Capitol Punishment (con)

Within an hour the stars disappeared and it began to snow. Not to worry, after all the weather forecast was for partly cloudy skies-no call for snow. Surely this would not last. Sadly it did. There were only brief respites from the white stuff for the remainder of the climb. The snow was with us for the duration.

Keeping to our well-laid track from the previous day we reached Moon Lake in four hours, forty-five minutes-a full hour and a half faster than the day before. The best thing about our strategy of packing the trail the day before lay in being able to hike quickly and with no route finding time wasting in the pre-dawn hours.

It was close to 9 A.M. when we had assembled our gear for the push beyond Moon Lake. The snow continued with only brief letups. Moving first around the right side of the lake we went left around a prominent buttress then up a steep snow slope to the basin below Daly Pass-the route from the other side via Capitol Creek. Now we were all on familiar ground. Winding first left up the valley the route then bends right and climbs steadily up the slopes of K2. Stopping for a short pause to replenish with energy bars, finishing before Jonathan and Bill I started up with Laila directly behind. Occasionally, glimpses of K2's summit tantalized through the misty veil.

Nearing K2's summit the ridgeline narrowed until the exposure on either side dropped off hundreds of feet. Sam whined, then retreated a hundred feet to await the outcome of these foolish human endeavors. On a narrow snow ledge we began the arduous task of donning crampons. I struggled with Laila's strap-on crampons in high-altitude befuddlement and stinging cold. We broke out the rope for protection. By the time we had prepared to continue it was well past 1 P.M. Jonathan belayed Bill up one short pitch where he established an ice ax belay point and brought up Laila. I followed closely behind tied into the same rope. When Bill greeted me with "Laila says she's cold and it's only going to get worse up here…" I immediately made the decision for Laila and I to turn around. With the daylight hours shrinking rapidly I knew that with all four of us on one rope the likelihood of all of us reaching the summit was dim. Down climbing to Jonathan I wished him and Bill luck and asked, "What's your turn around time?" The last thing they wanted was to still be on the knife-ridge after nightfall.

After another 20 minutes of exchanging crampons for snowshoes Laila and I started for Moon Lake and the long trek back. I glanced back for a last image of Jonathan dancing in place to keep warm as he belayed Bill from below. I thought they are going too slow. They won't make it at that rate.

Jonathan reported the rest of their ascent as follows:

"On the first lead I had some route-finding problems and ended up climbing to the top of K2 thinking it was the ridge. I was forced to back track and drop down on steep snow to circumvent K2 and gain the ridge proper.

"The weather was becoming increasingly worse. Blizzard conditions at times prevented us from seeing more than 20 feet in either direction.

"The knife-edge ridge was much more technical than I expected. Sheer drop offs on either side described it. The east side featured a several thousand-foot drop; the west side a mere thousand feet. The snow was unstable. Kicking steps triggered small spindrift avalanches off the face. Cornices were a big threat. Had to be careful to look on both sides of the ridge to make sure you weren't going to step through a cornice into oblivion. The climbing alternated from kicking steps on either side of the ridge, straddling the ridge, and dry tooling rock. I definitely wish that I had brought some rock gear. The pickets were sketchy at best. Additionally, we had so few of them (three) that we were forced to belay with only our ice axes as protection.

"On the next lead Bill kicked steps on the east side and on the top of the ridge. The weather would clear for a moment exposing tantalizing glimpses of the summit in the distance. "This is intense crap" was said more than a few times by both of us. The following lead was mixed rock and snow climbing over a small pinnacle and some more airy ridge climbing. On the next pitch Bill continued ridge climbing with a scary section of mixed rock and snow. At that point I looked at my watch and it read 3:30. We both decided it would take at least another 1:30 to summit and another couple hours to climb back across the ridge. This would leave us on the ridge after dark. This we were not willing to risk.

"On the way back across the ridge, we retraced our steps continuing to protect ourselves as best as possible under the conditions and with our minimal gear.

"At the end of the ridge proper as I belayed Bill towards me I reached back to steady myself against the snow behind me. BOOM! A large piece of cornice broke and fell from beneath my hand! As it tumbled down the East face for thousands of feet I lunged forward to avoid going down with it. Wow! That was close.

"We soon reached the spot where we had left our packs, which ended the technical section of the climb. The weather had become worse and I had a tough time
keeping my hands warm. My goggles had fogged up and I had to choose between keeping the snow out of my eyes and being able to see to get off the mountain.
With another foot of snow since we had begun climbing the ridge our tracks had disappeared from existence. We continued down to find our tracks shortly before reaching Moon Lake. Arriving at our stash and feeling extremely dehydrated I guzzled as much slush as I could."

Stay tuned for next year's attempt! We will keep trying until we get the deed completed!

New lessons learned: (1) bring two ropes (2) more rock gear for protection (3) start at midnight (4) build in at least one more "weather day"