Denali Journal: The Beginning of the Journey

Chillin' in front of the Beaver, our ride onto Denali.

 My goal in this is to share the story of Team Poutine's Climbing Expedition to climb Denali in the summer of 2011. I am using what I wrote in my journal as a frame-work upon which to build other thoughts and commentary. These entries will be posted on my blog with pictures to help illustrate the tale. I hope to use what I write here to prepare a book to share with friends and family and potentially write a “script” or “screen play” that I can compile our video footage and pictures from the climb into a homemade movie. I've got big dreams, but I guess it takes work to be a Renaissance Man.

Although I have been unable to help myself in editing some of the words in the journal, my attempt has been to type everything as I wrote it in my journal along the trip. I don't want to leave anything out as the journal really chronicles what I was going through mentally and emotionally through the climb.

The regular text comes directly from the journal, while italics indicates commentary that I have added while putting this together, several months removed from the expedition.

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Our carry-on luggage in the GPI airport. We got surprisingly more comments about getting on a plane in June with our ski boots than about our Poutingos...

Journal Entry No. 1

Location: Talkeetna Air Taxi “alternate” bunkhouse (they have a bunkhouse with a shower and a kitchen more in the town of Talkeetna, but we chose to stay closer to the airport where we wouldn't have to put up with climbers just coming off the mountain potentially celebrating into the night)

Organizing our gear in the Corwins' living room. They were very considerate to let us invade their home with our 'tons' of expedition gear.

June 15--We flew out of Kalispell yesterday afternoon following a frantic packing session/cleaning-the-house attempt/gear decision/friend-phone-calling morning. This in itself was riding on the tails of an all day gear-fest, prep day on Monday. I was raterh weary of making decisions about what shirt to bring, whether, or not to take an extra gadget or how in the world we were going to pack everything for the plane to Anchorage, then the drive to Talkeetna, the flight to the glacier, and finally our travels up the mountain.

Good friends and good food at the Moose's Tooth.

Regardless of all that we had a great trip up to Alaska, complete with a complimentary beer from the airline and the smiling faces of Ben and Katie Corwin greeting us at the Fred Stevens airport. The four of us , along with over 200 pounds of gear in four giant bags, crammed into the Corwins' jeep and set off for their apartment located in the “Baroness.” It was so much fun to see their humble abode! I hadn't seen either of them in a bout a year and a half. Both of them are awesome people, great friends, and fierce lovers of God. It is always inspiring to be around them. After dropping off the gear we cruised over to the Moose's Tooth restaurant for some local pizza and brews, both of which were fantastic.

Chatting with Matt, our shuttle driver to Talkeetna. Dad is going through a food bag with him. What you see is a five-day pile of grub, and a whole lot of grub it is as we find out later. 

I have a side note in my journal about how much I've flown this spring. This might be an understatement as I probably was in a flying contraption more this spring than I have been the last five years of my life. We rode in a helicopter to Fairy Meadows, I flew to Dallas for a wedding, flew to Denver for another, to Alaska on a jet, and then on and off the Kahiltna glacier in turboprops.

Last night I couldn't sleep. Not because of the futon I was sleeping on, or the close quarters to my dad, but because I was anxious about the upcoming trip onto Denali.

This was also my first experience with 24 hours of daylight. We were able to close the shades enough that it wasn't a problem to sleep but it was still startling when we came out of the restaurant around 10 in what seemed to me to be full daylight. We were even more amazed by this “Northern Phenomenon” while on the mountain, but more about that later.

Organizing gear at the airstrip in Talkeetna. We had to package everything in bags less than 80 pounds. I think this is the third time we've re-packed our stuff in the last two days!

The past couple of weeks have been a crazy roller coaster of emotions. You worry and fret over one aspect of the climb, get it settled in your mind, and then your confidence grows again...until you start worrying about another facet of the adventure. Crevasses? Yes. Altitude? You bet. Steep ice? Death on the Mountain? Small pack? Warm clothes with -30 degree weather? Everything.

Today was no different. Talking with Ben, to a drive with pseudo-guide and food delivery guy Matt to Talkeetna, to the Ranger briefing, to conversations with climbers fresh off the mountain has left my heart and mind dazed and confused.

It sounds like the lower glacier doesn't have very good conditions. Many climbers are falling in crevasses. I was braced and ready to be denied the summit by inclement weater up high but was not prepared to think about being turned away by the first segment. Still, I don't want to die. I don't want to fall in a crevasse. And I want to be able to climb for years to come.

Dad doing his best "Vanna White" showing off the pile that will fly with us onto the glacier.

We will make our decision when we get there, hoping and praying for cold weather and frozen snow. Right now I look forward to a good night's sleep and a beautiful flight in the morning.

I got a good night's sleep in the TAT bunkhouse, but we didn't fly out to the glacier until mid-morning. The weather didn't cooperate early for flying so we sat in stand-by mode for several hours with nothing to do except play with my kendama, tape pink flamingos to our wands, and worry about crevasses. We had everything packed for the flight in so we were stuck wearing our ski boots and glacier travel clothes, not uncomfortable, but not ideal for walking around the airstrip.

Killing time with the Kendama. It was an anxious couple of hours.

Flying from Talkeetna to the airstrip at Base Camp was pretty incredible. The landscape changes from rivers to swampy tundra to barren foothills to the mountains and glaciers of the Alaskan Range. I was surprised to see so many houses below that didn't seem to have any form of road to get to them. It would be much easier to travel around during the winter I'm sure. But how do they get supplies in the summer months?

The plane was a Beaver, and the flight in was only the two of us and the pilot. 

What struck me was just how BIG everything seemed to be in the mountains of Alaska! The peaks were more rugged and the glaciers were more vast than anything I've ever encountered before. And I probably thought the same thing when we flew into Fairy Meadows in British Columbia earlier this year. Your experiences make everything relative I suppose.

Thumbs up and all smiles!

A side glacier we viewed while flying in. We didn't have to cross anything that gnarly thank goodness.

The pilot dropped us off under blue skies and a harsh sun. With all the snow around to reflect the sun's intensity, combined with the altitude, Dad and I scrambled to get covered up and put sunscreen on our faces. We then piled our stuff in the sleds we chose from the pile at the air strip and skied down into camp.

Showing the plane we just rode in on at the landing strip of Base Camp. Another crew is packing their stuff and getting ready to fly out. They looked exhausted!