Moment of Strewth

Requin - Couvercle - Trient

 legendary brunch squalor

The day that followed our Requin failure was a rest day. We surfaced late in the morning and brunched on the terrace outside the hut, exhibiting our legendary Brit squalor for all to see: Brits abroad were renowned for their filthy, unkempt, ragged, disorganised . . . why go on? Continentals, by contrast, were well-groomed, clean, tidy . . . ach well, see if we cared.

Requin hut to Couvercle hut and Moine

Brunch over, we headed down to the Mer de Glace, cautiously across it, and up again on the other side to the Couvercle hut, 8852ft. Cautiously because there were many sharpish ridges of ice with crevasses yawning on each side, our loaded rucksacks swinging to unbalance us; falling into a crevasse would be a seriously bad idea: it would attract a scornful cry of “Strewth!” from our Leader, even if it caused neither death nor injury. Had we looked around to admire the panorama we would have seen our old friend the Dru, away down the glacier, but most of the time we preferred to look straight ahead, keep the balance, avoid the strewth.

Moine summit, Mont Blanc on the horizon

From the Couvercle hut, the local hill, the Moine, 11104ft, proved to be the very doddle we had been looking for, to wipe the Requin failure from our memory: a lovely scramble, scarcely needing to be roped up for, and from the summit we could see all that pointy stuff we’d been wandering about on as we tried for the Requin, and the looming hulk of Mont Blanc, and a skyline just beyond which lay Italy and Entrèves, whither we were ultimately headed. If we were spared. Fingers crossed.

Down (still daylight, no abseil, no wee glacier, how relaxing), and an early bed; for there had to be a payment for a day of doddle, and its time came at 2 the next morning, as we tottered sleepily in the dark down the moraine rubble from the hut to the glacier. Came the gradual lightening through monochrome greys to the moment when colour springs into being and our progress became easier and faster.

Couvercle hut to Trient hut

Across the glacier, up to the col at 12461ft, down the other side, across the next glacier, up the Glacier du Chardonnet and onto the Col du ditto, 10902ft, where we dumped our heavy rucksacks, for we’d be back there after we’d sewn up the Aiguille d’Argentière.

Up the steep snow to the ridge we cut huge bucket steps (so that coming down would be easy and safe), and hearkened to the Wisdom of the Leader about jumping off the other side if our partner fell off the ridge; “yeah, yeah,” we mumbled, and started along the ridge towards the summit, not far away, concentrating on managing the rope and not tripping over it. For we were now at 12802ft and the altitude was biting, a numbness was on our brains, a headache behind the eyes blocked any appreciation of the multitudinous pointy bits heaving into view, and the wee fluffy clouds floating about, way down below, and the band of atmosphere above the far far curved horizon, and the near-black of the sky. We’d all read the climbing books, and knew that this was when folk made stupid mistakes, so we trod with caution and spoke not at all.

Aiguille d'Argentiere: near the summit

Recollecting that moment, it occurs to me that it’s the highest I’ve ever been (outside of an aircraft) in my whole life, but at the time I hardly appreciated it.

If we’d stayed up there, of course, we’d have acclimatised and the numbness would have gone away, but in our fuddled heads one idea was still clear: we must get down before the sun turned the snow to porridge, and so after just a brief moment on the summit, back along the ridge we toiled, and carefully, carefully down the huge bucket steps to the col, where our rucksacks awaited us, the headache receded and our brains gradually returned to normal.

Phew! That was the iffy bit behind us. The next bit would be just a steady grind, down onto the Glacier de Saleina, across to the Fenêtre de ditto (10719ft) through that window and on to the Plateau de Trient, at the far side of which lay the Trient hut (10433ft), food, drink, rest.

But even as we started, still roped together, weary yet confident, on the steep slope down to the glacier, the snow was turning to porridge beneath our feet; in moments, it had broken away beneath me, and I was accelerating  so fast that the ice-axe could not stop me, and I pulled the others with me, none of us able to get a purchase anywhere in the porridge.

At moments such as these, time slows down, doubtless to allow you to review the events of your life, and repent of your evil deeds. Instead of which, I found I was observing the rapid approach of a wide crevasse that ran at right-angles across our path, and recollecting the account in a book pressed on me by our Leader, of a sturdy mountaineer who had fallen into a crevasse, struggled for many days to escape, and ultimately perished.  Now, if ever, was a major strewth moment, and there was no obvious way to deflect it. Nearer and nearer drew the jaws of the crevasse, they gaped  . . . and were behind us . . . and we were travelling onwards, slowing, stopping. Such had been our speed, such the angle of the slope, we had leapt right across the crevasse.

Wordlessly, without even a faint phew, we sorted ourselves out, checked our gear, started the steady grind once more.

Which took us across the Glacier de Saleina, up to the Fenêtre, down the other side, on to the Plateau de Trient, a vast flat expanse across the other side of which we could see the hut, on a rise above the plateau, with a terrace, and people. And food and drink. And no doubt a bonny clean toilet, for this was now Switzerland.

So near. But the surface of the plateau was the kind of snow that is a firm crust until your full weight comes on it, whereupon it gives way, and you jolt down to knee level. Each step a major effort. And the hut never getting any nearer. On, jolt, on, jolt, on . . . beginning to have food fantasies, plod, plod . . . until, suddenly, there was the final little steep rise, the terrace, the hut.

Wearily we sat on the terrace wall, feebly we plucked at the ropes, whose knots had tightened so much during our porridge-slide that we could not undo them. And all of us desperate for a pee. A moment of strewth was imminent.

Cometh the hour, cometh the man: for from the assorted persons sculling about emerged the very pinnacle of English gentlemanhood: observing our dilemma, he approached and quietly, considerately, he undid the knots, murmured gently in response to our squeaks of gratitude, and let us get to the bonny clean Swiss toilet. This was the sort of English that you would hardly even notice you were being ruled by, far less resent it, and as I luxuriated in the bonny clean toilet I wondered what a climbing holiday would be like in the company of such a person. Strewth-free, without a doubt. And yet, how could a body cope with absolutely no abrasiveness, no insults at all? No, the culture of the English Gentleman was a fine thing, but the culture of the abrasive Scot was finer yet.

Meantime, a Swiss hut had its own rules, and one of them was No Cooking, You Pay For Food, We Cook It, so Mac, whose job was Swiss-speak, had organised a perfectly splendid giant omelette and actual real coffee.

Yum yum.