CHAPTER IV
THE CONQUERING OF AORANGI
“If at first you don’t succeed,
Try, try again.”
Green’s memorable visit in 1882, in company with two Swiss climbers, Emil Boss and Ulrich Kaufmann, fired the enthusiasm of a number of young New Zealanders, who hoped to succeed, where he had just failed, in reaching the actual summit of Mount Cook, or, to give it its more romantic Maori name, Aorangi. But Aorangi, entrenched behind his ramparts of ice and frowning buttresses of rock, bade defiance to these inexperienced though daring Colonial pioneers in Southern mountaineering. However, though we had to contend against many difficulties, we were gradually learning the craft, and there were several determined, if possible, to win for New Zealand the honour of the first ascent of New Zealand’s highest mountain. Some there were who swore not to raise the siege so long as Aorangi remained unconquered, and stout hearts and sturdy thews remained to battle with the difficulties. Up to the time when the writer took a hand in the game some ten expeditions had been organized, and the peak still remained unclimbed. In 1894, after the failure of Mannering’s party in the previous season, a solemn compact was entered into by three members of the New Zealand Alpine Club to spend their summer holidays in making one more attempt to reach the summit of Aorangi; and, spurred into activity by the news that an English climber, with the famous Zurbriggen, was to leave England in October on an expedition to the Southern Alps, a party was hurriedly organized, and arrangements made by telegraph. Many members who were anxious to take part in the expedition could not, however, for one reason or another, get away, and Dixon had no fewer than seven refusals from climbers who had at one time or another expressed their willingness to join him. Finally a party consisting of Mr. M. J. Dixon, Mr. Kenneth Ross, and the writer decided to make the venture, and arranged to meet at Fairlie Creek, the terminus of the railway, on the evening of Monday, November 5th.
On arrival at Timaru we were surprised to find there, awaiting our arrival, Mr. T. C. Fyfe, who we thought was at that moment with Mr. A. P. Harper endeavouring to cross over from the West Coast by way of the Franz Josef and Kron Prinz Rudolph Glaciers into the Tasman. Mr. Adamson, the manager of the Hermitage, was also there. They greeted us with rather depressing news. Fyfe was doubtful if he could join our party, and Adamson assured us that we could look for neither provisions nor assistance at the Hermitage, which was practically closed “pending reconstruction of the company.” On every hand, too, we were met with discouraging cries of “Much too early in the season for climbing”; but, confident in our own judgment, we kept on our way undaunted, and at Fairlie Creek, found Dixon awaiting us with a wagonette and three horses, which he had chartered for £10 to take us to Mount Cook and back. We waited only for tea at Fairlie, and proceeded at once on the first stage of our journey—fourteen miles—to Burke’s Pass. Arriving there at 10.30 p.m., we compared notes as to provisions, equipment, etc., and sorting out what we did not require, each man packed his swag for the expedition. On Tuesday we were up at 4 a.m. and on the road three-quarters of an hour later. There had been a garish red sky just after the dawn, and now, as we began to ascend the slopes of the pass, a puff of warm wind met us and gave ominous warning that a nor’-wester was brewing. The nor’-wester, which is equivalent to the dreaded Föhn wind of the Swiss Alps, is the bane of New Zealand climbers, as it generally ends in rain, and often softens the snow and brings down innumerable avalanches from the higher slopes. We could only hope that this was a false alarm, or that, if a nor’-wester did come, it would be a baby one and blow over before we reached our objective. Scarcely could we realize that the child would grow into the giant he subsequently did.
We reached Lake Tekapo at 9.30 a.m., and, after stopping to get a shoe on one of the horses, resumed our journey. At Braemar we intended to camp for the night, in the hope that the Tasman River would be fordable early next morning. Shortly after midday we halted at a mountain stream to feed the horses and boil the billy for lunch. All around us were undeniable signs of the older glacial period, when the Godley and the Great Tasman Glaciers met on the Mackenzie Plains, and, uniting, flowed on in one grand ice-stream towards the Pacific. On either side were vestiges of old moraines, now grass-grown, and great rocks that had come down on the ice from the higher mountains.
Crossing the Tasman.
Camp Cookery.
We arrived at the Tasman River early in the afternoon, and, finding it low, decided to go on past Braemar and cross opposite Glentanner station. The river-bed here is some four miles across, and the water flows over it in several branches. We had some difficulty in finding a ford, and, at one spot, got into the treacherous quicksands in which the bed of this dreaded river abounds. In a moment the horses were up to their knees in it, and the trap wheels sank nearly to the axle. Having no desire to repeat Mr. Green’s experience of leaving his wagonette in the river, the whip was vigorously applied, and, the horses willingly responding, we just succeeded in getting through to firm ground. Finally we managed to cross the many-channelled river without accident, and halted at Glentanner sheep-station, where we were hospitably entertained. Here inquiries were made as to whether we could obtain a porter to assist with the swagging, and were gratified to find that the manager was that day paying off a station hand who would be likely to afford the necessary assistance. The manager was empowered to engage him in our behalf and to send him on after us, his wages to be £1 a day. We also added to our provisions here by purchasing half a sheep, and after a cup of tea and a spell of three-quarters of an hour, proceeded on our journey up the Tasman Valley, intending to camp that night near the wire rope that spans the Hooker River at the end of the southern spur of Mount Cook. By the time we got to Birch Hill the weather was so threatening that it was deemed wise to call a halt, and no sooner had we got the things out of the trap than the rain started to come down in torrents.
Next morning by seven o’clock the storm had cleared sufficiently to allow us to proceed, so, after a hurried breakfast, we started off in the direction of the Hooker River, first taking the precaution of getting the shepherd to kill a sheep to take up to Green’s Fifth Camp in case we should be delayed there by bad weather. The ground became rougher and rougher as the journey progressed, and, at last, we were brought to a dead stop through breaking the pole of our wagonette. This caused a vexatious delay, as every hour now was valuable, seeing that it was our intention to push on past the Hermitage and the hut at Green’s Fifth Camp, fourteen miles farther on, and pitch our tent some miles up the glacier at the foot of the Spur, below the Mount Cook Bivouac. However, there was nothing for it but to set to at once and repair the damage, and pack our belongings on one of the horses, to the cage on the wire rope that spanned the Hooker River. Accordingly, the horses were quickly unharnessed, and Dixon and our Jehu, on the other two horses, galloped up to the Hermitage for material to splice the pole, while Kenneth and I, with our porter—who had joined us the night before at Birch Hill—packed all our things up to the Hooker River. Arrived here, however, we found the manila rope, with which the cage is worked, broken, and one end jammed amongst the boulders in the bed of the river on the other side. Kenneth and I, however, got into the cage, pulled ourselves across, hand-over-hand on the cable, and secured the broken rope, which we spliced to the one on the other side. In this way we restored communication, though, owing to the rope’s being single instead of double, the cage could be pulled across only with great exertion. All these, however, were minor difficulties, which we brushed lightly aside, determined that no ordinary obstacle should hinder our ultimate progress. Just as we were preparing to get the swags across by means of the cage, we espied Dixon leading the old pack-horse from the Hermitage in our direction, and, as we could trust this animal in the river, we waited, and, transferring the swags to her, I got one of the other horses and led her across the river. Kenneth and our porter crossed in the cage, the latter being so frightened that he was not able to pull a pound on the rope. Dixon returned to the trap to mend the broken pole, and he and the driver followed us, later, on the other two horses.
The rough journey up to the hut at Green’s Fifth Camp was uneventful. The weather was fine, and the views ahead were strikingly beautiful. Dixon hurried ahead to make a pair of “ski,” which he fashioned in a most ingenious manner out of a couple of long palings and two short pieces of zinc. We were depending on these “ski” to take us safely and expeditiously over the dreaded deep snow of the great plateau above the Hochstetter Ice Fall. They were simply snow-shoes made of wood four inches wide and six feet long, and similar to those used by Nansen in his expedition across Greenland. Dixon had, the previous year, left two pairs on the rocks of the Haast Ridge above the plateau, and these we hoped to find, the third pair being required for Kenneth. A halt was called at the hut for tea, and, late in the evening, we started with the intention of crossing the Ball and Hochstetter Glaciers and camping at the foot of the Tasman Spur. It was a fine night, but no sooner had we shouldered our swags than ominous clouds were seen swirling over the shoulder of Aorangi. Dixon doubted the wisdom of proceeding, and our porter said he would much sooner wait till morning; but after a little deliberation I urged an advance, and slowly, in single file, the expedition trooped over the rough moraine hillocks of the Ball Glacier. The clear ice of the Hochstetter Glacier was soon reached, and, crossing this obliquely, we encountered another moraine, over the loose stones of which we slowly toiled with our heavy swags. We arrived at the Tasman Spur in a couple of hours, and, in a little hollow of the old moraine of the glacier, where grew some snow grass, veronica, and Alpine plants, we pitched our tent, after first removing the larger stones so that we might have a fairly comfortable bed. It was a fine night, and the snow-capped mountains on the left towering steeply above, with De la Bêche far up the glacier in front of us, formed a picture of exquisite loveliness in the brilliant moonlight. Opposite, across the valley, frowned the gaunt, rock buttresses of the Malte Brun Range. We spent our first night comfortably enough under canvas, and slept soundly till daylight.
Next morning the weather was again fine, and our spirits rose with the thermometer. If we could only catch the upper snows in good order our chances of climbing the peak were excellent. We were, however, soon to meet with our first disappointment. As we were preparing breakfast our porter, who, like Falstaff, was somewhat fat and scant o’ breath, and who had been sitting apart on a boulder on the old moraine, having finished his meditations, rose, and approaching me with some degree of deference, explained that he had come to the conclusion that he would not be of much more use to us. He was “all over pains,” and he had a “bad ’eadache.” Assuming, for the moment, a cheerful outward manner, though being inwardly somewhat indignant and sad at heart, I assured him that if he but came with us a few thousand feet higher, with a good swag on his back, his pains would quickly vanish, and, moreover, that the rarefied air in the region of the Mount Cook Bivouac was an infallible cure for ’eadache, and indeed for all the other ills that flesh is heir to. But my pleading was in vain. He cast one scared look at the frowning crags above, and incontinently fled. He even refused breakfast. Like another historical person—but for quite a different reason—he stayed not for brake and he stopped not for stone. With his blanket on his back, he made a bee-line for the hut, whence he hoped to get the company of our driver back to the Hermitage. The driver, however, had already started on his journey. A less determined man might now have paused a moment in his onward flight; but not so our Falstaffian burden-bearer. With all his pains and aches forgotten, he now continued his headlong retreat down the valley. Eventually he caught sight of the driver, whereupon he began to shout and bellow to attract his attention. The latter, good man, thinking some terrible accident had happened, stopped and rode back to meet the messenger of supposed evil report, and in the charitableness of his heart gave the deserter one of our horses wherewith to continue his flight. The Esk River, which the historical personage already referred to swam, is but a minor obstacle as compared with the turbulent Hooker, and our porter, though he had a good horse under him, was nearly washed away in the foaming torrent. Next day he continued his journey down the Tasman Valley in our wagonette, and arrived at the hotel at Lake Pukaki a sadder and a quieter man; but, falling in with two station hands, who primed him with bad liquor, he, once more, waxed eloquent, and even claimed for himself the ascent of Mount Cook! For a time he was quite the hero of the countryside; but each glass of whisky that he swallowed added some more Munchausen-like adventure to his tale, till the sum-total became so overwhelmingly great that even his boon companions, though they could swallow the whisky, could not swallow the story. It was, indeed, a terrible tale of privation and adventure that he had to tell; but, finally, he contradicted himself to such an extent that he had reluctantly to admit that he had not even set foot on the mountain! But he had his revenge. The men he had been engaged by were “mad, sir—mad as ’atters! They were going up a place as steep as the side of a ’ouse, and there was a young fellow named Ross among them who was the maddest of the lot!” Later, our porter, with his swag on his back, a bottle of whisky in his pocket, and a liberal supply of the fiery beverage inside him, wandered out into the night, lost his way on the tussock plains, and, having slept off the potion, returned next day minus all his belongings. Then he disappeared altogether, and history does not record whether he ever returned again to those dread Alpine regions; but the chances are that he preferred the delights of civilization—or the flesh-pots of the country “pub”—to the joys of Alpine climbing.
We had many a laugh, afterwards, over our adventure with the burly porter, but, now, as we looked somewhat ruefully at the extra pack he had left behind him, and thought of the added burden that would soon be upon our own shoulders, we began to realize the magnitude of our undertaking and to curse his craven heart. We did not, however, let this little adventure spoil our breakfast, and congratulated ourselves that, in three days from Dunedin, we had established a camp at the foot of the slopes from which Green, after many difficulties and much delay, commenced his climb—a feat not easy of accomplishment in those days. But the hardest toil yet lay before us, and the memory of that first climb to the Bivouac, encumbered as we were with packs weighing close upon 50 lb. each, does not fade with the passing years.
Occasionally there would be a bit of crag work, and at last we entered a long snow couloir up which we kicked steps in the direction of the Bivouac. This couloir got steeper at the top, and Dixon, thinking to make better progress, took to the rocks on the right, while Kenneth and I tried the rocks on the left. Preferring the snow work, we were soon back in the couloir, and lost sight of Dixon. A quarter of an hour later a jodel from us brought forth an answering shout from below, and presently Dixon’s head appeared above a pinnacle of rock on our right. The spare rope which he had in his swag had been taken out and was now coiled round his shoulder, so we knew he had been in difficulties. Making a traverse of the snow slope, he was soon in our steps, and we learned that he had got into rather an awkward corner, from which he had to descend by means of the Alpine rope. The snow slope above grew steeper and then eased off on to steep rocks, up which lay the route. Dixon led and Kenneth followed, but was quickly in difficulties, for the long “ski” which were attached to his swag would, in spite of everything, catch in the rocks, rendering the situation risky, and the language even more so.
It will perhaps be well to draw a veil over the various acrobatic feats that we performed, and round off the story by stating that we reached the Bivouac Rock at 5 p.m. Under the lee of this rock we found a little flat place, about six feet square, on the crest of a narrow, exposed ridge. On the one side a snow couloir, some 2000 feet long, sloped steeply down between the precipices to the foot of the Hochstetter Ice Fall. Northwards the ridge fell away toward the Tasman Glacier. The scenery was magnificent. Immediately above our camp were some splintered towers of rock, from which is obtained a glorious view of the upper slopes of Aorangi. Northward Haast and Haidinger, clothed with sérac and ice-fall, tower high in heaven; and thence the eye wanders round to De la Bêche—most beautiful of mountains—Elie de Beaumont, and the magnificent sweep of the Upper Tasman, leading to the Lendenfeld Saddle and the Hochstetter Dome. Across the valley were the giant rock peaks of the Malte Brun Range, catching the rosy tint of dying day; and below our Bivouac the battlements of the long rocky ridge leading down to the deep valley in which the middle portion of the great Tasman Glacier, with its streams of moraine and white ice, stretched itself in the deepening gloom of evening.
Dixon expected to find the Bivouac snowed up so early in the season, and he had carried up a short-handled shovel with a view to digging out the cache of provisions left there the previous season. To our joy, however, it was found almost entirely free from snow, and the tinned meats, fish, etc., to all appearance, in good order.
Kenneth and I now divided the swags and got out some provisions for a snack, while Dixon went up over the rocks in an unsuccessful search for water. We had arrived rather late in the day, and no rock could be found retaining sufficient heat from the sun’s rays to melt the snow we spread on it. The result was that Dixon returned with only about an inch of water in the billy. This we apportioned, and, at 7.30 p.m., once more shouldered our swags and started on the climb to the Glacier Dome. But it was now found that the snow was frozen so hard that we should have to cut steps in it all the way to the Dome, and as we saw no prospect of being able to do this with swags on our backs, and to come back for the rest of our burdens in time to make a camp on the great plateau beyond the Dome, we decided to camp for the night at the Bivouac. It was well we did so decide.
As the evening wore on it began to grow cold, so Kenneth and I set about pitching the Whymper tent, while Dixon went on cutting steps up to the Dome to make the ascent the easier in the morning. Owing to the limited space at our disposal, it was rather a difficult matter to pitch the tent satisfactorily, but we made a fairly good job of it, and, getting inside, set about melting some snow over the Aurora lamp to make a cup of Liebig for Dixon. This was rather unpleasant work, as the lamp was out of order and smoked badly. The Primus stove used so effectively in after years in our Alps, and also by my friends Scott and Shackleton in the Antarctic, were not then on the market in N.Z. Our lamp smoked and went out, and was relit, and smoked and went out again. The one thing it seemed incapable of was the generation of heat! Finally, the whole thing caught fire, and in order to avoid an explosion we threw it outside and extinguished the flames in the snow. Luckily I had with me a small spirit lamp, and, though it was not made for burning kerosene, we managed, by the aid of this, to melt some snow and brew three small pannikins of Liebig. Then we sat down and waited patiently for Dixon’s return. About half-past nine we began to feel a little anxious, and I was just getting on my boots to go out and look for him when we heard the clink of his ice-axe on the rocks above the tent. He had been gone two and a half hours, and had done good work. He was rewarded with the Liebig that had been kept warm for him for three-quarters of an hour, and then we, all three, turned into our sleeping bags, intending to make a very early start in the morning. We talked over our plans, and arranged, finally, to carry heavy swags up over the Glacier Dome and on to the plateau, camping eventually on the ice of the Linda Glacier at an altitude of about 10,000 feet above sea-level. Should there be any danger of avalanches from Mount Tasman in crossing the plateau, we decided to travel by night and select a safe camp in the daytime. The mountain was, however, singularly free from avalanches, and we began to think our chances of scaling the peak were of the rosiest.
CHAPTER V
THE CONQUERING OF AORANGI—continued
“It thunders, and the wind rushes screaming through the void,
The night is black as a black stone.”
Rabindranath Tagore.
A high bivouac in the Southern Alps, across which sweep the great summer ocean air currents, may, at any time, and without much warning, lend a spice of adventure to a big climb. And so it now happened. Before we could get comfortably warm in our bags, and settle down for the night, ominous gusts of wind began to flap the sides of our tent, and to send the snow swirling down the gullies. The wind gradually increased, and by half-past ten it was howling round our bivouac with the force of a gale. The sides of our tent flapped wildly, and at last it became evident that it could not stand against such a gale, but would be blown to shreds if left standing, so I got up, and levelled it to the ground. Hanging on to the rope to avoid being blown away, I took a glance round. The soft snow from the tops of Haast and Haidinger, caught by the wind, was blown like a great cloud-banner half-way across the Tasman Valley, while the moon went plunging into the storm-clouds that came sailing in torn masses overhead. It was evident that we were in for a bad nor’-wester, and as I crawled back under the folds of the tent and into my sleeping bag beside my recumbent companions I could hold out little hope for the morrow. Hour after hour the wind raged. There was no improvement till morning. Then the wind seemed to abate somewhat, and we pitched the tent again. It was bitterly cold, and snow was beginning to fall. It looked as if we were going to be caught in a trap, but we were loath to retreat, and stuck to our guns in the hope that before the day was over the gale would have blown itself out. But matters began to get worse instead of better. The wind once more increased in violence, and was now accompanied by driving rain, hail, and snow. We could do nothing but wait patiently in our sleeping bags and hope for the best. Towards evening we broached a tin of sardines, and managed to get enough water from the floor of the tent to allay our thirst. Then night closed round our storm-tossed bivouac, and the driving rain beat through the canvas, and formed pools on the waterproof floor inside. Several times we baled the tent out with pannikins, but there was no keeping it dry, and at last we were content to lie in our sleeping bags in the water. About 10 p.m. there was a vivid flash of lightning followed by a loud peal of thunder, and this was succeeded by another and yet another, each peal coming nearer than the one preceding it. The hours went slowly by, and at midnight the storm was at its height. The lightning came like balls of fire, and while the wind howled round the crags, the thunder crashed incessantly, making the Bivouac Rock, and even the ridge itself, tremble. Sleep was out of the question, but we huddled up in our sleeping bags, and occasionally told a story or sang a song. Someone quoted ironically—
The Mt. Cook Bivouac.
“There is beauty in the bellow of the blast,
There is grandeur in the growling of the gale,
But to him who’s scientific
There’s nothing that’s terrific
In the falling of a flight of thunderbolts!”
and Dixon sang a song about a juvenile Celestial who had caught a bumble bee, and, taking it for a “Melican butterfly,” put it in the pocket of his pantaloons with disastrous results! As the night wore on there was no abatement of the storm, but rather it seemed to increase in fury. The lightning was wonderfully vivid, the balls of fire being succeeded by a bluish light. The incessant thunder, at each crash, drowned the noise of the storm. It was grand in the extreme. Each moment I expected the rock under which we lay would be splintered by an explosion. “Is this blessed rock quite safe?” I inquired of Dixon, who had spent many nights under it, but never such a one as this. “No—not very,” was the answer. So we pondered quietly and put our trust in Providence, and—the laws of chance! Sleep was out of the question. After some time I looked at my watch by a flash of lightning, and found it was 3 a.m. Snow was falling heavily, and weighing down the weather side and end of the tent. I had magnanimously taken the outside berth, and now I could feel the snow curling up over my head in the slack of the tent outside. I beat it down repeatedly, but, like the pain caused by the peach of emerald hue, “it grew! it grew!” till it was once more arching overhead, and I had to sit up and plant my back defiantly against it. Long before morning it had formed a bank outside the tent four feet high, and, when the welcome dawn appeared, though I was still in a sitting posture, it was once more curling over my head, while Kenneth, who was next the rock, had a small cornice arching over his recumbent form! By this time the water in which we were lying had by some means or other got through into our sleeping bags, and this made matters still more uncomfortable. Peering out through the tent door in the early dawn, we saw the snow still falling, and, below us, an apparently bottomless cauldron of swirling drift. The wind had moderated somewhat and the thunder had ceased, but the situation was anything but reassuring, so we decided to beat a retreat to the lower regions. We breakfasted on cold plum pudding, and, creeping out of our bags, hurriedly packed our swags and got ready for a start. The tent had to be abandoned, as it was frozen to the rocks, and the stones to which the guy-ropes were attached were buried deep in the snow. We were soon roped together and at the top of a steep couloir leading down some three or four thousand feet to the Tasman Valley below us. Attaching the swags to the rope, we attempted to tow them behind us, but, as the snow was soft and the slope steep, this became dangerous work, and we decided to let them slide down the couloir before us. They went off with great rapidity for some 100 feet or so, then bounded over a huge tower of rock that jutted out from the middle of the couloir, and disappeared from view. Relieved of the swags, we proceeded cautiously, going with our faces to the slope as one would come down a ladder, making good anchorage with our ice-axes at every step in case we should start an avalanche. There were one or two nasty places, but nothing happened, and, getting on to easier slopes lower down, we were able to turn round and practically walk down the remainder of the gully. We could find no trace of the swags, and came to the conclusion that they must either have been arrested on the crags above or buried in the soft snow below. We decided to hunt for them on the following day, and wended our way back across the Hochstetter and Ball Glaciers to the lonely hut, defeated but not altogether disheartened. Arrived at the hut, the first thing we did was to get out of our wet clothes; but, as our spare garments were in the lost swags, a new problem presented itself for solution. We made shift with what was at hand. Dixon attired in a bath towel, to which he subsequently added a mackintosh; Kenneth gracefully clad in a grey blanket; myself in an airy costume composed of a short serge frock discarded by a former lady climber, made a fashionable trio such as had never before graced the Ball Hut, and that aroused many a vain longing for my lost camera, which, like our spare clothing, was in the buried swags. Breakfast—after our long spell of thirty hours at the Bivouac, with little to drink, and that little not of the best—was very welcome. At midday we turned into our bunks, and dozed away the afternoon. The weather continued bad, and towards evening we were startled by a large rock which came crashing down the mountain-side in close proximity to the hut, warning us that what with falling stones and the danger of a break in the Ball Glacier a few hundred yards higher up the valley, the said hut was in anything but a safe position. Day closed in, and, one by one, we dozed off again till at about 9.30 p.m. we were aroused by a further noise outside, and in our half-sleepy condition imagined we were going to be bombarded by another rock avalanche. Presently, however, the door opened, and in walked three men with ice-axes, Alpine rope, and other climbing paraphernalia. They proved to be Fyfe and George Graham (members of the N.Z.A.C.) and Matheson (a runholder who had come up to see something of the Great Tasman Glacier). There were now six of us in camp, and it became necessary to modify our arrangements, so we discussed plans, and resolved to make a very early start as soon as the weather cleared.
Sunday was occupied mainly as a day of rest, some necessary preparations in the way of cooking, etc., only being made. Graham constituted himself chef of the Hotel de Ball, and it was not long before the smell of a savoury stew was wafted in through the hut door. Alas for the hopes thus engendered! When we came to eat the stew we found that our cook—with the best of good intentions, no doubt—had dosed the dish liberally with what he believed to be salt, but which he afterwards ascertained to be tartaric acid! Someone suggested that if we now added soda it would counteract the effect of the acid, but we were not in a mood for experiments—so we gave the whole lot to Matheson’s dog, and at the end of the day the dog was still alive! We then made the further distressing discovery that there was no salt in the camp, and for the next three days we had to cook our meat and bake our bread without it. This was not so bad as long as we had soda and acid with which to bake scones, but at last the acid likewise gave out, and we were in a quandary. Dixon suggested citrate of magnesia as a substitute, but I prevailed upon Matheson, whom we made baker-in-chief, to try fruit salts,—a bottle of which we found in the hut,—and this he did with excellent results.
The weather cleared gradually, and by 8.30 a.m. the peaks of the Malte Brun Range were standing out above the top of the moraine, grander than ever, in their tracery of newly fallen snow—their grim precipices, which had slipped their mantle of white, being accentuated by the deep snow in the corries. The barometer had risen a tenth, the wind was from the south, and everything seemed to make for success at last.
As the weather was apparently clear down country, this seemed a fitting opportunity to liberate one of the carrier pigeons lent me by Messrs. B. and F. Hodgkins before leaving Dunedin. Attaching a message, written at the Bivouac, to the bird’s leg, we liberated him at 10 a.m., all hands turning out to give him a “send off.” It was an interesting experiment, as the bird had been taken right into the heart of the Southern Alps, and had to rise from a valley surrounded by mountains of from ten to twelve thousand feet in altitude. He rose gradually to a great height, making ten gyrations in one direction, and then with a sweep round in the opposite direction he seemed to suddenly make up his mind, and, taking a bee-line over the Liebig Range, disappeared in the direction of the coast at Timaru. He reached home at 4.30 p.m., having accomplished the journey in six hours and a half. It may be worth while remarking that when the bird reached Dunedin he was still flying at a very high elevation.
We now waited only for settled weather, as we were a very strong party, and had every confidence in our ability to conquer more than ordinary difficulties. Matheson, our newly formed acquaintance, was ready to join us, and to go with us to the summit if need be; so Dixon nailed up his boots with hobs and clinkers for the ice-work. We went early to bed, and pondered over the chances of success. There was one thing that made our minds uneasy—the amount of newly fallen snow on the higher slopes. This would render climbing difficult, if not dangerous. Still, we could but try, and if there should be any danger we decided to travel at night and camp in the daytime. By this means we should also avoid the terrible glare and heat from the snow slopes of the Upper Linda Glacier.
The people of Australia—who may be taken as able to judge—say there are three hot places—Hay, Hell, and Booligal—and that in the matter of temperature these should be put in the order named! On a cloudless summer day, when the sun beats through the stagnant air and is reflected from the snow and the surrounding slopes, the Linda, in any reliable classification, would probably come in after Hay and before the other place.
It was decided that we should rise on the morrow at 2.30 a.m.; but slumber held the hut till four o’clock, and it was five before we were ready for another start. We had not gone far before the storm descended upon us again, and there was nothing for it but to retreat to the shelter of the hut. Clouds obscured the mountain-tops, and it was snowing at the Bivouac. Disconsolately we marched back, and by the time we had regained our habitation the wind, accompanied by driving hail and snow, was once more sweeping down the valley. It now became a game of patience, but though all this gloomy weather and lack of sunshine was very depressing, we kept up our spirits and determined to set out again on the first opportunity. There was some chance of our running short of provisions, as we were now a large party, and it was arranged that Fyfe should walk down to the Hermitage for bread and tinned meats, while Dixon, Matheson, Graham, and I went to look for the swags, leaving Kenneth in charge of the camp. Accordingly we proceeded once more across the Ball and Hochstetter Glaciers, and on past our lower camp. By the time we got near the Tasman spur the snow was driving round us in blinding gusts, and we had frequently to crouch under a crag, and hold on all we knew to prevent our being blown away. Owing to the heavy snowfall, the whole aspect of the lower portion of the mountain was changed, and we had some difficulty in finding the exact couloir down which we had sent the swags; but at last we reached what we thought was it, and Dixon and Graham proceeded with some difficulty right up to the spot where the swags were seen to disappear over the middle rock. Owing to the great depth of snow, however, no trace of them could be found. Matheson and I searched another couloir to the right, but, not liking the look of it, and knowing there was danger from ice-blocks that occasionally fell from the edge of a glacier at its head, fully a thousand feet above, we beat a retreat to our camp. We halted at our cache at the foot of the Tasman spur, and Matheson knocked over a kea with his ice-axe, simply stunning it and subsequently catching it alive. We afterwards caught another at Green’s Fifth Camp. On our way down the glacier the wind was so violent that we could not stand against it, and it simply blew us before it over the smooth ice, while the driving rain that had now set in drenched us once more to the skin. We got back to camp at half-past one, and Dixon and Graham came in an hour afterwards—cold, hungry, and wet. Kenneth had cooked us a hot dinner, which we thoroughly enjoyed; and once more we turned in to wait for fine weather. That night there was another thunderstorm almost as violent as the one we had experienced at the Bivouac; but the lightning was not so vivid, and the thunder—though one or two peals shook the hut—was not quite so close.
Tuesday, the 13th, was spent in camp; but, the bad weather continuing, we could not get our clothes dry, and again the costumes worn were at all events original, if not conventional. Next morning the ground about the hut was covered to a depth of several inches with snow. Fyfe made his appearance shortly after breakfast, and the result of his foraging expedition was regarded as highly satisfactory, especially as he had brought up a fresh supply of bread and a quantity of salt. We were getting tired of eating mutton without salt, and though the scones that Matheson had baked—with fruit salts in place of soda and acid, which had run short—were excellent, still we welcomed the new supply of bread.
My holiday being at an end I had to return to Dunedin, and reluctantly took leave of my companions on the Thursday morning, leaving them patiently waiting to give the weather a final chance of clearing. This was my one and only attempt to climb Mount Cook before making the traverse of it some years later. Mr. Turner in his book says that I had tried to climb Mount Cook for twenty years and “was grateful that the author’s expedition gave me success at last.” This is on a par with several other extraordinary statements that his book contains.
The Hooker River.
Matheson accompanied me on my 14-mile tramp in the driving rain down to the Hermitage. We got wet crossing the glacier streams, which were all so high that we had doubts about being able to ford the Hooker River. However, we managed to get across safely on the old grey mare, though blocks of ice were coming down by the score in the ever increasing and rapidly flowing current. In the evening we drove another 14 miles to Glentanner station, which was reached with difficulty, as the mountain torrents that crossed the road had torn up their channels so that there were no good fords, while in one place the road was almost completely washed away. In another cutting a great slip that had come right across the road almost capsized the trap, though we went very carefully over it. In order to get to Dunedin up to time it was necessary for me to cross the Tasman next day and make a rapid passage down to Fairlie Creek; but, to our dismay, we were told that we could not possibly cross the river in the trap. I then decided to ford the stream with one of the horses, and walk the many weary miles to Lake Tekapo that night; but on arriving at Glentanner the manager said it would not be safe even to attempt to ford the river on horseback. Here was a dilemma. The alternative was to catch the coach at Lake Pukaki next morning, and young Ross, the station manager, generously offering to provide me with a saddle-horse, I got up at 2 a.m. and started on my lonely 25-mile ride along the lake-side. It was clear overhead, but Aorangi-wards the moon cut through the breaking fringe of storm-cloud. Occasionally a startled rabbit crossed my track in the moonlight, or a pair of Paradise ducks trumpeted forth a defiant note from a safe distance in the lone lagoons of the Tasman flats. In front was the changing eastern sky, tinted with the rose of morning; and, behind, the depressing gloom of the great mist-shrouded Tasman Valley, where my climbing companions were no doubt still waiting and scheming to conquer the monarch of the Southern Alps. I reached the Pukaki River at 6 a.m., and was rowed across in time for breakfast before the coach left. That evening I was in Fairlie Creek, having accomplished the 75 miles in the one day. From an upland plain I got my last glimpse of the Southern Alps. The weather had cleared, and the mountains stood up gloriously in the noonday sun—Sealy, Sefton, the Footstool, Stokes, and Tasman vying with one another; but, above them all, the mighty ridge of Aorangi. They were like old friends. It was with a sad heart I saw them one by one disappear. And once again I came to the conclusion that, for the man with a limited holiday, mountaineering is a game of chance with the weather, and that the weather generally holds at least three aces and a long suit.