First ascent of "The Fridge" 900M / 5c / M5 / WI5
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First ascent of “The Fridge”, 900M / 5c / M5 / WI5
It all started exactly 27 years ago, when during his first adventures on this north face, Manu Pellissier began to dream of a mixed line across this enormous limestone face. Luc Mongellaz had also already visited this face, attempting the first winter ascent of the Northwest pillar in 2017, stopping just below the summit after a fall by his partner. I am delighted to join this excellent team for my first adventure on this face.
Written by
Bronwyn Hodgins
A couple of days before the ascent we set out to explore the current conditions on the face and make a first ascent below the western summit of Epéna, spotted by Manu a few years prior. During the ascent, we could see the dominant ice sheets in the middle of the north face, wondering if we should change our plans. We decided to stick with our initial plan which also allowed us to equip a rappel line on the Champagny side. The result of this adventure was “Adieu les cons”, 500M / M5 / 5, a nice first taste of this face.
After two days of rest, we return to the parking lot at 4 in the morning. We get on our electric bikes to warm up a bit, then continue on foot and reach the point where things start to get serious around 7 in the morning. Pretty motivated to do the slab with crampons, I start the first step and, to my surprise, the rock is better than expected. Then we continue, alternating pitches on snow, rock and ice sheets that are just as they should be. The pace is good and we can fully absorb the atmosphere of the face. Protection is not always obvious, we make use of pitons, friends, nuts, bird beaks, ice screws… all the toys we have with us are used!
Manu takes over, the conditions are great, ice and squeaky snow… we have a great time! After having placed a few anchors in this mix of ice too thin for ice screws and a slab too compact for nuts, here we are now at the foot of “the court”, the ephemeral ice court that has been on our minds for so many years.
The atmosphere is captivating, hanging from our ice screws in the middle of this great 500-meter slide. Luc will have the honor of fighting this. The ice is quite hard, the vertical wall… no doubt the calves will get tired later!
Now we have reached the upper ramps, they are less easy than expected. The snow is uneven and sometimes insufficient. A first attempt to the right is stopped by the underlying slabs. Then we try to go left, the ramps seem less steep, but doubt arises. Starting with a tightrope, we end up doing pitches, the snow sliding on these difficult-to-protect slabs is a challenge. We finally get through this section and reach the pass around 4:30 p.m. – happy and deeply moved by this beautiful line, as well as the sunset with which we are rewarded.
However, the day is not over yet. We have to reach the western summit via a ridge that is less comfortable than expected, especially at night. Even if the moon is watching, we spend 3 hours on this aerial ridge, crawling a good part of the time. At the western summit, we find our equipped rappels, and 3 hours later we are on our bikes back to the car, 20 hours after leaving it. Very tired but happy, we have a beer before falling asleep quite easily!
