Getting rained off of the Liberty Bell Group led to the new key phrase that would define the rest of the trip: weather windows. The morning after our epic bail we drove from camp to Mazama in a light sprinkle of rain. Mazama isn’t so much a town as a general store/ gas station/ bakery next to an outdoor supply store, but it is a hub for those seeking adventure in the Eastern North Cascades. As the line for the counter would promise and our taste buds would attest, the bakery was top tier and the main reason climbing parties gathered in this spot on most mornings. As our group, and several others scattered around the outdoor picnic tables, devoured breakfast sandwiches, scones, or other baked goods, our guides were using the 1 bar of reception to check the weather forecasts. As they grimaced and groaned switching from one app to the next, the early morning coffee was reminding me of my cravings for another addictive chemical. I wandered away from the group into the general store with the slim but desperate hope there would be some form of nicotine. The store had the odd collection of items of the sort you find at the only gas station for miles around; handmade art, Mazama t-shirts, artisan foods, local raw honey. Behind the counter were a few brands of cigarettes… too obvious, there would be no way of masking the smell of smoke out here when my last shower had been a couple days ago now. Unless I could get my body odor smelling so foul…. No. I gave of any hope of alleviating my pain. And it was becoming acute. I could feel a level of tiredness and irritation in my eyes, my temper and patience were shortened. I had caught myself being a snappy asshole to my wife when she would ask innocent questions. I would have to come clean with her at some point just to apologize for my behavior on what was supposed to be a vacation. Fuck.

Why on earth did I decide to quit now? Oh yeah, because it was working. Because I couldn’t just wander over to the nearby Costco or CVS. I was cut off from the sources I relied upon to feed my addiction. I decided to satiate a less frowned upon addiction and grabbed a couple of Diet Dr. Peppers from the fridge. Carbonated, caffeinated, “sugar” water, you my only friend. Back outside, 3 of 5 weather forecasts were in agreement; Mt. Baker was getting hit with some shitty weather throughout the day. We would have to postpone heading up today, meaning we would be losing our day of on-glacier learning and practice. Not to mention our summit window had gone from two days to one. With the rain in the immediate area forecasted to not be much better, and no members of the group clamoring to have a repeat of the day prior, we stocked up on sandwiches and headed back to camp.

Not to let the day go completely to waste, our instructors decided to get creative and devise a crevasse rescue course in camp. This setup involved a truck bumper, a tatami ground mat, pickets, our ice axes, micro traxions, and helpless “victims”. As we each had the opportunity to sit in dirt and be rescued as ants crawled up our pants legs.

Honestly this method of learning crevasse rescue may have been the perfect way to introduce the concepts to beginners. There was no danger of having a catastrophic fuck up and dropping your partner into an actual crevasse. We were able to take our time because we weren’t standing around on a glacier freezing as we stood around waiting our turn. We were able to focus on the main ideas and work through setting up mechanically advantaged rescue systems, watching each other make mistakes, giving and receiving feedback. All without the added stress of real conditions. Obviously this wouldn’t be a replacement for practicing in snow and ice, but it laid an excellent foundation for further training and turned a day that could have been completely ruined by weather into one that still had value. As I am not an expert on the subject, I will not attempt to explain every step of crevasse rescue, and will instead link to the professionals at the end of this post for those interested in seeing how to rescue your rope buddy when they fall into the ice cracks.

We spent the rest of the day practicing rescues a few more times and going over rope systems for the 4 person teams we would be forming for travel on the glacier. Then we began prepping and packing. Tomorrow we were hiking up to base camp on Mt. Baker, weather be damned.

Crevasse rescue links: