The day ended with me hallucinating. Oh, and it lasted a full 24 hours.
As two parties of two, we successfully summited the Grand Teton via the Full Exum Ridge route.
We slept for a few hours in our cars at the base of the trailhead and my partner and I set off around 3am. I’m a bit of a slow hiker when much weight and/or elevation gain is involved, so I wanted to get going. But we decided to wait for the other two members of our party where the trail forks, but the fork wasn’t very far in, so the head start didn’t help much. And my hiking speed wound up not being a limiting factor, thankfully.
We got lost on the skree field on the way to the lower saddle, both on the way up and the way down. On the way up, we came upon one of the guide tents, which was occupied, so they gave us directions to the lower saddle. They also gave us cheese, which was fantastic.
At the lower saddle, water was flowing through a little pipe, so we filled up, put our packs in bear containers, and got ready for a long day ahead.
The Lower Exum is the “harder” climbing and Upper is mostly just scrambling (5.7). I started with the chimney pitch which went quickly and we made good progress, despite a left turn I made with my route finding, which made pitch 3 a bit more difficult and rope draggy than necessary.
All was going relatively well until roughly the end of the Lower Exum, when I curled into the fetal position, head in hands, miserable. I had no clue what was going on, but I felt like death and had no energy. It turns out waking up at 2:30am and doing 7k vert and then going climbing… is taxing on the body. Plus it was my first mission of this magnitude so I had no idea what to expect. Luckily my partner, Sam, explained that I was bonking and needed carbs. My sandwich fixed me right up, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t cry. He was thoroughly entertained and I have pictures to commemorate the occasion.
Once we got to the upper section, we were able to simul the majority of the climbing. There was more crying… but not because I wasn’t enjoying myself. I think my body was just so fully worn out, and we were waiting for our friends, and I just broke down. Plus I was climbing with an ex-bf, which had it’s own emotions wrapped up in it LOL. We were still on good enough terms to go climbing together though.
The top was pretty snowy, and we were blessed with beautiful still weather and clear skies. We summited as the sun was beginning to go down, around 7:45. As a gumby for this magnitude of climb, it didn’t register in my brain until then that we were only halfway. After the other party of two friends arrived at the top, and after taking some summit selfies, we began our descent. The rappels were fine, but navigating the skree with a backpack made me think my legs were going to give out. I was genuinely concerned I’d fall and hurt myself. I started to fall behind the boys. And it started to get dark.
We arrived back at the saddle around 11pm, cold and wrecked. We huddled in the bivy spot for a little while deciding what to do. I knew I wouldn’t be able to get warm, which meant I wouldn’t sleep, which meant hiking out the next day would be even harder. So I voted to descend. And they ultimately agreed.
That’s when we got lost again in the skree, in the dark. And there isn’t much of a trail in the skree, plus our headlamps only went so far. We could hear rockfall, which was a bit alarming. I was also worried about grizzlies. But with short rests and some navigation issues we made it back to the main trail.
We started seeing folks beginning their ascent… and they seemed like figments of my imagination. I felt like a zombie. After a few more miles, I started to hallucinate. I saw little leprechauns in the forest, little owl families, ghosts, and bears. I was quite tired. Somehow the trail down seemed to continue forever, around another switchback, down another fork. I felt fully dissociated like I did not exist. My legs kept going though, just very slowly.
Back at camp, my mind was running on fumes and I found it difficult to fall asleep. Eventually I got a few hours of sleep, then I went to Whole Foods and met the boys at Jenny Lake for a bath. I was grateful for the team, my partner, and the weather on the adventure.
If I were to do it again, I’d bring more layers and more carbs. Oh and I’d start earlier.