We Are Explorers – Autumn and Ice

May 5, 2024 mountaingroup

On October 13, we rose early in the dark, our headlamps illuminating our breath as each of us layered up and debated when to leave our sleeping bags.

Written by Benjamin E. Lieber

Images by Benny Lieber and Austin Schmitz

"Moose!!" I yelled. No reply. They were deep asleep.

It was past midnight. We approached the Hayes Range after a round trip to Anchorage to pick up Austin, about a twelve hour drive. As a team of three we were headed to the north side of Mount Moffit. Only weeks before we had coordinated a similar plan and managed to climb a beautiful couloir on a peak in the same range. Fall climbing was a particularly interesting prospect and we continued to inquire about its ways. When we arrived at the lodge, we exited the car and began a frenzy of bags shuffling into the basement. Excitement filled the lodge, and Austin’s infectious energy was immediately welcome.

At daybreak, Alex drove north to Delta Junction where he would fly in the bush plane first. Our fourth team member was pilot Jesse Cummings. Jesse has a long beard and always arrives in his cotton hooded sweatshirt, a beanie, and a pair of hearty work pants. Bush pilots in Alaska are skilled and courageous, their offering of services second to none. Meanwhile, Austin and I were slow and lazy. We groggily rolled out of our short rest, rubbed our eyes open, and shuffled upstairs for some hot coffee. The luxurious nature of the lodge was, and remains, a funny contrast to where we were going. The lodge is in the same range, we were actually only 18 miles from basecamp!

"We just have to drive to the airstrip, it's a short drive.” I told Austin. I let my foot off the brake, let the truck roll down the 100-meter-long driveway and took a right. "Alright, we're here." I said. Austin, bewildered, replied, “Here? Like the plane lands right here?” I assured him this was the spot and less than five minutes later we watched Jesse come buzzing over the hills. Jesse came in hot, landing on the grassy gravel strip next to the highway and Austin couldn’t believe it. “He can just land right next to the highway?!” he asked laughing. “Yeah man, this is Alaska.” And off Austin went!

When it was my turn, we arrived at the Trident and Jesse opened the clamshell door on the right side of the plane and we turned left into a secondary branch coming off of the north face of Mount Moffit. The wind and cold rushed into the plane and we headed directly towards the imposing North Face. Sheltered in the shadows, it was a big and scary place, especially flying straight into it in a small 900lb (400kg) plane! We were now speeding close to the rock-covered glacier and I poked my head out the door to see basecamp.

“Look for the big rock. See it?!” Jesse said over the headset.
“Where?!” I couldn’t find it.
“Now! Drop it!!” Jesse exclaimed.

I waited too long to pull the bag off the wing strut. I swung my head back to look at it. BOOM!!!

"You missed it, didn't you?!" Jesse asked laughing.
“Yeah. It exploded. Those guys are not going to be happy with me.”

We both continued laughing and swung left again to organize another round. With my hand now stiff in the cold air and holding another bag on the bars that hold the wing, the open window and the mighty power of the Alaska Range in all directions, it was certainly the wild- est moment of my life so far. Shortly before noon, Jesse landed the plane on its full-sized Tundra tires. They are probably about two-and-a-half to three feet tall (just under 1 meter) and on the side of them they say “Alaskan Bushwheel”. Awesome. We made it baby!

We set off with light packs along the Tundra banks next to the Trident and then onto the glacier. About 3 miles (4.8 km) from basecamp, we stopped to rest and noted our last few minutes feeling the sun’s rays on our face. From now on, we would be in Moffit’s shadow until our departure. This time of year, the valley and its walls receive zero minutes of sun and the days are shorter by more than six minutes everyday. By the time we left, there would be over 45 fewer minutes of daylight. By the time we reached our bags, it was sunset. We set up and hunkered into our sleeping bags.

In the morning, we awoke lazy and lethargic. Slow to get ready, slow to make breakfast. The area we planned to climb was a wall to the left of the taller proper North Face and its summit was the Northeast ridge. We found a line we hoped to climb and put it into motion quickly, although it was unfortunately well past noon by now. We climbed until nightfall then decided to return to camp and try again another day. Over thin ice and compact rock, and small bent V-threads and short knife blades, we hit the cold and darkness and finally made it to basecamp in the middle of the night.

For the next two days we rested, anticipating a light storm during this time. Our basecamp was in an incredible location. What it lacked in comfort it certainly made up for in beauty. Without sun, camp life was a frigid and austere environment. Frost began to grow on every surface. Our tent bags, hardware, and gear were covered in white crystals. It was rather inhospitable. About fifty feet (fifteen meters) from our tents a small glacial pond had an iced-over surface a few inches thick. Upon learning of this pond we began throwing rocks at it to see how thick it was. Solid! Austin poked a small hole wide enough for an upright Nalgene and we now enjoyed the luxury of having water we did not need to make from snow.

Beyond camp, we were surrounded by views of stunning mountain features. Mount Moffit’s north face towered over the valley and its summit stood 8,000 feet (2438 m) above. In the center of the face, ‘Entropy Wall’ stood as proud as a castle. It is one of the most powerful looking walls any of us have ever seen. The large northeast and northwest shoulders of the mountain loomed over us on either side and the imposing cirque was frozen solid. Looking west the east faces of Mount Hayes rose over 6,500 feet (1981 m) from the glacier’s western branch. The twin summits of Mount Hayes were silhouetted in the evening with pink and gold light. They stood out from the horizon like large lighthouses; their faces shadowed in dark hues of blue and grey.

Looking north the Trident glacier bent around in a small icefall before disappearing from view below. The large tundra of inland Alaska was visible in the far distance and in its autumn form appeared as shades of tan and brown in rolling hills and benches. Smaller peaks stacked in an unbroken chain in front of Mount Hayes’ East Ridge blocked our view to the Northwest. The main flow of the Trident Glacier now protected us from any further areas. Long crevasses, one after another, formed even the flat ground. Rocks littered it and lateral moraines ran along its sides. At night the stars came out by the billion. Shoving our feet into our boots we would arise from the tent in puffy pants and parkas to stare skyward. Sometimes faint bands of aurora borealis hung to the north in a dull green. The milky way stretched from horizon to horizon.

The fire was high that morning and with over half the route already climbed and rigged with anchors for rappelling, we were confident in finishing it. Following our approach tracks up and down the rocky hills of the glacier and skirting benign crevasses, I looked up at the proper north face and knew I would return to try it. Our autumnal climbing inquiry had been a success regardless of if we finished our route today or not. I was already beginning to look at the range in a different way.

Regaining our highpoint on the route was mostly uneventful and a lot of fun. However, early on in the low snowy section of the route a crashing eruption shattered the valley’s silence. We looked across to see enormous blocks of ice calving from a high shelf some five to six thousand feet (1524-1828 m) above the valley floor. In a matter of seconds, the ice and snow cascade descended the steep wall. It wiped itself out onto the glacier below. Its plume of snow threw up a monstrous cloud that filled the entire valley. Our approach tracks were out of harm’s way. We all watched on humbly from our route. Though we had a low avalanche risk on that trip, large shelves naturally shed weight throughout the year and it is simply amazing to see them in operation.

Shortly after our previous highpoint we found the best pitch of the route. Alex had called dibs on it from the valley. He was stoked! It was a beautiful ribbon of steep ice falling down a rock slab from a high corner. It was so long that our sixty-meter ropes were insufficient, and I had to simultaneously climb them as Alex worked his way to the next available anchor. I was absolutely buried in snow for the first forty to sixty feet. Alex handed me his elevated mitts, then was off again traversing a steep snow ribbon and then onto moderate ice for another rope length. The last pitch was steep, scary snow. After one poor pin and one mediocre nut, I made it to the ridge crest. It was a knife-edge. On the other side, the world seemed to drop away. The messy icefall we had seen from the bush plane was below and radiated a deep blue under now grey skies. More exciting than that though, we had topped out the route!

Clouds were building but the weather was fine. It was bitterly cold. Remaining only a short time at the top of the route, we prepared to descend. Again, we rappelled together into the dark cold evening. By the time we reached the glacier below, we had hit seventeen times with two sixty-meter ropes. That is a long way!

We awoke in basecamp on October 14 to heavy snowfall ushering in an arctic depression. As far as I was concerned, it was the first day of winter. And we had climbed on the last day of autumn. Temperatures plummeted. Ice crystals coated the tents and our hardware. On the morning of the 15th, we filled and lashed our packs to maximum capacity and began the hike out. Our rather simple walkout was now covered by a half foot of fresh powder. With our heavy packs, we struggled to make pace on the miles of rocks on top of glacial ice. The hike was significantly more difficult than anything we had done on the trip so far. It continued to snow. We each broke a trekking pole, and in flat low light we bushwhacked our way across the bare, lumpy blue ice of the main branch of the Trident glacier, a seemingly blind crossing that challenged my several years of guiding on glaciers. Alas, we crossed it and now had access to the tundra, but at the cost of a full day and we were forced to camp when night seized the valley.

That night temperatures continued to plummet. We estimated it to be well below -20°F (28°C). When I awoke in the snow by the Trident Glacier Austin had the stove going and Alex was lying awake, headlamp on, staring at the ice crystals hanging from the tent ceiling. I rolled over, my face was damp and stiff, and an icy rime around my sleeping bag’s hood spilled into my eyes. I was super iced. We packed up camp and began our final, and much easier, hike to the now snow-covered airstrip. Just as we were about to feel the sun, after seven days in the shade, we rounded a corner and found an entire herd of moose blocking the way. There must have been over fifty. It was a surreal dream. We stood together, ice forming on our hoods from our breath, and watched them run up the alder-covered slopes and out of the way.

We flew out one by one. I was the last one. For forty-five minutes I was alone on the frozen tundra and the sun was throwing its rays over me. I ran in circles to stay warm and watched the moose look at me strangely from the slopes. I looked at the tall peaks and the shadowed north face of Mount Moffit. We all crave to live in the now, to be present. And for those forty-five minutes I was as present as I have ever been. My senses honed to the great power of Alaska. I thought about Alex and Austin, erupting into the Lodge with big smiles. They were drinking hot coffee and drying out, having a hot shower, and getting into clean clothes. The thought of my friends rejoicing was very pleasant. My stiff wind-burnt cheeks stretched from the strain as I smiled. Lo and behold, Jesse’s plane buzzed over the moraine and a few minutes later I was tucked in behind him on our way out. My hands were warm again, and now so was my spirit. Interestingly, in retrospect, the walkout experience was more memorable than the route itself. We learned so much more about ourselves in that final phase of the trip. With one last glance at the Trident, I knew I would be back in the spring. It was time to let winter set in.