Projecting the Grand Central Couloir

It’s 1:45 AM and I’m firing up the stove to get some much needed coffee going. 15 minutes later with breakfast down, I make a short drive down the highway to a small pull-out, just north or the Icefields Parkway Centre by the Athabasca glacier, where Jacob is already waiting. Unlike myself, he opted to forego sleep all together and made the drive up from Canmore, leaving at 11:00PM. The project for the day is the Grand Central Couloir, located on the impressive North face of Mt. Kitchener. This is our second go on the route, after making an attempt about four years previously as a team of three with our good friend Russell. It was a big effort that despite being a failure resulted in a great adventure.

Optimistically, we discuss our timeline for the day and hope to be on the summit by 3:00 PM, as the forecast warns that we want to be off the face by the evening. The approach passes quickly, as we’re able to ski right from the car. Rockies scree is best served under a heavy covering of snow. Last time we made this journey we were shouldering heavy overnight packs, as we ground up the steep scree slopes. A few hours later we were heading up the toe of glacier with very bright full moon leading the way. Suddenly, a deep rumble shakes us from the monotony of walking in the snow. An immense amount of ice and snow has peeled off the overhanging seracs on the west side of the face. It’s a stark reminder of the seriousness of this place. The GCC weaves it’s way just off center of the face, out of reach from the most precarious seracs. Our primary concerns are the snow slopes immediately above the route and some interestingly perched snow mushrooms littering the face.

Just after 7:00AM and we’re at the start of the real climbing. We pull out the ropes start working our way up a few pitches of not to steep but ancient alpine ice. To our dismay, the winds are notably picking up and a steady flow of spindrift is now flowing down the upper pitches and into the couloir. Now over halfway up the face, with crux of the route being the next pitch to dispense of, we reason that it’s still sensible to continue. Jacob launches into the steep pitch of thin ice, referred to as the Blanchard/Doyle ice strip. A continuous flow of spindrift pours down the rock, making upward progress slow, but not unreasonable as the climbing is not too demanding. At about the half way point of this pitch, the spindrift is now starting to significantly intensify. Jacob does a fantastic job of finishing up the pitch, in sections where he is forced to climb by feel as looking up is simply not possible. I batten down the hatches and start to follow my way up. The relentless snow pouring down is rarely letting up now and I arrive at the belay with my inner hood completely caked in compressed snow. With the crux behind us, we have a brief chat about our current predicament. With conditions taking a bit of a nose dive, we consider retreating, but being relatively close to the top out now, we figure pushing onwards will have us off the face faster than descending. The next pitch should be straightforward up moderate terrain, where we hope the angle will kick back and get some reprieve from the torrent of snow blasting exfoliating our faces. I quickly grab the gear and take off, hoping to just grind it out. Unfortunately, the mountain had other plans. After getting 15 meters out from the belay, the force from the snow is starting to become too much. Upward progress feels impossible, so I retreat back to the belay. Aware that staying put and waiting things out with no shelter is not an option, we start drilling our first v-thread and thread the ropes to rappel.

Half a dozen rappels bring us back down into the less steep couloir proper. Thankfully, the winds have calmed and we’re able to relax on a decent platform we stomped out earlier in the day. With about 500 meters of steep snow beneath us, we opt to take advantage of the break in the weather and B-line it down. The decent passes quickly and soon we are back where we started. In stark contrast, our previous decent of this face took many hours, with us rappelling the entirety of the face through the night. It was interesting to notice how we both have developed as climbers in the time that has past since our first burn on this route years ago. On the walk back out to where we had stashed our skis, we immediately start to discuss when we would be able to return to this route, hopefully to get the send.

Projecting the Grand Central Couloir

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