Q Q Misha Gopaul climbs the last few metres to the summit of Grand Paradiso, Italy.


Q Ally Swinton nears the top of the NW face.


R The Chabod refuge at sunset.


seemed never even to have gone as far as the foot of the glacier.” Though Cowell no doubt exaggerated, with our current attitudes it’s hard to imagine there was an era when people were barely interested in this barren landscape above them. As Valentine and I slid our way up the path, I thought about why I was so keen to head back into the mountains just three weeks after being buried in an avalanche. What curious ideas they are that lead us to believe so desperately in some rock and ice that will never know anything of us, but can so easily take everything. My passion for the high mountains had suffered a severe blow, but I wanted to return to somewhere familiar to try and understand what had shifted inside my head. On every ski tour since the accident, aeroplanes passing overhead had made me start, and while crossing open snow slopes I had recurring ghost feelings that they were beginning to slide. The optimism of youth ended abruptly the instant I was buried upside down. As we reached a chalet in the woods, I remembered two years previously stopping to take a photo of it by moonlight in late autumn. On that occasion Masha Gordon and I had headed up to seize a narrow window of weather before a storm. Our approach in the early morning was laborious as we broke trail in knee- deep snow. The weather began to close in earlier than forecast as we rushed up the North-West face. By the time we reached the ridge, we were climbing in a maelstrom, and snow had begun falling with apocalyptic vigour. The descent down the Laveciäu Glacier was an anxious struggle to find a way through a labyrinth of partially-covered crevasses in a total white out. Though it had been foolhardy to set off with such a forecast, the subsequent feeling of elation and liberation after escaping unscathed almost seemed to justify the enterprise. That trip reminded me how perverse an enterprise like climbing mountains can be – setting oneself a dangerous trap only to revel in the subsequent escape.


The most joyful experience I’d had on the Gran Paradiso, however, was the first time I climbed the North-West face with good friends


Misha Gopaul and Ally Swinton in late August four years previously. We left Chamonix in the early morning and set off up the trail soon after dawn. We walked at a tremendous pace, spurred on by each others’ enthusiasm. We were soon sweating our way up the final slopes to the Chabod refuge in time for a quick coffee before setting off again. The sky was clear, and the glacier was in excellent condition. We roped up and carried on until we had crossed the rimaye.


"WHAT CURIOUS IDEAS THEY ARE THAT LEAD US TO BELIEVE SO DESPERATELY IN SOME ROCK AND ICE THAT WILL NEVER KNOW ANYTHING OF US, BUT CAN SO EASILY TAKE EVERYTHING."


Once on the face we liberated ourselves from the rope, and each climbed up in a different direction. The snow was perfect: a cold squeaky névé. I flicked my axes alternately into the snow as my feet carved small niches at each step. I moved up with a rhythmic punch - kick, kick - punch. Ally, full of curiosity, took a line off left towards the rocks, whilst Misha and I took a more traditional approach and climbed straight up. Halfway up the sun began to lift over the ridge, and light carved obliquely across the face. Ally climbed back to join us and then meandered far across to the right side of the face. I followed him, and we climbed up onto the rounded serac as it merged into the upper face. It seemed rare to have the freedom and time to follow whimsical interests on such a steep face. In just a couple of hours, we emerged jubilantly


onto the ridge and followed it to the summit. Yet, as Valentine and I ascended, the features of that summer landscape were barely recognisable, drifted and smoothed under metres of snow. Now, in the middle of winter, the landscape appeared sedated, yet contained in the vast depths of snow was so much potent and dynamic energy. To shuffle along under the sun, basking in the silence and the space, that was the simple, shared joy of mountaineering that I hoped would rekindle the fire and heal the wounds. We skinned out of the woods and met brilliant sunshine as the views opened out to the south and west. Cresting a rise, we saw the upper part of the mountain for the first time. With just a glance it became obvious that we wouldn’t be climbing the North-West Face: it had been entirely stripped of snow to


SUMMIT#90 | SUMMER 2018 | 57


ALL PHOTOS: BEN TIBBETTS.


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