Winter 2005

Skills Section: Staying Warm in the Cold
I always get asked the big question "Don't you get cold doing what you do?"

Well, I do—and pretty easily too. But I know that developing your own bag of tricks for how to cope in the cold, snow, wind, or rain can make or break a trip.

Learned well, your skills can eventually lead to longer trips into the backcountry, where you get to enjoy the many advantages of winter: there are far less people around, everything looks so beautiful covered in white, there are no trails (you get to forge them), and the hot cocoa tastes better.

Here are a few things I have found to be important in planning and preparing to head outside in the wintertime:

1. Do your homework. Thoroughly research where you are going (including distances, any side trips, etc), why (gauge your expectations), and for how long. You should also be getting ready both physically and mentally: talking to the pros, taking a class, doing lunges, working out with weights—it all helps. And have a plan B in case weather kicks in and you have to make a change.

2. Don't take anything brand new. On a long trip a small defect such as a poor fit in boots can make life miserable and may even be life-threatening. Use weekend and shorter trips to break in gear, figure out your own body's response to the cold, and get a handle on what layers you need to keep you warm.

3. Stay well hydrated. It’s hard to think you need lots of water when it’s cold outside but your body loses a lot of moisture through evaporative heat loss so drink, drink, drink. Take a thermos if you need to because a well-hydrated body makes for a warm one.

4. Eat all the time. On winter trips it’s no joke that lunch starts when breakfast ends and ends when dinner begins. Snacking all day ensures we have enough fuel for keeping our bodies warm. If you are cold at night, make sure that you have the right insulative padding under you, a hat on your head to prevent heat loss, and food in your belly to keep the fires stoked.

5. Have fun and go with the right attitude. Go into any trip with the attitude that anything can happen. Our minds are the only requirement for having fun so be flexible and remember the real reason you go winter camping is to enjoy the beauties and rewards this season in the outdoors brings.

Sunniva Sorby is a veteran of many outdoor and winter trips including a sierra ski traverse, a crossing of the Greenland icecap and two expeditions in the Antarctic. She lives in the SF bay area and when not working at Patagonia can be found mountain biking with the Wombats.

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Joshua Tree for Mortals
One of the great climbing areas of the US, approximately 250,000 climbers each year test their mettle on Joshua Tree’s Quartz Monzonite formations. But sometimes Josh’s notorious run outs or stout grades can make you wish you had nerves of steel or superhuman strength.

Fear Not! Here is a non-definitive route guide to Joshua tree for the Weekend Warrior.

Bolted Face Routes
Haven’t taken our anchoring class yet? Bolted climbs exist in Joshua Tree but, unlike sport climbing, require a little more nerve as the bolts can be more run out. Here are a handful of routes to get you started that provide adequate bolted protection and have anchors at the top.

Top Rope Areas
You know how to place protection and build anchors but are wary of the crowds on the popular top rope areas such as the Thin Wall, Trashcan Rock, Atlantis and Echo Rock. Next time, try these areas for a variety of climbs:

Warm and Sheltered Areas for Cold and Windy Days
Winter in Joshua Tree can sometimes bring strong winds to the desert. Here’s where to go to stay warmer:

There are a number of guidebooks and online resources that can help you as well—a little research will open a new world of Joshua Tree climbing to you. Our rock climbing courses listed in this newsletter can also help improve your skills and if you’re really in a jam about where to go for your next trip, call our office at 877.4WildOut (877.494.5368).

Note: Climbing is dangerous. Know your limits and climb at your own risk.

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Staff Adventures: Denali Insights
by Jackie Paulson

“The ambitious climb high and perilous stairs, and never care how to come down; the desire of rising hath swallowed up their fear of a fall.” — Thomas Adams

I heard the rumble, low and steady, as I lay in my bag, trying not to move. Even the slightest shift in position would cause the hard-earned hot air enveloping my exhausted body to stealthily escape past the draft collar on my sleeping bag. It took one hour, two Snickers bars and a Peppermint Patty to warm it up in the first place.

We’d been five hours up the headwall, a forty-five to fifty degree wall of snow and ice, wallowing through knee-deep new powder only to top out on the West Buttress of Mt. McKinley to thirty-five mile per hour winds laden with snow. In the time it took to remove my gloves, strip off my shell jacket and add another fleece pullover, my fingers became numb and stiff and my tent mate had frozen parts more, uh, let’s say “equatorial”!

The wind continued to punish and despite our hard-earned progress, painstakingly working our way up the headwall on the frozen fixed lines clotted with snow and ice, nobody needed a Magic Eight Ball to see what would happen next. Reluctantly, with no hope of continuing along the exposed ridgeline in that weather and no place to dig in for the night, we clipped into the rigid fixed lines and began the tedious descent to our previous camp at 14,000 feet.

Demoralized and dejected, everyone on the team had crawled into our respective tents after a little hot food and collapsed. I lay there wondering if anyone else had heard the avalanche. Then I spent some time contemplating what compelled me to sign up for days like this! At last the heavy, muffling curtain of sleep descended and I thought no more of climbing or crevasses or freezing or sliding snow.

The view from the pit toilet the next morning showed a huge slab avalanche had indeed cleaned out the upper headwall, coursing down beside the fixed lines, then covering several rope lengths of the makeshift trail we had used just hours before. My mind played out the catastrophic possibilities we had narrowly avoided. “What the hell am I doing here on this ill-humored ice cream cone?” I wondered, shaking my head for no one else’s benefit. Something more significant than chance had called me to this high place. Surely there was some underlying compulsion deep within my psyche, hidden and unexpected as a crocodile in the high grass on a riverbank, and probably just as dangerous.

I returned to camp and stepped down into our little snow kitchen, poured a mug of hot water for my tea and sat down next to Phil Ershler, our team leader, where he stood holding a frying pan, sizzling and popping with bacon grease, over the burner. He handed each of us a bacon topped bagel and the sleepy kitchen was silent but for the stove. No one wanted to talk about the avalanche.

My teammates with the exception of Phil had been mere strangers just over a week ago when we met in the Anchorage airport. We stood around the baggage carousel making pleasant conversation and eyeing each other surreptitiously when we got the chance. Pete and Ben had climbed together previously, and Adam had worked with Phil before, but on the lower Kahiltna glacier a metamorphosis had begun. We traveled roped together in two teams to avoid a crevasse fall. Pulling heavy loads of supplies in plastic toboggans, we had steadily made our way over snow bridges concealing deep holes and cracks in the glacier, adjusting to one another’s pace and righting each other’s overturned sleds every day from our first steps away from Denali base camp at 7,200 feet to our present camp at 14,000 feet in Genet Basin. Now we were one interdependent snow shoeing, sled dragging, pack carrying, load hauling entity.

Sitting there in the relative comfort of the “kitchen”, the sun slowly heating the reflective confines of Genet Basin, none of us could know what was ahead. No one knew that before Ben, Phil and I would stand on the summit in a frozen white out, we would have suffered the untimely abandonment of a team member and spent two days pinned down by a storm at high camp with 80 miles per hour winds. We didn’t know we’d face a difficult descent from high camp across the “cat walk” portion of the buttress, our packs overloaded with Pete’s discarded gear, or that Ben would self-arrest on the lip of a crevasse on the lower glacier, feet dangling over the giant concealed crack.

I didn’t know at the time that the question pending quietly at the edge of my consciousness would answer itself in the days to come on the barren splendor of that mountain. I couldn’t have known that the force drawing me then and drawing me even now to the frozen heights of mountains everywhere is none other than man’s ageless, timeless, universal need to conquer. Often misidentified, it is the need to conquer not the mountain, but to conquer the self. It is the desire to expand and redefine personal boundaries of tolerance and fortitude. It is the challenge of overcoming fear by learning to function effectively in its midst. It is the tedious process of unifying a diverse group of humans often through personal sacrifice and compromise to achieve a common goal. It is the call to remain ever humbled by the forces of nature even while occasionally standing victoriously on a summit. This is the answer. This is why I climb.

After breakfast Phil declared a rest day and Ben, Adam and I decided to walk to the edge of the basin for a closer look at Mt. Hunter and the routes on the West Rib of our mountain. The headwall would have to wait. We roped up and walked for about fifteen minutes until it was clear we were approaching a precipitous viewpoint. Mt. Hunter rose just above eye level from the North East Fork of the Kahiltna Glacier several thousand feet below us. The glistening river of ice stretched out as far as our view would allow toward the soft green and brown patches of tundra on the horizon.

The azure sky hung in great contrast to the glacier below and the three of us stood in silent awe of the mighty Alaska Range. The sun warmed our faces as we laughed, tossed snowballs and posed for each other’s cameras. Yesterday’s events, the treachery of the headwall, the avalanche, the close call with frostbite all seemed to soften and melt away with the warmth of the afternoon. There, rapt in the serene beauty of Denali I put off thoughts of why I had come and thought only of the great fortune I had to be alive that day, that moment on that mountain.

Jackie Paulson joined the staff of Wilderness Outings in 2001 after working as a Deputy District Attorney in Los Angeles County. She has been a life long backpacker and outdoor enthusiast and continues to pursue skills in her latest passion, alpine climbing. She is currently writing a book entitled "On the way to the Summit: Life Lessons Learned on the Mountains of the World."

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Upcoming Courses
Check out our new 2005 course offerings in Rock Climbing , Backpacking , Parent N’Kids , Navigation , and First Aid .

> Winter Camping: 3/5-6, 4/2-3
> Beginning Rock Climbing: 1/22, 2/5, 2/12, 2/19, 3/12
> Anchor Skills: 1/29, 2/26, 3/19

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