Mount Assiniboine
How do I begin this trip report? I’m sitting here typing and wondering. OK, well, this was one that appealed to me once it was mentioned by Robert Meshew. “Fred Beckey wants to climb Assiniboine. Let’s go with him”, he said. “Yeah, of course!”, I emphatically replied, thinking what an opportunity. Ultimately, the Meshew wasn’t able to go; a new baby kept him close to home. So, I found myself driving out on July 22nd alone with Beckey. I knew this would be a memorable experience one way or another. Heck, at the minimum, I’d be spending around 20 hours in the car with Fred. The first day, we planned to drive out to Canmore where we’d sleep at a campground the Fred knew about. The next day, we’d catch the helicopter to the Assiniboine Lodge (beats the 20km hike) and then plan our climb then.
What struck me about Fred right away was his packing, or lackthereof. My main climbing partners (Robert, Aidan, and Michael) are such excellent packers. I had become accustomed to small packs filled with only the minimal amount of gear to get the job done. Fred had easily three times as much stuff as me. Of course, he wouldn’t use it all, but it was coming with us. We jammed it into the back of my little car and headed out to Canada with passports in hand.
“I hate the road from Bellingham to Sumas! It’s terrible”, griped Fred. He doesn’t like the sharp turns, the deep ditches on either side, and the trucks. To Fred, this stretch of highway is often the crux. I’d always enjoyed it though, even the pungent smell of the farm animals. Without too much hassle from the Canadian customs agent, we were in Canada. I was especially excited to see new mountains. I’d not been beyond Chiliwack. Today, I’d be seeing two new big ranges: the Selkirks and the Canadian Rockies.
The drive to Kamloops was a feast of eye candy as well; Yak Peak is an impressive dome of granite. It would be great to go there one day. Kamloops itself was a sweltering place. We stopped at some restaurant whose name I forget where Fred got a piece of apple pie and started trying to woo the young waitresses.
Beyond Kamloops, there’s a long stretch of Trans-Canada highway that leads to the Selkirks. I must admit the arriving in the Selkirks was exciting. To me, they appeared to be a bigger version of the Cascades. Most of the mountains were a beautiful dark rock and, with the dark forests below, the place seemed to be enchanted or haunted. I asked Fred how the brush compared to the Cascades. “Oh, it’s worse!”, he replied. On top of that, the Selkirks have even fewer trails than the Cascades, which are not known for their extensive trail systems like the Rockies. Regardless, I must come back and at least try the easy approaches. Rogers Pass held a feast of beautiful peaks. The the north, the Hermit Peak area looked especially enticing, complete with a huge waterfall pouring down from the glaciers. After starting the discussion of brush, Fred often would point to some horrendous brush slope and comically say, “There’s a good slope to tell Roper about! I think he likes it! He can have it!” I got a kick out of those quotes.
Another long stretch of road lead to the Canadian Rockies, which look very similar, no surprise, to the Colorado Rockies, with certain exceptional peaks: Temple (wow!), Victoria, and, of course, Assiniboine. But, it would be a while before we we’d see Assiniboine. We stopped in Banff for another sit down meal. No fast food this trip.
Just a few minutes down the road was Canmore. I was looking forward to resting in a quiet campground. Well, that’s how Fred described it, but I was a little suspicious when he mentioned there was a McDonalds across the street. We pulled in, just off the highway, to the campground. It was loaded with tents. It was super hot, and the sun had almost set; it wouldn’t be a nice cool night. It was right next to the highway and, on top of that, it was next to a train track. OK, not much sleep for me tonight. We at least found a place behind the fence that was officially on the Visitor Center’s property. It was hot enough where it was uncomfortable to be in the sleeping back, but staying outside subjected me to the bugs. The heat didn’t stop Fred; somehow he completely vanished inside his sleeping bag. Between the semis down-shifting as they approached Canmore and the trains that roared by in the night, I didn’t sleep terribly well. I woke up well before Fred. Since we weren’t on a tight schedule, I didn’t bother waking him and spent my time wandering around and reading material at the Visitor Center. I think around 8:30 or so we were on our way. Well, first we went to MacDonalds, but that was too crowded, so we went to a donut place. Then we went to the grocery store. So many places! I bought just enough to see me through the climb. I got a kick out of the stuff that Fred was buying, like a big block of cheese. He asked me if he should get any butter. “Butter?”, I thought, “Why does he want to buy butter??” Well, I decided to be a little assertive with the legend and totally opposed the purchase of butter, citing that it would melt before we even got on the chopper! Thankfully, he didn’t buy the butter, but the cheese was nearly curdled by the time we got to the Assiniboine campground.
The signs leading out of Canmore to the Assiniboine area weren’t terribly clear and somehow no one in the town knew where it was! Fred and I were baffled. We decided to follow the most prominent roads that led in the direction we wanted to go. Well, that worked just fine and we were soon on the long long dirt road that led us to the dusty parking lot where the chopper would come to pick us up. By this point, a few people had already recognized Fred. One person asked, “Are you Fred Beckey? I’ve read a lot about you.” To which Fred humbly replied, “It’s all bullshit!” By this point, you, dear reader, may be getting the impression that Fred Beckey is a cantankerous old climber. Not so at all, he was quite friendly with everyone he ran into. I think Fred was a little impatient with this person because we were still trying to find where the helicopter pickup spot was. Fred’s actually a humble guy and does more asking about those he meets than the other way around.
We spent some time packing up, then hiked a shorter distance down the road where the chopper would pick us up. We were one of the first to arrive and several more folks arrived after us. I think we were on the second or third ride out. The ride was quick, under 15 minutes easily, but it passed in what seemed like two minutes. The famous view of Assiniboine emerged suddenly and is dramatic. Assiniboine is by far the most impressive peak in the area and I just viewing raised my excitement to climb it.
We arrived to a group of friendly folk at the little Assiniboine Lodge. We assumed there would be many climbers here, but most of the people here were staying just to hike around and enjoy the scenery and food. We did find a single French Canadian climber who spoke no English. Fred tried asking him about the conditions but didn’t get far. I hoped the climber spoke Spanish. Nope, just French. I did discern that crampons were required and, more frighteningly, ice screws. That wasn’t a good sign. I told Fred about the crampons, but mysteriously kept quiet about the ice screws. I supposed I was a little skeptical and didn’t want to spoil our enthusiasm since we didn’t have ice screws. According to the staff at the lodge, only one team, a party of two Scotsmen, had climbed the mountain this year. And there was a party of five women up there now.
We hung out for a long time on the porch of the lodge, meeting various members of the staff, all of whom knew of Fred, but, before meeting, weren’t sure it was really him that was visiting because someone had taken down his name for the helicopter reservation as “Fred Brecky”. I used a small telescope to peer at Assiniboine. I couldn’t make out that much detail. It looked steep, but it didn’t look that icy. After a couple of hours on the porch, we decided to pack up and head out to the campground. Fred’s pack was bulky and much bigger than mine, even though I was carrying the tent, the rope, and the rack. Curiously, he packed his sleeping bag at the top of his pack.
Fred was a little slow along the trail and stopped every now and then to rest. His back was bothering him too. “I need a new back!”, he’d frequently remark. I used the extra time to wander down to the shores of Magog Lake and wander around. Surprisingly, the lake was very warm, totally swimmable! We continued on the relatively short distance to the campground, found a spot, and set up. Later on, a group of Canadians (Mike Nash, author of Exploring Prince George and party) walked by and remarked how refreshing a dip in Sunburst Lake was. Being only 10 minutes up the trail, I decided to head out just a little before sunset. I took a quick dip from the isolated shores and then dried off as the sun dropped behind the ridge to the west. From here, Assiniboine shows off it’s steepness proudly and towers over the valley.
Back at the camp, Fred had dinner almost ready to be cooked. Mine was a boring ole Chili Mac (which didn’t agree with me completely) and Fred’s was mashed potatoes with melted cheese and salami. “I have to eat this cheese fast! It’s almost ruinied!”, he said. I thought back to Fred wanting to buy butter. I tried to eat as much as I could, but I just wasn’t that hungry. We went to bed under a nice sky. Fred was sleeping outside. I decided to sleep inside the Beta Light and fell asleep fast.
Around 4am, I noticed the wind had significantly picked up. I listened more intently expecting to hear raindrops. Sure enough, they started to come – intermittent, but big wet drops. I decided to get up and move all the gear inside the tent. Barefooted with headlamp donned, I zipped around camp and picked up most of Fred’s stuff scattered about and stuffed it under the Beta Light. Fred poked his head up and I exhorted, “You better get in the tent, Fred. It’s starting to rain.” By this time, I had everything in the tent. The rain was coming down harder and I escaped into the tent. “Where’s the entrance?!?”, yelled Fred through the wind. There’s only one entrance to that tent and I noticed Fred was pulling at the wrong side! Now, the Beta Light is a super lightweight tent that has no floor or poles. You use your trekking poles to hold it up. I could just see the whole thing come tumbling down with Fred pulling up the stakes. “Over here! The other side!!” I found myself yelling much louder than normal; the wind and rain had continued to increase. Fred came around and squeezed into his side and was surprisingly quickly in his bag and asleep. I slept well the rest of the early morning hours despite a very hard rainstorm. It poured for an hour or two it seemed like. The wind didn’t start relenting until 6 or 7am. I emerged around 8am to a beautiful day. Most everyone else, including Fred, stayed inside until at least 9am. The ground around us was wet, but dried fast. We weren’t in a hurry and took a long time to pack up and head out. In the mean time, many folks came down to meet Fred and talk to him, and we were both happy to chat with all the friendly folks in the campground.
We headed out around 11am, if I recall. Some others in Mike’s party (Anna Marie and Sharon, if I recall) stopped us to take our picture. “I’m real ugly!”, joked Fred. But, he politely stopped and smiled for the cameras.
The hike to the Hind Hut is about 1800 feet of elevation, maybe 2-3 miles max. So, it wouldn’t be a hard day. It was actually a nice change of pace from the Cascades and my other partners where we are always using every minute of the day. For once, I wouldn’t be wasted at the end of the day. Above us though, the only way through looked to be steep. The route led us through two chossy gullies, the second steeper, but more solid. Fred stopped every so often for a long break and by the time we were at the top of the first gully, Mike Nash and Judy Lett caught up to us. I hiked up ahead and scouted out the second gully, yelled back to the others, and climbed up and waited. Fred, upon arriving, expressed his condemnation for the horrible rock. The entire slope is indeed crumbly. Mike and Judy decided to return at this point. Fred and I pressed on and found that the route got even worse. It was harder to follow and it became even looser. I spotted the party of five women high above and to the left descending a snowfield. From the base of the snowfield, I could see a ledge running all the way over to a hundred feet above us or so. OK, I saw the route, we just have to go up. The climb up to just below the ledge is tricky and if you can deal with this fine, you’re probably plenty ready to climb Assiniboine. Fred rested one more time for a long time before making one last push.
By this time, the women were rappelling down to where we were. There were two guides and three clients. The guides all knew of Fred and were delighted to meet him, telling us of their favorite routes of his. We decided to stay put while they passed us. Fred told me that he was planning on returning to the campground. He absolutely hated the loose rock (”This is junk!”) and his back was still bothering him. However, Fred urged me to go on. I was undecided about what I should do. Since moving to the Pacific Northwest, I haven’t done any solo climbing. I just didn’t enjoy it the way I used to. But, I was facing a solo climb of one of North America’s Fifty Classics. I was tempted to turn around, but I decided that since I was up here, I should at least press on to the hut and try the climb. If anything became dangerous, I’d just turn around. So, that’s what I did. Before I headed out, one of the guides asked me, “Hey, do you realize that your helmet’s on backwards?” D’oh! I had noticed that it felt funny, but I didn’t feel like fixing whatever it was, assuming that I just had a twisted strap or something. Probably not the best image for someone going to solo Assiniboine. Oh well…onward!
Fred had actually climbed the worst of it. I had to scramble up about 30 feet to the large ledge that led across the cliffy face, past a ribbon waterfall, to the snowfield that led up to the hut. I stopped frequently to look back down on the route to make sure that Fred made it OK. I saw him enter and exit the second gully. Between the two gullies, he took another long break. I continued, but made sure that I could see him the whole time. Eventually, I saw him on easy ground below the first gully and knew he’d make it back fine.
Most of the ledge is easy, although there was one particular place that I remember that required exposed 4th class scrambling – a bulge in the cliff. I moved quickly past the falls; the spray was soaking me. I climbed the snow which led to a few more loose scrambling spots. Eventually, I was up in the cirque and I could see that the hut was only twenty minutes away. Soon enough, I was there. It was a beautiful day and I had the place to myself. The hut itself it quite comfortable and clean. I was used to the huts of Central and South America, which aren’t nearly as nice. There was water nearby too.
I lounged around the hut reading the book that I’d hauled up there (The Magic of NeuroLinguistic Programming Demystified). Around 6pm, I radioed down to the lodge to check the weather, which called for a clear morning with a probability of rain in the afternoon. OK, it wasn’t the best forecast, but at least the morning would be clear. I spoke with Claude at the lodge and told him I’d try to climb the mountain in the morning. If things didn’t look good, I said, I’d turn around. I set my alarm for 5am and went to bed.
I awoke feeling good and ready for the climb. I had a quick breakfast, packed up, and headed out. There was excellent beta in the lodge including a large photo that had the route outlined on it. It was pretty much what I was expecting. I noted the location of the red and gray bands in relation with the rest of the mountain so that I’d know my approximate speed. I headed across the cirque, dropped down into the talus and headed up. At the base of the mountain, right at the edge of the glacier, I made some 4th class moves to get on the lower slopes. I was now officially on the climb. The lower slopes are quite easy though fairly steep and quite loose. The climb up is easier than the descent and I made quick time.
As soon as I found snow, I touched it and discovered that it was indeed quite hard and ice. I would most likely need crampons. Crampons! I didn’t remember putting them in my pack last night. Did I? I figured there was no point in checking now. I was not about to climb back down and get them and climb back up over all that loose junk if I had indeed forgotten them. I saw that I could avoid this snowfield so I would keep going until I absolutely needed them – then I’d check. I did a good job of route-finding while avoiding the snow. At one point, maybe a 200 feet below the red band, I could not avoid the snow without an undesireable long traverse along the north face. I opened my pack tentatively and learned the unfortunate truth – no crampons. Well, what to do now? I found the most narrow spot of snow where I could jump from rock to rock. Still, I couldn’t avoid about a 10 foot stretch of ice. It was way too slick and steep to attempt without crampons. I did have my ice axe though, so I tried to cut a deep boot step for myself. This worked beautifully, and I cautiously put my right foot into the hole and stepped up. Then I swung my ice axe and caught the edge of the ice. This solid hold enabled me to swing my left leg way over and up so that I could pull and my lift myself on to the rock. I pulled up and reached up with my left hand to a good rock hold. I was now able to skip from rock to rock to the base of the red band.
I climbed through the Red Band, surprised at how easy it was. There was some ice on the route which reduced the amount of holds I could use, but it was still easy enough not to worry about climbing through alone. I suppose it was 5.0 at the most. At the top, I found numerous rappel anchors. From my memory of the location of the red band, I realized I was high on the mountain. “There’s actually a good chance I’ll succeed. Maybe 75% now”, I thought. I’d started giving myself a 50-50 chance of success and now I was only two hours into the climb.
I moved leftward along the top of the Red Band to the ridge proper where the classic climbing started. This part of the climb is superbly exposed over the left side and solid. There are numerous rappel anchors along the way. The climbing is mostly 4th class with occasional easy and short 5th class moves.
About thirty minutes later, I was at the base of the Gray Band, which looked significantly harder. The band directly along the ridge was overhanging. Obviously, I would need to find a better way. I moved to the left, looking for a good line. I found a blocky but steep line and headed up. Along the way, I found a piton right before a very exposed move. I decided to be safe and clip my daisy chain to the piton. I safely moved through the steep moves then stretched over and unclipped the piton and climbed the rest of the way up. At this point, I could see the final slopes. “95% chance of success”, I told myself.
The technical moves weren’t over, but they weren’t as sustained as the Gray Band. It was another 15 minutes to the top, and there was a decent amount of 5th class sprinkled in. Suddenly, I was there. I felt proud to have climbed the mountain. I walked along the top of the mountain along a thin sidewalk of a ridge below the corniced summit. I decided not to go stand on the snow, having heard a horrible story about the cornice breaking off and sending the climbers tumbling over the east face. I headed back to my pack, sat and ate, and called Ken and then Robert. A small plane buzzed the summit and I stood and waved. I wondered if they saw me.
Remembering the weather forecast and my own experience from climbing in the Colorado Rockies, I decided not to linger too long on the summit. I stayed a total of 30 or 40 minutes, then headed down. I decided I would rappel as much as I could. Immediately, there was a steep and exposed move. I realized that I’d climbed up this, but down-climbing was more challenging. Though I have plenty of experience down-climbing, I wasn’t in the mood for the continual concentration and decided to rappel.
I made anywhere from 10-12 rappels total. I had a 50 meter rope and it usually would stretch to the next good rappel station, although I did have to do a good bit of scouting. During my numerous rappels, the Assiniboine helicopter was flying around the mountain. At first, it was circling the summit high above me. I waved when I could although most of the time I was in the middle of a rappel and I didn’t want to stop. I had heard from the party of women that the rockfall was bad on the mountain when they had scouted it. For this reason, they decided to not climb Assiniboine, but instead concentrated on satellite peaks. I didn’t feel like waiting around to find out. During the rappel, there was some rockfall due to meltoff. I got hit by a couple of small rocks, but nothing bad. This just goaded me on. I did take the time to coil my rope after each rappel. Once, when I swung my pack off, my ice axe slipped off and went flying, gone forever. My axe loop had broken a couple of weeks before on Mount Cruiser when I’d tossed my backpack over a chockstone.
Later on, the helicopter came back and this time was hovered close me. It actually gave me an eerie feeling. Was there something I didn’t know? Were they trying to tell me something? I wished they would leave; I preferred being completely alone. Back at the lodge the next day, a staff member told me that the helicopter was on a mission searching for the body of a climber who had disappeared in September of 2005.
I continued rappelling for as long as I could past the red band. I barely had enough rope to clear the snow. In fact, I had to slide the last 5 feet or so. The remainder of the descent was along steep loose terrain and was tediously slow. The slope is broad here and I wanted to make sure that I ended up in the same place that I started. I slowly made my way down to near the base of the climb where I found another rappel sling that led into a rounded steep cliff. “This isn’t the way I came up”, I thought, so I moved towards the glacier. “Aha, there it is!” I found the scramble and deliberately climbed down and touched down on talus. Done! I slogged my way back, stopping to press my lips and drink from an icy pool at the base of the talus. I slowly climbed back up to camp where I made an immediate radio call to the lodge. They put me through to Claude, who was making his rounds to the campground. He told me that Fred was doing fine and congratulated me on my summit success.
It was only 1pm and I had planned on returning to the campground. But, the thought of more mosquitoes and horseflies dissuaded me. I decided to spend another night at the hut. I remained inside the hut for the rest of the afternoon, sitting through three rainstorms, and leisurely alternating between reading my book and napping. This was such a pleasant and relaxing way to spend the afternoon; I absolutely loved it. I spent a little time sitting on the edge of the cliff overlooking Lake Magog. I wondered if anyone could see me (turns out no one saw me, even while they were looking for me through the telescope earlier that morning). I had an early dinner and went to bed around 9:30.
I slept late the following morning and took my time getting ready to hike out. I descended in about an hour and a half or two hours from the hut to the campground. I down-climbed everything instead of rappelling. It felt good to be back down on the easy trail heading for the campground.
I found everyone out and about. They all offered me congratulations. Fred came ambling up, very happy that I had summitted. We all chatted for a long time and I told them my impressions of the mountain. Later on, I interviewed Mike and various members of his party. I had my video camera to make a movie from this trip. I decided to leave it behind on the actual climb – a good idea, since the rain came not long after I’d arrived back at the hut.
Today was Wednesday and it was time to catch the chopper. So, we said farewell to everyone and packed up and headed off. Fred insisted on carrying more than he should have. He grabbed my Beta Mid and wouldn’t give it back for me to carry it. “Let me carry some of that iron!!”, he said. I told him the rack was buried in my pack. And I told him he couldn’t have the rope either. I was surprised at how he insisted on carrying his fair share. I could easily carry the group gear, but he wouldn’t hear of it. My only chance was to pack it quickly before he could say anything. The Beta Mid was one of the last items to be packed because we had it airing out in the sun.
We enjoyed more lounging about back at the lodge as we waited for the chopper. The horseflies weren’t nearly as bad and the heat had abated some too. We said our goodbyes to the staff as we boarded the chopper and lifted off. It was good to be back at the car, on our way out. The long drive back to Canmore was dusty again, despite all the rain. It’s amazing how quickly the ground dries in the Rockies compared to the Cascades. Fred mentioned that he wanted to stop to make some phone calls in a mountaineering shop (Valhalla, I believe) and talk to one of the employees.
I was beginning to witness classic Fred Beckey. At this point, I only wanted to get back home and relax and eat a hamburger or something. Fred’s only thought was the next climb. He was still insisting on coming back to Assiniboine, maybe even this summer. What I really thought was funny was that Fred sat himself down in the climbing store and grabbed a “Selected Climbs of the Canadian Rockies” book and proceeded to write a full page of beta that he gleaned from the book! We were there for maybe an hour and a half. “Gosh, we need to go now if we’re going to make it at a reasonable hour”, I thought. Fred could see that I was ready to leave and just started to laugh.
Fred had me stop at four more towns to check weather and call people to arrange future trips. The following day, back in Kirkland, I was reading Ways to the Sky (highly recommended), in which Fred is the most prominent climber documented, and read the various personality traits which I all witnessed.
By the time we were in Kamloops, it was already late, maybe pushing 10 or so. Fred insisted on stopping before Chiliwack to bivy. I wasn’t into it because I had forgotten that I didn’t have my comfortable sleeping pad and I didn’t want to spend another night on the hard ground, especially when I hadn’t bathed in some days. When I realized that I did have it, I conceded. We got off the highway and drove to the site. Fred had the directions memorized having spent many nights there. To our dismay, the gates had closed at 10pm. Instead of walking down the road, we just turned around and drove back to Seattle. I was happy with this, even though we arrived back at nearly 3am.
All along the way home, from at least Rogers Pass, we discussed things such as the how the Worldwide Web and email worked, why people used dating service, and even climbing. Fred insisted on doing some of the driving. I figured that I was this close that I might as well finish it off. Besides, I was feeling pretty good. “You must have looked it up and discovered that I fell asleep a couple of times behind the wheel!” Fred crashed at my place. He was awake before me this morning and I could hear him on the phone arranging trips!
I felt privileged that Fred told me about some of his classic climbs during the drive home, including The Devil’s Thumb, which sounded just like the most amazing adventure of all time, something way beyond me. Further reading of Ways to the Sky revealed another notable climb: the second ascent of Waddington with his brother Helmey at ages 19 and 17! That was back in the day when the climbers were much tougher. They started the climb at the ocean, making shuttles of supplies. Incredible! Absolutely incredible.
Thanks for the amazing few days, Fred. Great memories.
