Scott Duncan Hut – Bow Hut. 17km. 750m altitude gain – 950m altitude lost. 10.5hrs.
After the long day yesterday we decided to sleep in for a bit… which meant not getting up until after it started getting light at 6am. I stumbled outside and looked around. A sea of snow and glaciers and mountains looked back at me. Everything was bathed in dawn light, and looked incredibly beautiful and remote.
Pottering around the hut getting ready, we didn’t feel too bad, and decided to keep heading onwards. If we ended up feeling hideously sore we could turn back. We flew down from the hut out across onto the glacier at 8.15am, roping up as we started heading uphill. It probably wasn’t necessary, but we really didn’t know the terrain, and we figured it couldn’t hurt. Plus more practise with roped up travel wasn’t a bad thing.
Our first goal was to reach Balfour High Col. We could see it from Scott Duncan Hut, and it seemed so close for a point that was several kilometres away. Travel conditions were good though – we were still trail breaking, but the snow wasn’t sticking to our skins now, and it was a pleasant clear day. Not windy, not too hot, not too cold. We were surprised to discover that we really weren’t feeling too sore, and could easily keep up a decent pace as we gradually reeled in the distance between us and the Col.
As we started climbing up onto the bench before the Col, we ran into a couple of other groups, heading towards Scott Duncan from Balfour – hurrah! We wouldn’t be breaking trail anymore! Although our run of isolation had now ended, human contact had been made.
We stopped on top of Balfour High Col to look at the road ahead, and decide on a route. We had two options. We could pass underneath Mount Balfour, along a bench with seracs looming over us on one side and great open crevasses lurking beneath, or we could turn downhill earlier, and weave our way down a narrow path between a rock and the crevasses, and then turn across to the hut. Everyone who had come up that morning had gone for Option A. The path looked clear and obvious, and we’d have the advantage of speed to help us clear the serac danger-zone quickly. We went for Option A, but decided to stay roped up.
Through necessity, we quickly got the hang of skiing downhill with ropes on. I was last on the rope, after being deemed the one least likely to fall over. We hurtled past the seracs as fast as we could, discovering that trying to stay in control with heavy packs and tired legs wasn’t as easy as it sounded. I’d almost prefer to have been going uphill. Convincing tired legs to keep going, we turned down the last slope, then pushed across the short uphill section to reach Balfour Hut.
There were hoards of people milling around the hut – well, we knew it was booked out that night, otherwise we would have been staying there. Balfour Hut was our second escape point in case of extreme exhaustion. If we really had to we could beg for a spot on the floor. But although we were all feeling pretty tired, and the downhill to reach the hut had taken longer than planned, we weren’t feeling that desperate. It was 2.30pm, so we still had another 6 and a half hours of daylight. And if necessary, headlamps. Besides, we’d finished the longer section – 10km down, 7km to go, and the uphill was nice and gradual. A quick lunch, and we pushed onwards.
The ski up Vulture Glacier was indeed gradual, but we slowly started to melt as the afternoon sun reflected at us from all angles. On rest breaks I’d dive my face into the snow in an attempt to cool down, and eat handfuls of snow to keep my mouth from drying out. Thankfully it started to cloud over though, and as Amy set a fast pace up the glacier, we marched and marched into the clouds.
Counting steps and counting steps, staying roped up we made our way up to Olive-St. Nicholas Col. It seemed like we would be at the top in just 500 steps… maybe another 200… another 100… another 100. With the clouds came snow and a cold wind; my ear started filling with snow and feeling numb, where just a couple of hours earlier it had been overheating in the sun. I pulled my neckwarmer up to cover it. Convincing tired limbs to keep moving, we finally reached the top. The afternoon storm was clearing, the sun was getting low in the sky, and the Wapta Icefields were spread out in front of us, mountains sitting in a sea of glacier.
We unroped and started flying down towards Bow Hut. I got stuck with the rope (perhaps I volunteered), and my tired legs protested as I turned down the hill. The snow was gorgeous, but my legs refused to appreciate it, as I struggled to keep a consistent snow plough going.
In the end we stumbled into the Hut at about 7.45pm, revelling in the luxury of being able to take our skis off, and not having a pack on. And it wasn’t even dark yet! Bow Hut is like a mansion of huts. There’s a separate wing for the bunks, another for the huge kitchen area, and the toilets, instead of being in a little outhouse in the snow, were just off the corridor joining the other two areas.
We dropped our things on a bunk then thankfully collapsed in the kitchen to cook dinner, feeling smug as we heard people who had just started the traverse talking fearfully about what a long day it was going to be tomorrow, having to ski all the way to Balfour Hut. A few people asked us where we’d come from, and were amazed. But honestly, it wasn’t that bad, we didn’t get up super early, and we definitely weren’t travelling super fast. It’s only 17km even if it is with a heavy pack. Now Wapta Traverse in a day, THAT would be a challenge…