we went to this
cosy camping full of climbers. We arrived at the camping in the late afternoon.
The same day we went to town to get the last supplies we needed to go climbing.
The next morning we took the Flégère cable car to the Aiguilles Rouges. Here
we wanted to climb 'La Chapelle de la Glière'. An alpine style rock climb with a beautiful ‘Razor’ pitch. After my first lead on this
route, little experience with nuts and friends, multi-pitch routes and a first
experience of terrible rope drag I suffered from a weird feeling where it was
very hard for me to go on, better known as fear. So for the upcoming pitches
Bart took the lead. We continued on the route with a break after the sixth
pitch. After another demotivating confrontation with a chamois who apparently
could make it to his point with ease, we continued to the top of the route.
After a few minutes of enjoyment on the summit, I just realised we were only
halfway and still had a small journey ahead of us. It was already late but we
still wanted to make it to the last cable cart to Chamonix. We didn’t make it
though. On the way down, which should have been an easy walk we stumbled upon a
wall of snow that was blocking the path. But no worries, on the right of the
path we found a belay point where we could rappel down to a ledge from where we
could go down to the cable cart. At least that was the plan. Once on the ledge,
we discovered that is was impossible to go down through a field of snow without
crampons. When we discovered it was impossible to go down through the snow, we
already pulled down the rope, so returning wasn’t an option either. We started
to look around for an alternative route to go down. At first we couldn’t find a
way down, but then it happened. I saw a small piece of paper. I picked it up,
and saw it was a page from the guidebook of the wall we were on. Was this luck or
was there something up above guarding us? Who knows. Anyway, we found a rappel
route and got down just before it went all dark. Luckily for us, we brought our
tent, so we camped near the lift. The next morning we took the first bin and
went down. This first climb was already a great adventure, although the real
adventure still had to come.
When we
arrived back in Chamonix, we went to the tourist-office to check the weather forecast. We
decided to take the cable car of the Aiguille du Midi. We went to buy the food we would need to
stay up for 2 days and we left with the last cart. Once up at the station, we
prepared to get on the glacier and pitch our tent between two or three other
tents. There we ate something and went to bed. We had to get up very early to
leave on our climb. We wanted to climb the Aiguille d’Entrèves. A route which is
AD- according to Camptocamp but back then I thought it was PD. This was going
to be my first alpine climb. I was very
excited. The next morning was painfully early. We left as the sun touched the
horizon for the first part of the climb, a seven kilometre walk to the start of
the route. It didn’t took long before I realised that I hadn’t eaten enough.
When we arrived at the start of the route, I felt pretty empty inside. I ate
some candy bars which gave me energy to go on. We started the climb, it was
easy terrain to climb and I really enjoyed it. The view was amazing but when we
were half way, the weather changed. It became very clouded and it started to
snow. The wind started to pick up, A snowstorm was coming. And yes, a few minutes
later the weather was terrible, but because we passed the point of no return,
we pushed forward. After this climb we still had to walk back. The trail was
snowed in and we couldn’t see the crevasses. At that point we realised why a good preparation is mandatory, which we hadn’t at that point.
We pushed on and when we descended more, the visibility became better and we could
see the trails again. On the way back I was completely out of energy. I tried
to go on and pushed as hard as I could. I fell a few times, but Bart helped me
to push on. After a serious struggle to get my empty body back to the location
where we left our tent, I fell down in the hole where we put our tent last
night. There we decided to put up the tent again because of my empty body and
upcoming bad weather.
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| Daan on the Col du Midi |
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| On our way to the Aigulle d' Entrèves, the third mountain from the left. |
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| On the ridge |
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| Beautiful climbing on the ridge, just before the weather turned foul. |
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| Daan climbing the ridge in less than ideal conditions. |
When we got
in our tent, a snowstorm blew over. We had to stay in the tent for the next
sixteen hours. These where some scary hours. The wind was blowing down on our
tent which was only anchored with our two piolets and two ski poles. After these
hours, we decided to go to the lift. The last push to the finish line. It was
still much further than anticipated. Then we arrived at the last ridge to the
Midi lift. On this last ridge, I almost fell down because my crampons where
stuck in my pants (classic). Luckily I could plant my piolet in the snow, which
saved me. When we arrived at the lift station, I was very relieved. Here there
were the usual Asian tourists who were taking pictures of every mountaineer
they could get an eye on. After some waiting, we finally could go down. The
first thing we did, was going to the ‘Midnight’. A place with delicious
hamburgers. After that we went for a drink and then to the camping where we
relaxed after our adventure. That day we also met an Australian guy who was
also named Daan, who was completely amazed by the fact that he met another
person with the same name.
The next
day we wanted to climb a multi-pitch route somewhere further down the valley,
but on our way up, we realised we forgot our water. So we returned to get some
water but by the time we got back, we were to tired (read lazy) to go back up,
Also the weather was changing and it was already getting to late. So we went
bouldering for a while, which we grew tired of pretty fast, although it was fun in the
beginning.
The next
day was my last day in Chamonix, but we couldn’t do a lot because of bad
weather, so it became a last lazy day. The next morning I left Bart in Chamonix
and drove home on a boring ten hour drive. It was a great week where I learned a lot and did awesome things, I hope
I can repeat this, next summer but then with better weather.
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