Tantalus Range - Alpha Mountain: A journey to the center of pain

Squamish: sea level
Lake Lovely Water: 3937 ft
Alpha Mountain: 7562 ft
August 18, 2003

As I hurtled down the icy slope to my impending doom, my life did not flash before my eyes as expected. No…. And I didn’t think about my kids. Lord knows, I love them, but I’ve got lots of insurance and they’d be OK, they’ve got pictures. No, I didn’t think of those things. All I could think of, and I believe it was more of an intense inner howl in primal scream mode, was, ‘What the f*#%! Was I thinking? I want my mommy.’

But perhaps I should begin at the beginning. I am a city boy from Toronto and have never climbed a mountain. Not even close. I had mentioned to my friend Chris, a rabid outdoorsman, that I wouldn’t mind going for a hike with him some time. Kinda like the old ‘Let’s do lunch.’ Unfortunately, he took me seriously and called me at a stag on a Saturday night at 1am to invite me to hike Crown peak on the north shore the next morning. Coulda been the whiskey, might’ve been the gin, but….unbelievably, I said ‘Sure!’ There’s a trip report on that one that adequately describes the pain I endured.

However, all of the pain seems to melt away when you’re sitting on top of a mountain that you’ve just climbed. So when Chris asked me if I’d like to climb the Alpha and Serratus peaks of the Tantulus range in a couple of weeks, as we picnicked on Crown peak and ‘relaxed’, I brain farted and, to my great horror, said ‘Yes!’.

The days leading up to the trip were busy ones. Chris provided a list and even went so far as to shop with me for the many, many things that I needed. I believe if I totaled the receipts (which I don’t even want to think about doing) we could’ve gone to Hawaii.

I began to worry as I mentioned the trip to friends and they just looked at me as if I’d lost my mind. It didn’t help that every time I talked to Chris he’d offer a new morsel for me to chew on like ‘I haven’t worn crampons or used an ice axe before either.’ And then ‘Actually, this is the most technical climb I’ve done.’ SHIT Baby! This is my mentor, man!

I met the two other members two nights before we left for a bite to eat. Dave had cleverly developed a story about having to go to Calgary at the last minute, a plan that I had intended to use during dessert. But the bastard beat me to it during the appetizer. Brendan, however, was about as gung ho as could be. If I was a ripped, 22 year old rock climber, perhaps I would’ve felt the same way.

I demonstrated my inexperience quite early by offering to drive us up there. My city driven Range Rover will never forget the experience of screeching through the bush, paint chips flying, as we made our way to the edge of the mighty Squamish River.

We were assured by our man Friday, who would be taking across the river, that we could park on reserve land (Kodiak Adventures). He even had a parking spot taped out. Beware of these empty promises, my friends.

As we stood on the riverbank waiting for our passage the minutes passed. After 45 minutes we began to wonder. Suddenly, a boat pulled up. Was it our man? No. But it was a boat and we took it across the river, at half price actually. We were concerned that Mike might forget to pick us up on Sunday night but we didn’t care, the journey had begun.

The beginning of the hike is a bit of a bushwack. After that first short stretch, the remainder of the hike up to Lake Lovelywater is not too difficult and absolutely picturesque. The trail is very well defined and the first half is not too steep. The second half is a bitch though. Keeping you company along the way is the inappropriately named Lovelywater Creek. If this is a creek, I’m the Pope. The ‘creek’ thunders alongside the trail for long stretches and waterfalls abound. We stopped several times to take pictures and marvel at it. Stopping to sample the massive raspberries overgrown on the trail, all the while wondering where the bears were, oh yeah, make lots of noise.

We arrived at the ACC Tantalus Hut after about 4 ½ hours. The boys weren’t pushing it as they didn’t want to kill me too early. No, no, they wanted to watch me slowly expire. The Lake is stunning as the water is so clear, and so frickin’ cold. The supervisor let us use a campground pad for a few hours and we had a dip in the lake ate lunch with some new found friends (Doug and Rudy – both in their 60’s had come from the Red Tit Hut) and relaxed. Then it would be on to the Russian Army Basin to camp. For me, it literally was a dip as I found the water incredibly cold. The boys didn’t flinch as they dived off a cairn by the shore.

We met some good people at the Cabin (Tom and Kelly) while Doug offered us to row the length of the Lake and he would row back in order to save us the hike. We were ambivalent, but he was pretty insistent. Eventually we took him up on it. It wasn’t until the hike home, two days later, that we realized how much misery he’d saved us. The Lamda Lake trail is no easy feat.

As we came to the end of the cruise, the view was simply amazing. Around us in a large glacial bowl were a dozen or so waterfalls streaming down the shear mountainside, peak after peak (Alpha, Serratus, Dione, Red Tusk etc) the Crescent glacier looming above, Garibaldi in the distance from a much different vantage point. Mind boggling!

We disembarked and began the hike to the Russian Army Basin, which we thought would be a relatively easy one. Unfortunately, we shucked when we should’ve jived and ended up on a major bushwack. Thick stuff that was really unpleasant underfoot as rocks were hiding here, there and everywhere.

However, we made the Basin with an hour of daylight to spare. The Basin is a vast bench surrounded by peaks and glaciers. It is so named, I’m told, because it is so big, you could fit the Russian Army in it. They’d have a tough time camping there though, as we found only enough usable flat, soft ground for our two tents, and just barely, at that, as we had to clear the area.

The site was a good one though as it faced the Crescent glacier overhead that calved at hourly intervals. Waterfalls everywhere again. We spent the weekend listening to the crack and boom of the glacier.

We got the camp set up, had dinner, enjoyed the warm breeze and watched the stars. When we first saw Mars, out in the country without the light pollution, I thought it might be a flair, it was that bright. I almost had Chris convinced as well, but he was adamant it was Mars. The moon rose about an hour later, the darkness of night was now light up, we could see the glaciers and some of the peaks in the moonlight, brilliant place!!

As the ascent to Alpha Peak was a three hour trip, we were in no hurry in the morning. As we were finishing breakfast, Tom and Kelly who we’d seen at the Tantalus Hut, who’d flown in by chopper, came up over the rise to our site. They had no food or packs. They’d just gone for a walk and kept going, reinforcing our feelings that the hike from the Basin to the cabin was an easy one. Knowing what we know now, I can’t believe they just went for a stroll and completed that hike. It’s a bitch!

We set off at 11am feeling pretty good about the day. We were fresh and the sun was shining. However, after we made the initial ascent, clouds starting moving in and out. Route finding was becoming a challenge. Even with all the data we had, our initial goal of where the rappel was turned out to be off a little. All our decisions were based on info from Alpine Select, speaking with others at the Hut and other info garnered from maps, websites etc. Now we were exercising our route finding skills. We began a long traverse across the top of the mountain. The footing was loose shale and very treacherous. It was slow going, for me anyway.

The traverse ended at the foot of a snowfield. We dumped our packs on a large boulder at the bottom. Beside us was about 15 feet of a rock ledge and then a cliff. We left the packs in preparation for the last scramble to the peak. Crampons and ice axes were unleashed. As we were ascending the glacier I asked Chris if we would go over the cliff at the bottom if we fell. He said, ‘I think the rocks would break your fall.’ Very comforting.

We made the top of the snowfield, a climb of 70 yards or so, which had a 4 foot ledge of level snow. We then had to jump a moat from the snowfield to the mountain onto a 6 inch wide shelf. Nasty stuff. We took off the crampons and left them with the axes. We then had to scale a nearly vertical face to get to the peak, all considered class 4. It was slow and dangerous going. As I made it to the top, I was exultant….until Chris pointed to the peak about 600 more feet up.

The weather was coming and going, we were traveling light after leaving out packs at the snowfield. It was dicey, but the forecast was for good weather and it was moving in and out fast. The boys decided to give it a try and I said, thanks but no thanks. I told them I’d meet them at the foot of the snowfield. They disappeared up the trail.

I scaled down that shear cliff to the top of the snowfield. I tossed the crampons and ice axe (yes, I realize now I should’ve held onto that) onto the shelf of the glacier. I then made the jump over the moat to top of the snowfield. I landed and slipped hitting the ground hard. Half of my body was on the shelf with my feet and legs on the decline. I dug in hard with my fingers and toes. Time stood still.

Then slowly, gravity took over, I inched my way down the slope then began to pick up speed. Holy shit, hear we go!

As I hurtled down the icy slope to my impending doom, my life did not flash before my eyes as expected. No…. And I didn’t think about my kids. Lord knows, I love them, but I’ve got lots of insurance and they’d be OK, they’ve got pictures. No, I didn’t think of those things. All I could think of, and I believe it was more of an intense inner howl in primal scream mode, was, ‘What the f*#%! Was I thinking? I want my mommy.’

I focused on finding somewhere to land as I flew to the bottom. I made a last second jump and landed, standing, soaking and hyperventilating, on a boulder, one more of my lives having been spent.

I changed out of my soaking clothes and pondered lifes many mysteries as I waited for the boys to return.

And return they did. They had made the peak! It was socked in and, unfortunately, they couldn’t see much, but they had made it. The descent was pretty easy.

All in all, if the weather was good, this would have been a fairly simple, pleasurable hike and I’d recommend it.

The next day we set out for home. The trail was hard to find and we ended up being hemmed in by the start of the creek. So, yes, we had to ford the frickin’ thing. This was also a new experience for me and Chris found it pretty damn funny. It looked like it was waist high and 20 feet across, but Chris swears it was up to my knees and about 6 feet. Whatever, I wasn’t too happy about it.

We finally found the trail and as we warmed to the hike we realized how difficult this sucker was…..and we were going downhill. We lost the trail at one point and had to do some serious bushwhacking again. By now, I was used to it. We were about half way back to the Hut when Chris blew out his ankle. This was very bad news as the Lamda Lake hike was pretty steep and uneven and the hike from the Hut to the Squamish River was steeper.

Chris gamely sucked it up and hobbled through the pain. We had to rappel at one point, and it must’ve been excruciating for him. As we neared the Hut, Chris began to think that he would have to hitch a ride on the chopper if he was going to make it out. We knew a chopper was coming for the couple at 4pm so that was our goal. We made it with about 20 minutes to spare. And we were in luck, as there was a place for Chris on it (Chris says a BIG THANKS to Tom and Kelly!!!).

He choppered out and we were left with 3 hours to hike down to the river to catch our ride. Chris would find his way to the car and we’d meet there, turns out Tom and Kelly drove him down the same dirt road in a pimped out 300M. The hike out was brutal as there was no time for stops. It was full bore all the way and my quads were aching after the steep parts at the start.

However, we made it and Mike was waiting for us with a pop. Sweet! I was exhausted and happy to be nearing civilization.

Bad news when we reach the other side. I guess our original ride (Kodiak Adventures) across the river didn’t appreciate us leaving without him. Someone had taken a crap on my windshield, flattened one tire, and chain sawed several trees behind me. Nasty stuff!

Anyways, we cleaned the crap, changed the tire, and got Toby from the Squamish Peacekeepers out with logger Dave to remove the trees. That took another couple hours. Brutal. As they led the way out we were behind them and all of a sudden the truck was making a weird noise……..flat tire……shit! By the time we changed it was dark. Off to Wendy’s for some real food.

And that was that. Trip done and in the books. Though I was exhausted and every bone and muscle in my body was sore and on fire, I felt damn good. And, yes, I can’t wait til we do it again! Oh, did I mention there was lots o’ mosquitos?

Posse:
Dan C
Brendan B
Chris R

Words: DC
Pics: CR