Carrots and Peanut Butter: The sound I never want to hear again

The other day I heard a sound that I never want to hear again in my life. I had only heard vague rumors of this sound, but the instant I heard it I know exactly what it was, and it made my blood run cold. It was the sound of ice axes buzzing, four inches from my ears.

Friday evening, and I was driving down I-25 again toward Estes Park, this time with a warmer forecast than the weekend before. Tucker and settled into our bivy at the trailhead watching heat lightning ignite the sky above Denver, then woke at 2AM, made some quick chow and hiked off into the dark forest. Being the solstice, the sky turned grey before we even made Chasm Lake, and we entered the upper cirque beholding the Diamond aloft in full morning light. More familiar with the terrain this time, we quickly ascended the icy North Chimney and were roped up at the base of Ariana on a brilliant warm morning. Tucker dispatched the devious thin starting sequence and before long we were high up the wall contemplating the formidable crux. Ariana proved to be as exquisite and beautiful as we had hoped—and as difficult as we expected. The powerful, thin crux took us both a few tries to figure out, and the gorgeous 5.11 endurance pitch was everything I hoped it to be and more. I tried like hell to onsight it but at 14,000 feet the pump adds up faster than usual, and I ended up sailing off the final bulge. Regardless, I would be hard-pressed to pick a more fun pitch of rock climbing in the mountains. We topped out the technical terrain with big grins and began scrambling toward the summit under a calm sky.

We were working up the last technical step, probably only 30 vertical meters below the summit of Longs Peak, when our blue sky was suddenly blotted out by dark clouds and cold hail pelted our faces. We’d been ambushed. A mere minute later I heard an electric buzz behind each ear, and the instant understanding of what that sound meant pulsed through my veins like a shot of icewater: Longs Peak was becoming a giant lightning rod, and we were almost at the very worst place to be.

By necessity, alpinism teaches us to be decisive under pressure. In some situations there is simply no room for hesitation; when immediate action is needed, the only wrong choice is no choice. In this case, we had just climbed a third to forth-class ridge and we had comparatively mellow terrain in front of us that lead down from the summit. Dude, we need to run. Now. In a way, serious situations in the mountains are actually really simple; you know what you need to do and you do it, that’s it. Hustling over the snow and talus, I cast a quick glace up at the summit blocks, so close I could have scrambled up in a quick minute and tagged the summit. Maybe a younger man would have gone for it, but I was content to make a quick bow, acquiesce the mountain’s unfathomable power, and scurry on down the ridge towards the safety of lower elevation.

Twenty minutes later we were standing in bright sunshine grinning again and watching the storm rumble over the Indian Peaks. We couldn’t help laughing. In a day of bomber T-shirt weather, the twenty minutes of precipitation and threat of lightning were literally the twenty minutes we were closest to the summit of the peak. Now, with the storm rolling on towards the plains and none other in sight, we could have easily hiked back up to stand on the summit, but neither of us even suggested it. I think we both understood that today, the mountains had made their power clear to us. I believe that as silly monkeys stomping around this planet with our inflated egos, one of the most important things we can do is acknowledge that something is bigger than us and simply observe with respect. We spent some time digging the awesome view, then continued down towards the rappels.

So I still haven’t stood on the summit of the Front Range’s most iconic mountain, but maybe it’s better that way, because I still wonder every time I see it, maybe this time, and I start brewing plans for starting another pre-dawn adventure.