The North Face of Athabasca



I had just finished a weekend of sport climbing in Skaha on the 8^th of May 2016 and was driving back to Calgary so I could catch my flight up north the next day in the early morning. As I was driving through the Rockies I was looking up at all the mountains dreaming of being on an alpine route again. I knew that the Columbia Icefields would be in condition if there were some good freezes, having heard from some friends who were out there two weeks ago. So I checked the forecast and there it was, freezes for a week straight. I texted my friend Alex so we could get to planning our next adventure, in previous outings together we have had long heinous slogs with little to no climbing, or short approaches with brilliant climbing. Alex is a fan of the slogs; I’m a fan of the climbing. So finding something that would appeal to both of us was the challenge.

Finally we settled on the objective of the North Face of Athabasca, a stunning wall of steepening ice which leads you to the final crux rock band at the top of the face. Forecasts were calling for snow midweek, but as long as it wasn’t a large amount the route would be in great shape. I nervously watched the expected snowfall during my work week; at times it was calling for up to 50cm, an amount that would surely cancel our plans. Some areas of the Rockies were hit hard with Yamnuska accumulating over 40cm, but in the icefields only around 15cm fell and with one day of heating before we headed out, anything dangerous would have sluffed off already. Everything was a go, so when I got back in Calgary on Friday evening, I rushed home, packed everything I needed in a flurry and was off to Alex’s place. A quick stop at Pizza 3000 and picking up 7 cliff bars, a pack of candy and some yogurt at Safeway, I had my fuel for the trip and we were off. A few naps later for me had Alex pulling into the trailhead just before 11:00PM, enough time to get a solid 4 hours of sleep before the climb, this made getting up early for my flights up north look like nothing.



3:00AM both of our alarms are going off in the car; this is my least favorite time of any alpine climb. I’m always nervous before a bigger climb and the early morning hours just don’t help. Alex drinks his homemade smoothies, while I put back my yogurt and one of my cliff bars. We were off at 3:30AM walking up the glacier tour bus road before it splits off to head towards our route. Now this is probably my favorite time of the morning; you’ve gotten over the early jitters, you’re awake, and the nervousness begins to go away being replaced by excitement. There was one other party ahead of us, we both reached the glacier at the same time, and luckily they were doing the Silverhorn route so nobody would be getting in each other’s way. Alex and I set off to the glacier first around 6:00AM breaking trail, Alex took the majority of the post holing lead as I was going to be the one leading the route. I’m still not sure who got it easier.

We eventually let the other party lead the post holing near the final crest before our routes split off, and at 8:00AM we were gearing up for the climb, we’d brought 8 ice Screws, a small rack from .5-2 camalots, a set of nuts and a couple pitons. I took everything but one ice screw just in case Alex needed it should I fall into a crevasse. What looked like a short distance to the bergschrund ended up taking forever as the snow deepened the closer we got to the face. At one point I would have described it as climbing sugar, I was using my knees, arms, tools, chest, anything to just struggle up one foot at a time. After way too much effort I was standing beneath the bergschrund trying to decipher a way to get over it and onto the climb. It took a lot of attempts, and some ski tourers who were at Silverhorn were probably wondering what the hell we were doing, but eventually we both managed to get established on the face and began climbing up.

We simul-climbed the entire ice face, hard crust snow coating the face made easy travelling so we solo’d everything but the last hundred feet where the snow disappeared, and tired calves made the idea of having some screws in sound like a good plan. We didn’t have much rope between us, so I was having to place ice screws during this last part more often than I would have liked, and ended up with only one screw at the very top to belay Alex up to me. I had forgotten to grab the extra screw off him once we had passed the bergschrund, something I was regretting at this point. Eventually we were both at the top, with only the crux rock band to go until we reached the summit ridge. We built a proper anchor with the screws Alex brought up, drank a little water, and started looking upwards deciphering which way to go. We scouted a line that went directly above us, it looked like the obvious weakness to attack. It was about 10:30AM at this time.

Off the Belay I placed a screw quickly just to make sure I didn’t fall onto the anchor and then was off. I charged up a short snow slope to the first rock band, it was a small little corner system. I managed to place a bomber pin at the bottom of the rock and started looking for ways to get established in the corner. I eventually found a weakness a couple meters left of the pin that would get me over this band and climbed up over it, struggling with the rope getting caught up in ledges I managed my way over the first band and was looking into the chimney system Alex and I were looking at from the belay.

I scraped away in the middle of the chimney, and there was a tight constriction that I slotted a nut in, it was a big solid one that gave me tons of confidence. I gingerly moved into the chimney, stemming on either side of it, using one tool in the center where there was a small runnel of ice and the other tool hooking on small ledges. Slowly I moved up continuing this patter, stem higher, find a tool placement in the runnel, try to find a secure hook, stand up. It became a game of nerves as I gained more and more height having not placed anything, at points the angle eased off but there still wasn’t gear. Finally after about fifteen meters of climbing I managed to find a great #2 placement. Inspired by this I stood up and kept going, foolishly thinking I was going to find more placements. I got back into my rhythm of climbing and continued slowly moving up. After a while I found another good rest, I must have been climbing for at least half an hour by this point, my calves were on fire from stemming and my arms were getting tired. Alex yelled up at me wondering what was taking so long, he was beginning to get cold, I yelled back “I’m really fucking scared” and went back to my rest. Apparently I stood there for five minutes. Eventually I got going again and found a #1 placement, my fourth piece in about fifty meters. I looked for more gear here hoping to build an anchor but there was nothing, so I continued upwards again. The chimney narrowed on the right side, so I had to jam my right boot in the ice runnel and stem with my left on the wall. Slowly I made delicate after delicate move, after a mind numbing twenty meter runout, again, I finally found a spot for an anchor and could rest. I looked at my watch and it was 12:05PM, I had been going for around 90 minutes.


Alex climbed up quickly, the safety of following the pitch had him loving every move, which looking back on I really did enjoy too. He took 15 minutes to climb what took me 90, but made sure I kept him on “the girlfriend belay”. At the top of the pitch he laughed saying he understood why I was so scared, no wonder it took me so long. We had a short little five meter section of rock to go then I was on the final fifty meters of snow slope to the summit ridge. The sun and safety of the last section had me whooping for joy as I climbed up. I gave Alex a body belay for the final section and soon we were both standing on the top taking summit selfies sometime around 1:00PM and looking at the incredible view eyeing new peaks to climb not even being down from our current one. On the descent I managed to leave my chest pocket open and lost my phone, I debated going backwards for a bit to find it, but tiredness won and we continued going down.

We got back to the car around 5:30PM tired and haggard, and changed into some more comfortable clothes and shoes. My mind was still numb from being on the sharp end the whole day, it matched Alex’s frost nip toes, but we came away with nothing too damaging in the end. A Wendy’s baconator with fries, along with a couple naps, led us back home to Calgary where I could sleep away comfortably, dreaming of my next climb.