Peak Bagger: August 2008

I have wanted to climb the Grand Teton ever since I met Amy. She had done it with her brothers the summer she worked in the Tetons before we were married. I felt this goal was a bit out of reach until I could find someone with the knowledge on how to get up there safely. So I kind of put it on the backburner until the opportunity came along. Well...a few weeks ago I get a call from my good brother in law, John. He says he knows someone that can guide us up the Grand and he asked me if I was in. Only thing is the date was about two weeks away. Without much hesitation I said I was in, but I said I better ask Amy. So Amy gave me the approval and I was definitely in. Our plan was to do a quick summit...leave at 9:00 the night before and plan to summit the next morning about 9 or 10. This would entail an all night hike. I wasn't sure about that, but hey if thats what it takes to get me to the top...great! We took off a bit earlier than planned, about 8:30ish. We took our time going up, after all we had all night. The first 3 or 4 hours of the hike were extremely enjoyable trudging along in the moonlight. We didn't even need to use our headlamps. It was the perfect temperature for hiking. We reached the first camping spot called the meadow probably about midnight and continued hiking until we were almost to the lower saddle. Probably 300 ft below the lower saddle we realized we were making better time than we had planned. We didn't want to get to the lower saddle to soon because that would mean spending several hours in the wind and cold that the lower saddle is notorious for. We really couldn't continue our ascension above the lower saddle until 4 or 5 in the morning because the route gets a bit more technical and we didn't want to summit in the dark. It was only about 2:00 at this point so we had a few hours to burn. We decided to try and get comfortable in some rocks we found below the lower saddle. This didn't work to well...after lying down for a few minutes we were all shivering. Kevin suggested we cuddle (we're all married adult men here right?)...John and I wanted nothing to do with that. So...Kevin had heard there was a way up the Middle Teton that didn't take that long...if we hurried we could get up the Middle and then get down in time to summit the Grand. We decided it was probably best to keep moving to stay warm. So we quickly made it to the lower saddle and headed in what we thought was the route to the Middle Teton. This route slowly got steeper and steeper. After not more than an hour of hiking we found ourselves going up stuff that was making me a bit nervous. Yes, I'll admit it...I was the chicken in the group. We finally came to a dead end. It was either climb down a sheer cliff to get to a spot that we could then climb up a sheer cliff. Needless to say that was an easy decision. We turned around and headed down. The down climb was pure torture to me. I don't do well hanging on cliffs in the dark. Kevin, our guide, really did a good job of helping me keep my head and we slowly worked our way down. We made it down to the lower saddle about 4:00 just as the lower saddle camps were starting to stir. We took off towards the upper saddle at about 4:30 following closely behind a guided group of about 20 people. We kept running into them and we realized this was an Exum guided group. Exum guides are considered the elite of the elite guides. At the upper saddle we were behind one group of about five people. The guide told us if we wanted to get ahead of them this was the time. They were roping up since this part of the climb gets fairly exposed. We were assured by Kevin that we could get up to the top without a rope. There was nothing to difficult to get up. He told me to just not look down and be sure on your holds. Needless to say, I was freaking a bit, but I tried to take his advice and not look down. This helped a lot. Kevin was right. There were not a lot of real hard climbing parts. There were good holds and good spots for your feet all the way to the top. It was just the mental part of knowing that if you did in fact fall it would not be pretty. I said quite a few prayers on that last part. I really wanted to see my wife and kids again. Well, we finally made it up. I was a few minutes ahead of John and Kevin. When I got there I was so full of emotion that I broke down and cried like a baby. I'm not sure if I was thankful to be alive after the harrowing ascent or if I was just happy to be there after so many years of dreaming about it. We were extremely cold as it was below freezing with the wind chill factor...we probably under packed when it came to warm gear. We spent 15 or 20 minutes on the top. While we were there the clouds moved in making it impossible to see the valley floor. Thankfully we got about 5 minutes before that happened. We were the only ones on the top and it was quite a feeling. We had one last problem. Our plan was to do this trip fast and light. Hence we didn't bring a rope. We brought harnesses, caribeaners and figure eights for rappeling, but no rope. Our intention was to bribe someone with a rope for a ride down the rappel. The problem was that we were the first ones up and we were probably several hours before anyone would be there with a rope. We really didn't want to sit in the frigid weather until someone came along with a rope. Well...our luck continued. On our descent to the spot where the rappel begins we ran into the Exum guided group. We talked to the female guide and she seemed a bit disgusted with us. She really didn't think we were very responsible relying on someone else for a rope. But, she was somewhat understanding of our plight. To try and downclimb the really exposed parts would be really dangerous. We had to do the rappel. After expressing her displeasure with our situation she reluctantly told us that she had a rope cached down near the rappel and that we could use it. We thanked her over and over again and quickly headed down to the rappel. Kevin went first to show us how it was done. I went next...as this was to be by far my longest rappel (about 150 feet) I was a bit nervous although I had comfort in knowing that for the first time this trip I had a rope on me. The rappel was actually quite fun after the initial step off of the edge. It was definitely an adrenaline rush.
Well the rest of the trip was quite uneventful and a bit anticlimatic after what we had been through. We descended with pretty good speed and got back to the car at about 1:00 or 2:00.
So, thats the story of our Grand Teton climb. Overall I am so glad I did it. I would do it again but I would definitely bring a rope next time. I think I need that sense of security. I would also bring an extra layer of clothing, a pair of gloves, and a wind and water proof shell. I think I would have been more comfortable at the top with this bit of extra gear. I am so thankful to John and Kevin for giving me this opportunity. It is always a good day when I am in the great outdoors living life to the fullest. It is extra good when you get the chance to experience it with others that share your same passions.