The Spatzizi and that Little Juniper Bush

This is a story of how I discovered what climbing a mountain in the real wilderness, was all about. So bear with me, while I set the scene.

Where am I? I have traveled many tens of kilometers down a one lane dirt road (where I saw a very big black bear) and crossed the Klapan river bridge (this bridge gets washed out, every now and again) to get up on the railway grade, never used by a train, but frequented often, by the locals getting around. From there we drove to the trailhead.
Today I am going to climb a mountain in the Spatzizi Wilderness Plateau.

Click here to hear a Bear Growl audio clip .au file

We picked up the thread of a very faint trail and began our zig zag ascent up the mountain. My Bear Paw wilderness guide described this trail as an old Indian trail, but I'm fairly gullible, so might just believe most anything. I soon began to notice clumps of a brown fibrous substance, hanging from the ends of low lying brush along the trail. When I asked what this was, I was told that this was last winters coat from Mr. Bear. This explaination is quite believable, and I'm beginning to get a clue that I really am in the northern wilds, aren’t I?

Much to my surprise, my Bear Paw guide then began climbing an avalanche shoot. Straight up we went. Now straight up any mountain is a tough climb, so I inquired as to why we were not continuing that nice zig zag effort, as we had been. My guide explained to me, that there were no trails and to bushwhack thru the thick brush on either side of us, was much more difficult. Gees, there's always a trail to the top of any civilized Colorado mountain! Climbing, I became so exhausted, that if a bear had come and eaten me right then, it would have just put me out of my misery. Yet, we kept climbing. I began to hope that the way down would be easier. I didn't know about that little juniper bush, yet.

We climbed through an area thick with the clustering of wildflowers. Then we reached the top. No kidding, but the top of this avalanche shoot was a mountain goat trail, no wider than 12 inches. As we walked upright along this goat trail, I glanced only briefly to my left, as the immediate drop off was tremendous. I promptly stopped doing this, only to have my guide call back over his shoulder "you’re not afraid of heights, are you?". I had never noticed before.

Much to my relief, this narrow trail gave way to rolling plateau and there, it surely was paradise. We spotted close to twenty Stone Sheep up on the hillside. We also spotted, a fifteen foot length of churned up burrow, where my guide explained, a grizzly bear had dug after one of its favorite snacks, a ground squirrel. Lying there looking out over the Klapan river valley, a rainbow dropped from the clouds below us, to the valley floor, even farther below. Being above a rainbow, was surely an awesome sight, I will always remember.

We proceeded to make our way down the mountain. I had been hoping the way down would be easier and at first, it was. We jumped and literally skied standing on our feet, down very steep, sandy slopes. I discovered that on the grassy slopes, I could slide on my bum, using my feet out in front of me as rudders. This was great fun. To reach continued easy travel downward, we at one point, roped together and crossed a short hard rock area. My guide commented later, on my lack of hesitation with ropes and rock, which turned out to be a very handy thing.

Before too long, this downward fun came to an abrupt end. I remember seeing my guide ahead of me, considering how best to proceed, standing at the edge of what looked to be an incredible drop off. As it dawned on me, there were no easy answers to this delimna, it also occurred to me, it could be years before anyone found our bodies, due to the remoteness of where we were. I had asked for wilderness mountain climbing, and that’s exactly what I was getting. Soon enough, my guide came up with a plan. We were to rope together once again, and this time my guide had a pre thought out, three hop strategy, for negotiating our way over this vertical hard rock and into the treeline, below.

I’m not really afraid of heights and I’m also, not really a stranger to the use of ropes for mountain safety. However, there was very little to get a grip on. If the plan failed, we would go sliding right off that mountain and over the edge, and into the valley far below.

Our plan worked great, but I’ll never forget that little juniper bush for as long as I live (and probably that guide won't either). No bigger than just one of my feet, I had both feet securely wrapped around this live stronghold, on an otherwise sheer rock face. Then here comes this 200 pound man, who was to take my place at that little juniper bush, while I was to continue on down. Yeah, right! But once this plan was in motion, there was only one thing we could do. See the plan through. As this big man leaned into to me (in order to not slide off the face of the mountain, himself), his feet searched for a place to secure themselves, which was only possible, if I moved my feet. I cautiously baby steped around that little juniper bush, saying the whole time "I can’t, I can’t".

Well, it’s a good thing I could, because soon we were back in the trees. With twilight upon us my Bear Paw guide, in typical understated fashion said, we needed to keep moving because we didn’t want to encounter a bear, did we?. The two of us returned to the trailhead at 1 am, with out the aid of a flashlight, but seeing quite well in the afterglow of the long summer days, northern twilight.

And that's how I discovered what climbing a mountain in the real wilderness, is really about.