American Direct solo – Petit Dru

American Direct solo – Petit Dru

 
I finally managed to put my demons to rest.

The American direct solo has been an aim of mine for a few years after reading an account of Bonatti and his incredible efforts on this face.

It thwarted my efforts more than once, the first time due to bad weather, the second due to lack of balls and the third time due to equipment issues (forgotten crampons).

It all went quite smoothly apart from drifting off to sleep on the descent and missing collecting my girlfriend from the airport (sorry Ali but I thought it was a fairly good excuse) oh and the odd bit of falling rock.......

I climbed the route to the end of difficulties and used a rope on some of the pitches.

Alaska New Route

So...back on the sun soaked crag those 7 days of suffering on the snow plastered peaks of Alaska seems like a different life time.

It all started on the same sun soaked crag.

"Dave you fancy a trip to Alaska in a few weeks. My partner has just dropped out, I have loads of funding, loads of kit out there and there are loads of new route objectives to be done"

I was sold on the first sentence and drooling by the last.

The area is often referred to as the ‘Patagonia’ of Alaska with stunning granite spires clustered around a tight area of deep glacier valleys, and with more new route potential than you can shake a stick at it is an obvious expedition choice for any motivated climbers.

We arrived in Alaska after the usual airport shenanigans of Visa issues and overweight baggage and after being told multiple times that the bags were too heavy and fines must be paid. With our reaction of unpacking and putting clothing on, taking clothing off, putting boots on and filling pockets (repeat multiple times) resulted in the check in lady waving us on with the hope that the next unlucky passenger would be an easier target for her to get her claws into…

And so before we new it we were on our way to Talkeetna blurry eyed with a month’s worth of food and climbing kit to hopefully get us up whatever came our way.

Talkeetna is a great little town described as a ‘|Drinking town, with a climbing problem ‘and is the usual departure point for which to get a short flight into the mountains of many areas of the central Alaskan range.

As a result it’s a great place to catch up with many climbers at their final departure point into the mountains and that we did but after 5 days of socializing and drinking with twit I was starting to suffer and dream of an easy life in the mountains.

Unfortunately/fortunately for us our destination is in a rarely visited area of Alaska where reliable weather forecasts are hard to come by so with the risk of an unsuccessful flight blue skies and zero clouds were the order of the day and so we each day we waited, getting up before the pilots to show our keenness watched and chatted to climbers who came and went often flying in to climb the highest peak in north America or to climb some beautiful ice lines in the Ruth gorge and then ate and partied. After a couple of days we started thinking maybe another area might make more sense but luckily some of our friends who flew into the Ruth a few days previously were updating a blog from the glacier regularly so we new they were just sitting out storms and waiting for things to stabilize so we may as well do that in the comforts of the fair view in.

Eventually a semi window appeared, either that or the pilots at TAT were so fed up of us constantly badgering them (the previous night we actually slept in the main office ) that we were told we had 5 min to get all our kit together . We quickly squashed our loads of kit into the plane and off we went with our new best friend. The whole way there it was hit or miss. There was a lot of cloud and it seemed unlikely that we would be able to see the glacier never mind land on it and then finally at the last minute it cleared to reveal a beautiful sight of snow plastered peaks , snow laden glaciers and although it wasn’t ideal conditions and I can honestly say I wasn’t complaining the sight before us was up there as one of the most incredible views I have ever seen. A grown ups playground to pit our child like fantasies against.

A bit more research and money had gone into our toys compared to the bucket and spade that we needed for our childhood adventures but none the less we were equipped for any style of ascent and it’s just as well we were as with record snow falls in Alaska for the last 50 years combined with the last 5 days of snow storms to say things were from ideal would be the understatement f the year. The avalanche risk was un…. High and access to routes would be a long hard slog. My usual approach to peaks would be light and fast a system of packing everything you need for a safe multi day trip up a peak and then halving it and accepting that you just cannot stop. But in this environment twid's idea of ‘come on lad let’s just get strapped on something and suffer’ really paid off as whilst we were literally suffering our way inch by inch up this peak other parties were just getting totally shut down and coming back empty handed.

Our line ‘hard Arteries ‘named after the lads who joined us who had a interesting diet of blocks of butter, could no doubt be climbed in a very quick time in ideal conditions as a lot of the sections we were forced to aid(the art of placing gear and attaching a webbed ladder to it to make progress, so climbed gear rather than the rock, slow but sometimes the only way up) were beautiful soaring granite crack lines as good as any I have seen in the alps the majority could definitely be free climbed at around E2 and would be great fun but some of the overhanging bulges it difficult to say if they would go free.

The new route we climbed weighed in at ED, A3, Scottish V and had about 1000m of climbing on it.

The peak was the NW pillar on Middle Triple Peak, Kichatna Spires, Alaska

This was my first of hopefully many trips to the kichatna's

I would like to thank Mountain Equipment and DMM for their great kit. Mount Everest Foundation and the BMC for their massive help. TAT for their brave pilots, the roadhouse for their greasy spoons and the Fairview Inn for their fine ales and great music that kept us sane. Oh and twid for his bottomless enthusiasm and great story telling

　

Facts

Condor Airlines – www.condor.com

Do direct flights over Greenland from Germany. We actually landed in Anchorage earlier than we took off…

Accommodation – Anchorage

Talkeetna – TAT offer a free bunk house

But for more luxuries try the roadhouse

Rangers Station

Talkeetna Air Taxis – The best airline for flights onto the glaciers

Sat Phone – Opposite REI

REI –gear shop

Supermarket near REI


Piolet D'Or Nomination  -  http://www.pioletsdor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=265&Itemid=363&lang=en

http://dmmclimbing.com/news/2012/06/alaska-success-for-twid-turner-and-team/