May 16

The approach to the snowfields was a step-by-step process, of course, through narrow saddles and high crags. Imagine a trail blasted with dynamite (literally) out of the side of a drastic cliff face, the trail sitting like a shelf squeezed onto a vertical plane. Then, imagine traversing this vicious upwardly mobile path carved into the stone, turning the corner and seeing the path buried in snow. How to move forward? A man named Andy explained to me the science of kickingsteps, of leaning into the mountain, of directing the body's weight correctly. His wife had more trouble than me, she tensed up and couldn't go forward or backward -- stranded on a ledge of snow crying. We need skills out here you cant anaylyze your way through, you must move precisely, a tandem action of muscle and bone. But skills arent enough, a part of you must simply leap forward through the fear.Eventually, we moved out of the steep wall passes and into a bowl with broad topography, but in doing so we lost any hope of finding the trail somewhere beneath the thick plates of snow. Out of the danger of sliding off the mountain and into the vast nowhere of the snowfield. We used a compass to locate a point called 'Saddle Junction', 3 miles away, where the trail bails down into low country and out of the snow. We read the 2D contours of the map against the 3D contours of the real world, finding landforms that matched, using them as guides.Also, along the way we discovered two hikers disoriented and spun around in confusion, miles from where the thought they were. This was a grim image of what is possible, of the consequences of true danger -- no signs or trail to follow.While crossing this ridge, sweat bulging from my forehead and a pinpoint of pressure in my shoe where a pebble lay, eyes gauging downward in acute concentration of feet shuffling forward -- a sudden understanding that the mountain too is moving, crushing upward inches per year, beneath the pressure of two fault lines. I stopped to consider this. Looking out at the lower hills, stone folded in on itself, the landscape looked different to me: dynamic, in motion,moving without moving.The sheer task of moving forward, of becoming a mammal crossing a desolate landscape. My joints fused to the shoulder of the mountain and my eyes welded to the arc of sky.