Climbers find passage to serenity
Mt. Jefferson provides respite
By JEFF PETERSEN
Of the Emerald
There was the sun, wind and big sky, and in
the middle of it all there was the mountain
Tons of rock, snow and ice anchored the
horizon and made man small
Central Oregon's Mt. Jefferson was big, im
mensely big.
Its 10,495-foot pinnacle poked at the hazy
evening sky, and gusts of wind buffeted the
mountain and the two men who stood and
stared. The men were wind-burnt, darkly
tanned and sticky with sweat. Fingers of wind
caressed their tangled hair.
One man — lean and sinewy and clad in
shorts — turned away from the mountain and
looked about He saw glacier-carved lakes and
ponds, beds of red and yellow flowers and
wind-sculptured groves of trees. On this par
ticular evening the wind was playing havoc. It
rushed in swift gusts through the narrow,
hanging valley of Jefferson Park, which was in
long shadows just north of Mt. Jefferson.
As the sun dipped lower in the west, wind
began to blow stronger. Soft yellow light
poured in from above and behind the men and
mixed with shadows, transforming the park in
to an eerie, inspirational, almost magical place.
Silhouettes took the stage.
The next morning the men would perform on
a stage of their own: Their stage would be the
hazardous, perilous and tricky Jeff Park
Glacier, which has been called one of the most
challenging snow routes in Oregon. If a route
up the glacier could be forged, the men would
continue clinbing until they reached the vol
canic remnanf's summit.
At ? a.m. they leave the tent's warmth and
comfort and scramble under the starlit sky
toward Mt, Jefferson's north face. Clouds of
steam issue into the night. The men s
breathing and the crunching snow underfoot
are the only sounds that break the silence An
hour slips by.
Above the timberline the men clamber over a
rock moraine — a gouge in the rock created by
the crawling glacier. A streak of yellow light
begins to illuminate the eastern horizon and,
although dimly, the grotesque monster — Jeff
Park Glacier — begins to take form. Rapid
thawing and freezing has changed the
glacier's face. What once was a smooth
complexioned child has now become a pocked
and pitted monster.
As the men struggle to attach crampons —
spikes that help the climber stick to ice — to
their boot-bottoms, a chilly breeze rushes off
the glacier and cuts to the bone. Tying into the
safety rope with numb and spasmodic fingers
becomes a painful activity.
Then come the first steps onto the ice.
Crampons crunch and ice axes jingle. One
man makes a roke and they laugh tensely.
A gaping crevasse intercepts the path, but
after some difficulty passage is made via a
"Bridge" of snow. The crevasse cuts far into
the glacier’s entrails: it is a “bottomless" blue
hole of dripping ice
Beyond the crevasse, a steep ice fall makes
climbing hazardous.
The men take turns leading pitches (one
pitch is a rope length of 150 feet) and belaying
(securing the safety rope in case of a fall).
Crampons barely bite into the strewn ice
blocks, and attempts to cut steps in the blue
ice prove futile
Upward movement comes to a grinding halt.
To the right is a maze of snow cracks, fractures
and splits. Because the way left looks more
docile, the climbers make a forced traverse in
that direction, moving off the hard ice onto
softer ice Here the ice is less steep, but steps
must still be cut because footing is
treacherous.
The lead climber strikes vigorously with his
ice axe, causing an ice sliver avalanche to
cascade on his belayer. Tiny cups are carved
and then stepped into with as many crampon
points as possible Making his way
methodically up the glacier, the lead climber
carves one step at a time.
Up ?00 steps, then up ?00 more - at each
step the crampon points gouge the ice Two
hours slide by Finally, the head of the glacier is
reached and the climbers can rest in relative
safety. Fallen rock from towering pinnacles lit
ters the snow. The climbers look at lake-dotted
Jefferson Park far below To the north, Mt.
Hood reigns over a sea of clouds.
At 9,000 feet the oxygen is much thinner.
Breath comes in shallow pants.
After a long rest, the climbers traverse on
crusty snow to the lower lip of a yawning
"bergschrund" — where the glacier's weight
has torn the ice body apart from the mountain,
leaving a chasm 50 yards long, 10 feet deep
and 40 feet across
Making a reconnaissance cneck or tne
bergschrund's west end. one climber is
startled to hear a sharp crack deep within the
ice under his feet. Unknowingly, he has ven
tured onto a cornice that hangs serenely over
1,000 feet of thin mountain air. The climber
carefully,quickly and quietly retreats to safety.
An airplane circles Mt. Jefferson and dips its
wings: the pilot swoops so close the climbers
can tell he is wearing sunglasses. They wel
come this intrusion because it breaks the ten
sion.
The airplane roars out of sight, its shadow
slipping silently across the grotesque icy ex
panse of Jeff Park Glacier. The sound of the
lonely wind returns. The wind is blowing sand
loose from a trio of nearby pinnacles.
One climber yodels. He has found a route to
negotate the bergschrund. "I think it will go,"
he says. They go for it.
Then there is the jump 10 feet down to the
crumbly red rock. After that up the loose, rocky
talus slope of glacial debris they scramble until
a snowy headwall is reached
Next is a scratch, claw and bite section of
vertical ice to an exit crack which leads up and
out of the snowy prison. The crack points to
freedom.
What a relief it is for the climbers to relax on
red saddle knowing that Jeff Park Glacier, the
grotesque monster, is behind them. Tension
and fatigue finally overwhelm the climbers'
bodies and they begin to shake and quiver —
withdrawal symptoms.
From red saddle a relatively easy scramble
r _ _
Photo by Dan Muir
The Jefferson Park Glacier in Central Oregon has been called one of the most challenging
snow routes in Oregon, and is on the trail to the summit of majestic Mt Jefferson.
traversing pink cliffs leads to the summit ridge
Climbing the summit pinnacle during summer
season is an easy as climbing a ladder to pick
apples, and at least as rewarding.
On top of the 10,495 foot pinnacle the
climbers lay back to enjoy the sun and wind.
Climbing Mt. Jefferson has not made the
mountain an inch smaller, but the climbers
have become bigger, immensely bigger They
wish they could stay among the gods forever,
but realize man is only a temporary visitor here.
Now they must go: they leave only footprints
that snow, sun and wind will soon erase: they
will be back.
—emu
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