Mount Cook, New Zealand

21 December (Mid-summer/winter) 1999

‘'course you can get up Mount Cook’, Mark commented, I’ll remember to keep my thoughts to myself in future!!!

A year or so later I find myself on the other side of the world, about to take off in a ski plane, heading for the Plateau glacier. What a flight, amazing views up the Tasman glacier, snow capped mountains, crevasses, icefalls and then ‘if you look out your left window you will see Mount Cook’, WOW, then oh my good gracious or words to that affect I’m climbing that tomorrow!!!! Made it safely to the hut, said hi to our fellow guests then, ‘Hi Valerie, weren't you in NZ three years ago’ then after a quick double-take, ‘different bloke though, eh?’ sometimes the world can be a little too small!!!!!! 8pm bedtime with that nervous tummy you get when you are sh*t scared or slightly nervous. Up at midnight getting dressed trying to force food down with your body screaming ‘excuse me what are you doing’. After much faffing we step out in the dark, starry night, full moon, and head in the direction of the string of head-torches. Easy going in the compacted footprints zig-zagging our way across crevasses, thank goodness for the dark. More crevasses, then puke!!!! Not mine but a group in front is having difficulty so we pass them in the dark, pleasantries shared. Later we saw the group head back for the hut.

Sunrise, what an amazing sight, oh how I wanted to stop and take it in, take a deep breath and really let it all in, but we have to keep moving across the top of the Linda glacier and under the Gunbarrel; very unstable sections, no time to waste. Talking of waste I would like to apologise for my call of nature and the poor bloke who had to share my experience, the highest……………… you get the picture. He and his guide turned back shortly after!!!!

I look up and to my amazement then eventually amusement there is a Frenchman trying to climb five pitches of snow/rock using every part of his body. Then he decides he can’t go any further and proceeds to abseil back down while Mark is climbing up!! We eventually got going again with my nerves a little rattled about the impending climb, elbows and knees at the ready. No knees required I’m glad to say just some enjoyable climbing (Scottish grade II).

Tired, tired, tired; 9 hours of climbing and I’m tired. We traverse on hard brick snow onto a final pitch of ice then the summit, 3750m. With a grin as big as the biggest Cheshire cat I’m standing on top of the world. Over to my right, the Tasman Sea; in front, Mount Aspiring rising like the Matterhorn of the South, breathtaking just breathtaking. So with another breath we start to head down.

Descending, descending, descending; onto ice then abseiling off remarkable tat into a sense of humour failure. ‘We are going to die if we don’t get going’, so tired puppy but still smiling runs across the Gunbarrel and leaps through the now soft snow and then the crevasse field. Thank goodness we crossed them in the dark on the way up. It is funny how you think treading lightly is going to take away the fact that your pack and you weigh a ton. After fourteen hours I lie down. With the threat of crevasses swallowing me up and falling seracs I decide I have had enough. I’m going to stop right here. Only the thought of flying out gets me up from the soft snow and back to the hut.

I was flying out no matter what so I had a very sound sleep. We started to walk out at 10am, oh joy, oh happiness, oh rapture. Too much wind, my arse. We soon found out why people fly in; the scree went on forever and it was my turn to have a sense of humour failure. Eventually onto the moraine and the cruel final hike up to the hut we settle down in the knowledge that tomorrow we finish our Mount Cook trip. After a relatively short walk, we were picked-up by the friendliest bus driver known to woman. He enthuses about our trip and really brings it home; I’ve just climbed Mount Cook, good feeling.

‘So tell me about that bit and that bit and … no I don’t want to know any more’! Poor mummy, well she would take me up Ben Nevis when I was nine.

Valerie C