Blind in Sasquatch Country
"Are my headlights off?" Bonk not-so-casually inquired.
"Uh, looks like it," I assessed, with a half-rolled "fatty" burrito in my hands.
"Jesus!" Bonk whined as he fumbled with every knob and lever within reach. We were on I-5 about fifteen minutes south of Tacoma, not very far along our way to Mount Saint Helens at around 9 pm. Finally he settled on just keeping the flashers on, as the brights wouldn't stay on either. We went like that for another five minutes before finding an exit. At a gas station we messed around under the hood by headlamp. The engineers Bonk and Nikita debated which fuse was to blame, and eventually tried enough combinations to decide that the bulbs themselves must be this issue. Maybe one had already been out, or maybe they both blew at once due to their identical wear. At least the brights would stay on now, so we took the backroads to an AutoZone, pissing off every passerby on our way. Swapping both bulbs did the trick, so we hit the road again.
I think we made the trailhead around 1:30 am. It was raining good, so setting up camp consisted of throwing our skis into the snowbank from the rocket box, and moving enough gear into the rocket box and the front seats for me to shimmy under the bunk in the back of Bonk's Tahoe while he and Nikita slept above. When I rolled over I had to squeeze my shoulders together a little, but other than that it was comfy enough. And when Bonk or Nikita rolled over I could see the supports of the platform wobble a lot. Engineers. At least there was more legroom than the back of my Tacoma.
Later that morning, after oatmeal, toasted bagels, and coffee we began our alpine start at 11 am sharp. and in five hours we were somewhere near our objective.
"I can't see shit," Bonk said.
"What do you want to look at shit for?" I cleverly countered.
According to Bonk's hand-held glowing screen, we were about 700 feet shy of the caldera rim of Mount Saint Helens, and I was seasick. The shit talking didn't help my gut. I imagined blindly skinning off the corniced rim, and wondered how fully I would evacuate my bowels before I hit the caldera floor. That's why I bought brown snowpants, right? Nope. Keep it together. Just keep tapping out ahead with the ski poles.
Nikita referred to the weather in a cleaner, sportier way, "We're really in the ping-pong ball now."
The rocks that had guided us for the previous couple thousand feet had dried up. There wasn't even a steady enough breeze to add to our sense of direction. Physical connection to the world was only along the surface which we could feel with our climbing skins and poles.
Now the slope was kicking back, as the guide book said it would, to around 35 degrees, a sign that we were definitely nearing the rim. That relief was countered by my knowledge that avalanches are common at 35 degrees.
Now that the slope was closer to my face I could make out some texture on the surface of the snow. Again this resulted in no net gain of confidence. As the visual information soothed my vertigo somewhat I also noticed that the snow surface was getting ripply, a sign of wind loading. And it was getting deeper.
We stuck together to keep each other in sight, but if something slid all three of us could be caught. My gut turned upon imagining an avalanche beacon search in this soup. Trying to safely ski down while keeping an eye on the beacon would be a trick.
So I cried uncle. No one else had any objections to turning around, as the weather windows we had seen lower on the mountain weren't showing any signs of reopening. As we transitioned to head downhill, the wind picked up, bringing heavy snow with it. Now it would be a race to follow our skin track back before it got filled in. And the visibility had dwindled to thirty feet.
"Let 'r buck," I sagely stated.
Bonk and Nikita lead the plunge, with Bonk watching the glowing screen and pointing Nikita this way and that. I followed with my compass and tried to make sure we were holding Bonk's bearings, eyes darting from Nikita to Bonk to the compass to the snow in front of me. I took my eyes off Nikita for a split-second and he was gone.
"Nakitaaaaaa! Fuck, did you see that?" Bonk asked.
"I didn't see him disappear, but it seemed quick. Did it look like a sudden drop to you?" I asked back.
"Yeah, his arms flew up like he fell straight down." Bonk said.
"Shit, Nakitaaaaaaaaaa! ARE YOU OK?!", I yelled, trying not to sound frantic.
We barely heard Nikita's reply, "I'm ok but I can't climb back up here, I'll traverse under until I find a good spot!".
So we kept yelling at intervals, trying to keep within range of Nikita, by moving parallel to the invisible cornice that separated us. Bonk and I had descended another couple hundred yards when we stopped hearing Nikita again, so we waited and kept yelling. Eventually we heard a holler back behind us and Nikita materialized from the fog thirty feet above us.
He regaled us with his tale of going airborne with no warning and falling a good 15 feet into the soft snow of the gully bottom. He then traversed under the cornice for roughly a hundred yards until he reached a point where it subsided enough to do a beached whale move back onto it. Then he was smart enough to pull out his avy beacon to find his way back to Bonk and I.
Similar cornice to what Nikita sent by surprise, but the next gully over.
We were all relieved but not quite into the woods yet. Rocks were still few and far between, and it took some strained staring to find and refind our up-tracks with every turn we took down. Real relief was provided by the final continuous rock spine that lead to the treeline. Then we could see well enough to make some big creamy turns past the highest tents. The next group of tents belonged to a group of snowshoers that we recognized haven passed pleasantries with on the way up. They asked us if we made it to the top. I said I didn't think so. Their plan was to leave at midnight to thread an alleged early morning weather window. We wished them luck and coasted back down to the parking lot for some well earned brats, beans and beer.
The next morning dawned wet again, but we still wanted to go for another lap. We made it back up to the lower rock spine and got some more mashed potato turns before piling back into the Tahoe. We stopped for more tortillas and I rolled up another half dozen fatties with our leftover beans and brats to keep us going on the trip home. Poetry in motion.