The weekend has finally arrived where I'm supposed to lead an official SAC tour as a tour guide. Strangely enough there are only two people that applied for it so we leave as a group of 4. That's a rather small one, but being my first experience as a tour guide is probably for the best. After a long preparation and planning...and even a small trip to the same place just to make sure the conditions were good...we finally leave towards Arolla.
The approach to the hut was already done by me and Glauco one week ago so there is no surprise there, except maybe that we are even faster than last time...and we were not even running up. I guess is because this time the snow is a lot better and there already tracks in it.
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| On the way up |
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| Probably the coolest place to build a hut! |
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| Ladders... |
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| ...more ladders... |
Compared to last weekend there are also more people at the hut, but still not full...which makes things always more comfortable. Especially in those small huts, it's a bit of a pain when it's booked out. Anyway this time the expectations are really high because we know the weather is going to be good the day after...
...and in fact so it is! In the morning we wake up at 5:00 and there is not a single bit of cloud in the sky. The wind is also not strong and even not that cold. We don't really have to rush to get out so we take things quite easily and shortly after 6:00 we start climbing down the stairs to get on the glacier. The route contours underneath the Pointe de Bertol to then go up pretty much in a vertical line to the saddle between the Pointe and P3373. In reality the route goes a bit further along before going up, but there is still quite some hard snow and hence going straight up seems the best option.
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| Sun rising behind the Dent Blanche |
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| First steps just outside the hut...stunning |
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| Nice snow fields to climb up |
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| Up on the glacier and in the sun |
Once up on the glaciers the views are simply stunning. The sun is sitting on the top of the Dent Blanche and magnificent views of the Matterhorn, Dent d'Herens, Monte Rosa...are all around. Knowing that this glacier is heavily crevassed in places we extend the distance between us in the rope, connect the two ropes and keep going. The tracks contour again around the Pointe de Bertol on the north east side, pointing at the Col de la Tsa. Before the Col we need to cross the bergschrund, which is not that small...but luckily there is still enough snow that is not really a problem to find a good bridge to cross on.
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| That spike at the end of the ridge on the left is our goal |
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| Crossing the bergschrund |
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| On the plateau under the summit |
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| What a collection of mountains! |
Afterwards on a pretty much straight line we slowly get up to to the plateau underneath the Aiguille de la Tsa, still avoiding a couple of crevasses. There is already a team of three people aiming for the top, and this simplifies even further the route finding for us. The route starts on some rather large ledges pretty much in a vertical line below the summit. From here the route goes up also in an almost vertical line, first slightly to the right and then back to left. There are a few bolts and two stands which help in route finding. From the second stand the route crosses on a slab to the left. The slab is cut along by a nice little ledge which offers rather comfortable places to put the feet. Following the slab to the end we get on the south ridge and......mamma mia! The "steep but not that steep" slab gives place to a totally vertical view down on the west side. I can almost see the car from here!
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| At the bottom of the route |
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| After the traverse |
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| on the ridge and in the first chimney...the route goes now slightly to the left |
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| Glauco on the rather exposed exit of the chimney |
Things get immediately a lot more interesting! Now the route follows the ridge in a sort of small chimney. After a few meters there is a rock in the middle of it and the route goes to the left of it. Which means that for a couple of meters you have to to stand with your full body completely exposed to the verticality of the west face. However there is a bolt just in the middle and a nice (even though small) ledge for the feet. Shortly above this exposed bit of climbing there is another stand. Here the choice is between going to the right, cross underneath the summit and then get up from the back...or go to the left and climb yet another chimney. Even though I know that the chimney on the left is supposed to be a 4c pitch I somehow believe I can do it...and go for it. At first the route simply traverse to the left after the stand, but then the chimney appears. There are no bolts...only two cracks that go up an almost vertical slab. I put a friend (camalot number 2) in the left crack and start going up. There is a block jammed in the right crack. I knew about that from a description and force myself to trust it...pull up on to it until I can reach a slightly comfortable stand for the right foot. Then again in contrast with the left foot on the left crack, another pull up and I'm almost out of it. Yet another contrast position and there I'm...out of the crux, on lead and on trad...and I could not be any happier! Everyone else follows but no one feels like leading this pitch, and to be honest I cannot blame them. Is not difficult...it just needs some confidence because it's rather exposed and a mistake can have bad consequences...
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| The crux |
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| Rappelling |
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| Next summits... |
So after a bit more than 3 hours we all stand on the top of this magnificent granit spike. Here the wind starts to pick up a little bit and despite not being cold, it's quite fresh. But the satisfaction of having reached this summit, leading the whole tour, is great. It was not difficult, but not a walk in the park either. Plus the weather could not be any better so I really can't ask for anything more than this. After two rappels, the second one of 50 meters we get back down to the bottom of the route where we get some deserved snacks. Now the "easy" part of the trip should start and we first walk up on the glacier towards the Dent de Tsalion. This is a rather easy walk, scramble until the last bit before the summit, and easy yet really nice steep ledge to the top of the second summit of the day. The guide book from this point onwards gives one hour to cross to the Pointe de Tsalion...but to us it's going to take a bit longer than that.
Finding the route on the ridge is not difficult, since the only choice is to go down slightly on the right or on the left. But a few sections of the ridge are still covered by snow...and this makes things a little bit more complicated to deal with. The snow on the east side is really soft and wet...and is basically not holding anything. But fortunately the snow on the west side is still quite hard and it's relatively easy to traverse using the west side of the ridge. Walking on the top is not really a good idea because the snow is sometimes very soft and other times hard...difficult to predict. At the last part of the ridge covered in snow before reaching the lowest point...it's a bit more tricky. It seems the only chance is to get down on the east side where the snow is very soft...and we are not sure if it holds. So I decide to go forward while being belayed from the top and to try and see if it's possible to get around this obstacle. In fact it was possible to use the snow which for some magic physics trick is still hard enough to down climb on it. While going down I even notice that there is a little stone man...which means I'm on the correct route...oh yeah!
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| Short but nice ledge leading to the top od Dent de Tsalion |
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| On the ridge |
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| Crossing those snow ridges gives some sort of "north face" feeling |
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| Despite sometimes not comfortable climbing...the views are always amazing |
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| And the worst is now done...the Aiguille still can be seen |
And from here the ridge becomes shortly flat and then slowly goes up again, but it's basically possible to walk without any problem. Only thing is to me careful about the big cornices on the east side...so we walk as much as possible on the rocks and on the west side of the ridge...until we finally reach also the top of the Pointe de Tsalion. Now we really expect that this tour has no more technical surprises for us...since it should basically be a walk down. Now I finally understood while the more experienced tour guides always said that the tour is only finished once you are at home in the shower...the walk down is not that easy in the end. Following sporadic white and red square signs we zig zag down a rather steep snow field and sometimes really loose rocks. There is even an additional abseil point, which we decide to use. It would be possible to go down on the snow, but it's now getting too soft and we don't want to trust it. Abseiling will take longer but it will be a safer thing to do.
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| Last steps before the Pointe de Tsalion summit |
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| One last rappel... |
After the abseil we get down on the snow field, pointing at the lower part of the SSW ridge of the Dent de Perroc. Once in the middle between P3013 and P3113 the "path" points straight down on rather loose rocks and rubble until it becomes...after a good 30 minutes of yelling on the very loose stuff...a more decent path leading finally to the hut.
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| Relaxing at the hut...even deck chairs! |
A tour that in total lasted 11 hours...so longer than we expected. The conditions on the Dent and Pointe de Tsalion were not really perfect and that slowed us down a little bit. Nevertheless this has been an amazing day, well worth the long drive down to here. And it feels like a mid summer alpine tour...which means that if the season is starting with such a nice tour it can only get better!
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