A stiff chimney.
Facing page 250.
If the ascent, however, had been weary, stale and unprofitable, the descent was to provide me with at least one compensating thrill. With the aid of the doubled rope, the great chimney before mentioned can be descended, and the dreariness of going home by the same road, as it were, avoided. Knubel and Lugard led off down the chimney, the upper half of which is barren of outstanding difficulty. We fixed a doubled rope, but there was no need to use it. In the middle of the chimney, however, there is a sloping platform which was plastered with ice; and below the platform the chimney falls away in a great overhang. We discovered a rusty piton driven into a narrow fissure in one side of the crack, but it was very loose. So Knubel hammered away some of the ice from the platform and laid bare a projecting stone over which he passed the spare rope. Together we let Lugard down to the bottom of the chimney. Then came Visser’s turn, and Knubel went next, preferring to rely entirely on the doubled rope. Having nothing else to do for the moment, I relaxed, and was absorbing the view when, by the merest chance, I happened to glance down at my feet. To my horror, I saw the rope on which Knubel was now hanging in free air slowly but surely rolling itself off the belay. Just in time to prevent its slipping off altogether, I trod heavily on it with my foot. Knubel, all unconscious of how near he had been to destruction, swung gaily downwards to the others. Then came my turn. After what I had witnessed, I felt disinclined to trust myself to the treacherous belay. After some little delay, during which I was much chaffed by the others, who were unaware of the cause of my hesitation, I succeeded in jamming the rusty old piton firmly enough into its fissure to satisfy even my now somewhat critical ideas of safety; and, passing the doubled rope through the ring, I shinned down. The climb was over. There remained nothing but the dreary return to the Montanvert; there had been one thrill, and that an undesirable one and unshared by my companions. The impression that survived was one of monotony, and I longed for all the wonderful variety and wide appeal which makes the real mountain adventure such a thing of joy.
The Grépon
A gigantic saw set up on edge and crowned by an array of irregular teeth—such, as seen broadside on from either the Mer de Glace or the Nantillons Glacier, is the great serrated ridge formed by the Charmoz and the Grépon. The deep col, or depression, which divides the ridge approximately in half, bears the composite name of the Col Charmoz-Grépon. Both of these peaks were climbed for the first time by a party consisting of Mummery, Alexander Burgener, that Viking of guides, and B. Venetz, a young fellow who must have been a very active climber; and all three declared the ascent of the Grépon to be “the most difficult climb in the world.” The advance which has taken place since Mummery’s time in modern rock-climbing has robbed the Grépon of its right to this proud title; but its ascent is still held to rank amongst the most difficult rock-climbing problems which the climber is able to find in the Alps or, indeed, in any other part of the world.
The ascent of the Grépon formed the last item upon our programme for the summer of 1911. Like the Requin, the Grépon is built up of huge blocks of marvellously firm granite, and, after my experience of the former, I hoped for little mountaineering enjoyment from the latter. As far as we could gather, there would be real mountaineering only on the ascent to the Col Charmoz-Grépon, whence the actual climb starts, and on the descent from the Col des Nantillons. Several mountaineers, however, had assured us that rock-climbing was not only more attractive than snow and ice work but also more difficult. So, desirous of testing fairly the truth of this statement so far as we ourselves were concerned, Max and I left the Montanvert at 2 a.m. on September 5, bound for the ne plus ultra of rock ascents.
If care is taken never to lose sight of it, a path, at first well-marked but dwindling away to a diminutive track, may be followed almost on to the Nantillons Glacier, whence the broad couloir running down from the Col Charmoz-Grépon is reached. The head of this glacier is enclosed in a cirque of horseshoe shape formed by the cliffs of the Charmoz, Grépon and Blaitière. In line with the ends of the horseshoe, the glacier tumbles over a cliff, and the icefall thus formed divides it into an upper and lower half. We succeeded in keeping to the Montanvert track all the way to the glacier and, while walking up the gently inclined snow-free surface of the lower half, had ample time to study the icefall. It was easy to recognise in a steep island of rocks lying close under the cliffs of the Blaitière the best line of ascent to the upper half of the glacier. Below these rocks the ice steepened somewhat, and a few steps had to be cut before the island was gained. Once on the rocks the traces of previous climbers were everywhere in evidence, and we followed a trail of empty tins, bottles and other leavings of humanity to the farther end of the island, where, just after daybreak, we roped and embarked upon the glacier. We had proceeded only a few yards, when we were suddenly brought up short on the edge of an enormous crevasse which stretched away, unbridged, on either hand to the bounding cliffs of the cirque. To cross would have involved hours of hard work and step-cutting, but for the fact that two ladders tied together and laid across the chasm at its narrowest point were still in a sufficiently serviceable condition to enable us to gain the farther edge without trouble. Thence, hastening through a short zone endangered by the séracs of an ice wall at the foot of the Blaitière, we gained the middle of the upper basin of the Nantillons Glacier and proceeded leisurely up the hard-frozen snow to the foot of the couloir which gives access to the Col Charmoz-Grépon.
The summer having been exceptionally dry and fine, the mountain was practically free from snow and ice, so we left one of our axes and a knapsack containing all superfluous baggage at the foot of the couloir, to be recovered on the descent. In the remaining knapsack we carried spare clothing, a spare one-hundred-and-fifty-foot rope and a few provisions, including a can of peaches and a tin of condensed milk reserved for the summit feast. Camera and spare films were stowed away, as usual, in my coat pocket. Some little difficulty was experienced in effecting a lodgment in the rocky bed of the couloir, the glacier having shrunk away from the rock to such an extent that a rather deep cleft had been formed. The descent into the cleft was easy enough, but it was only after a sharp, if short, struggle up a very steep chimney with unreliable holds on the upper side of the cleft that the broken rocks of the couloir were gained. Here the climbing was perfectly easy, though the rock was far from firm, and care was necessary. We climbed close together on a short rope on account of the many loose rocks, some of which needed only a touch to start them crashing down to the glacier. Without meeting with any real obstacle, we mounted rapidly, keeping for the most part well to the left of the couloir which bore unmistakable signs of stone-falls. At the point where the couloir bifurcates, we took the branch to the right. It was much steeper and narrower than the lower part of the couloir and was partially filled with ice, but the remains of steps were still fairly well preserved and needed but little re-cutting. Shortly before 7 a.m. we gained the Col Charmoz-Grépon. On a little level ledge overlooking the immense and tremendously steep precipice falling away towards the Mer de Glace, we found shelter from the icy morning breeze and, warmed by the rays of the sun, settled down to our first rest and meal since leaving the Montanvert. Progress had been on the whole leisurely. The climb had provided mountaineering of the ordinary, everyday kind without notable difficulty, though, had it not been for the ladders, the large crevasse would undoubtedly have provided hard work. But it had been real mountaineering with all its essential variety, now rock, now ice, now snow; everything had been taken as it came, and, in addition, we had been almost throughout in, to us, an unknown region of wild and beautiful scenery. But now from the col onwards, if the information of others could be relied upon, we should for hours on end be indulging in nothing more than a strenuous form of gymnastics.