Monsters in the Mountains

A True Story

I woke up with the rest of our patrol, it was just after dawn. I knew all too well that today I would lead my friends through a few miles of mountains to our next camp. Two weeks in on this 23 day trek and it was finally my turn to lead our patrol for the day. The night before our instructor, Don, pointed out approximately where he wanted us to camp. He left the route to ­me but said to meet him just south of Independence Pass for lunch and a lesson in cartography.

Our cooks quickly prepared a hot breakfast. From across the small clearing that was our camp I could hear the familiar moans, groans and chuckles that signaled another oatmeal breakfast. Lisa decided to make fritters for our group. She knew that a leader with the oatmeal blues was no fun to listen to. Unfortunately Lisa knew nothing about making fritters except what she could remember seeing her father do years before. Of course she didn’t bring this fact to light until we all had plates of gooey cornmeal with half-raw cubes of potato inside. Starving at 11,000 feet is not highly recommended by most hikers and to clean the pans only to make oatmeal and clean them again was out of the question. Even when you’re doing nothing but hiking in the mountains time can be an important factor. So we ate our half-cooked fritters, took our bearings and left for Independence Pass.

The route I chose proved extremely difficult in parts yet we all agreed it was much better than any of the alternates. After a few hours we found ourselves just over 12,000 feet on a saddle between two low peaks. The past three quarters of an hour had been spent traversing a fairly steep slope of loose rock that seemed bent on breaking our determination and will. We were all quite exhausted and the popular vote was to skirt the valley at our present elevation. The alternative was to traipse downhill with 60 pounds of added momentum strapped to our backs and hike back up the other side with that same sixty pounds pulling each of us back as if to hold us captive in the valley.

I examined the route to the left. A rock field covered one third of the route and half of that was covered with a deep snow whose coating of ice I could see glistening from four hundred yards away. I called a halt to the patrol. Complaints were immediately voiced by those who guessed my intent.

“I can’t deal with walking downhill and having my toes jammed into the front of my boots.”

“I think my blisters popped. My feet feel wet and it’s not sweat, I just know it.”

“There’s no way I’m walking up another hill.”

“I’d rather go body surfing on a shallow reef.”

I could easily understand how everyone felt. After all, I too had climbed the saddle and wasn’t too keen on taking the valley route. But snow meant danger and in the beating sun it could very well mean death. The snow on the rockfield, combined with the weight of our patrol, made the conditions prime for a slide.

“It was during a break in the yelling that we heard the first scream”

We all dropped our packs to rest as I thought about the situation. This breather gave everyone a chance to build up their defenses. A slightly heated argument ensued. The same complaints were being voiced by the same people and we were getting nowhere, literally. This only served to frustrate us all. We were going around in circles and I actually began to feel dizzy.

My first cramp hit me right about then. Deep within my viscera something was objecting to my presence around it. The pain began deep within my abdomen then thrust outward and downward in sharp bursts. The pain quickly reached my bowels, spurring me for a frantic search for the camp shovel. I emerged from behind a rock a few minutes later feeling rather weak. I looked up and saw most of the patrol was heading for the rock field while two others waited for me. I had to scream to stop them and they screamed right back.

“We can make it” they said. “If we take our time we’ll be alright.

They were wrong and I said as much. After a couple of minutes they came back and began a vigorous protest of my leadership.

“You’re being an ass,” one said.

“This isn’t a dictatorship you know.”

“Can’t you see how we all feel? Don’t you even care that Julie’s blisters are popped? You’re being a real jerk.”

“I don’t care if you’re leading or not, I’m not going to listen. You’re just on a power trip. You’re not a god and if you were I sure as hell wouldn’t worship you.”

By now the attempt at discussion was just a shouting match. This served no purpose other than ruining any chance at a group decision. My shouting and aggravation quickly took its toll on my already weakened body but I couldn’t give in. My rebuttals began to grow shorter though while the pauses between them increased noticeably.

It was during a break in the yelling that we heard the first scream. It was very faint and came from across the valley. We looked west, to the other side, and made out the figure of a man frantically waving his arms. It was Don and he was desperately trying to signal us to take the valley route. Silence enveloped the patrol. Nobody said a word as we headed downhill. Being right can be isolating, even when no one is pointing it out.

I tried very hard to relieve tension in the group. As we plodded onward I kept floating up and down our line telling bad jokes and encouraging the footsore trekkers to keep their chins up. It wasn’t as bad a hike as some had imagined. Everyone seemed to find humor in the fact that I had developed an acute case of diarrhea. We had to make frequent stops to accommodate this and that helped to elevate our spirits as we rested our soles.

We reached the other side of the valley sometime in the early afternoon. Don was waiting for us. His first words however had nothing to do with our morning or our lesson.

“What were you trying to do,” he yelled, “kill yourselves?” Don’t you have any common sense? The sun is out, the snow is covered in ice, doesn’t that tell you anything? You don’t have ice axes. You were never taught how to cross a snowfield. You don’t know what’s under the snow. If you were lucky someone would break a leg. More likely, no, I can tell you right now you would have started a slide. Your combined weights are nearly a ton. Do you really think that snow will support one ton of weight? It’s a damn good thing you heard me yelling. I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be the one to call your parents and say, “I’m sorry but your son or daughter made a really stupid decision today and died for it.”

Well Don was on a roll and didn’t stop for about 5 minutes. None of us had anything to say to Don or each other. He was treating us like small children and that caused a lot of resentment. All that had been done to elevate the mood of the patrol had been ground up like so much meat and a few people were eyeing me as if I were eating it up. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Though his intent was simply to get his point across, Don chose to be confrontational instead of instructional and that caused rifts between some of us that never did quite heal.

“By this time I had been reduced to stumbling along. Small grunts escaped me as I tried to run ..”

Our cartography lesson lasted for a half hour. Don left us afterward with instructions on where to camp that night. We waited another half hour to eat lunch and continued on our way.

The thin air at high altitudes can make a person quite thirsty. When you combine that with hard physical exertion we were told to drink at least one quart of water per day. We were all very low on water, in fact most of us had run out. There was no real worry though, Independence Lake was only three quarters of a mile away. By the time we had walked a half mile my cramps had become a steady pain throughout my abdomen and bowels. Tom chose this wonderful moment to complain about his thirst. He had run out of water as we were walking across the valley earlier. Now we were passing through an area of stagnant pools of water.

“I’m thirsty.” he said.

“Independence Lake is only a quarter mile away,” I replied. “Hang tough, we’ll be there in 15 minutes.”

“No, I’m really thirsty. Let’s all stop so I can get a drink.”

I was already walking bent over from the pain and this idea did not appeal to me in the least.

“Just keep going, we’re as good as there. You can see the lake clearly and the water is fresh. There’s no sense in risking contracting giardia from tainted water.” For some unknown reason Tom felt that this would be a great time to blow up.

“I was hunting with my dad in Texas and we drank from stagnant pools just like these and they had scum floating on top!” he yelled.

“That’s fine Tom but this isn’t Texas, your daddy isn’t with you and we’re not hunting! I’m not holding up the rest of the patrol so you can drink scum. The rest of us are just as thirsty and would much prefer fresh water.”

“Well you can’t stop me.”

“I also can’t leave you behind, now let’s go.”

“No, I’m not afraid to drink scum off of water.”

“Then keep arguing with me and I’ll throw up in this pool to make you happy.” I truly believed this would happen at any moment.

“I’m stopping right here and drinking. I don’t give a damn if you wait or not.”

“Fine. Joe and Dick stay here with Tom. Everyone else, let’s go. I can’t take this pain anymore.”

I turned my back on them and made a beeline for the lake. Behind me I heard Joe’s voice. “Go on, we’ll be fine. He’s in pretty bad shape, go with him and make sure he’s okay.”

By this time I had been reduced to stumbling along. Small grunts escaped me as I tried to run for the lake. I no longer cared about my path. I trudged through small pools of water with reckless abandon. Ten minutes later I was bent over behind a boulder next to the lake relieving myself of breakfast and lunch. I felt surprisingly good afterwards but Tom and I kept a good distance apart for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

As evening approached some of the other members of the patrol started getting sick also. In its own sort of way it made me feel a little better. They wouldn’t have to exert themselves as much as I had but I was sure they would get an idea of just how difficult the day was.

That night we had a meeting to discuss the events of the day and voice our opinions. We did this every night and I knew what was coming. Since no one seemed eager to begin I started it out with the faults I had seen in myself.

“I should have taken charge more on the saddle. I never should have let the option of crossing the snowfield become an issue. I also never should have left Tom, Joe and Dick behind this afternoon. I was wrong to let the party split up but I was in the extreme pain that some of you are starting to feel right now. Try to imagine putting on your packs right now and walking for a day. It’s not a pleasant thought. I’m sorry for blowing up like I did but I seriously thought I would need to be carried out of here on a stretcher.”

And just like that I did to my friends exactly what Don had done to us all earlier in the day, I shut them down. Honesty is the best policy yet so is biting your tongue. I had the former down but the latter not so much. Of course I realized all this about 3 seconds after I stopped talking.

Tom’s solution to this was to stand up and say “Shit, obviously he doesn’t need us for anything. This is a waste of time, I’m going to bed.” He turned away and did just that. One other person followed him. This hurt me much more than listening to them rip into me would have but I feigned indifference, or so I thought.

The rest of the patrol tried to remain objective. A few people appreciated my efforts in the valley to lift morale and actually thanked me for it. That helped, but a great uneasiness had settled over us. It took me a long time to realize the most important lesson from that day. Being a leader is about inspiring others through inclusion and discussion while keeping tempers at an even keel. It may sound easy or it may sound hard yet when you dedicate yourself to the concept you find that the greatest obstacle is often you. When tempers flare and heated words are said, consensus dies. It’s not a winning team.

As I headed for my tarp afterwards I was approached by Julie.

“I’m really sorry Phil.”

“For what?”

“I feel bad. Everyone seemed to use my blisters as an excuse for not going into the valley. I wasn’t any help either. When you needed support nobody gave it to you. I don’t know, even after all that arguing you still tried to make everyone happy, and it worked. Thanks a lot, and don’t worry, Tom will be over it by morning. Goodnight Phil.” I could feel her smiling in the dark.

“G’night Julie. And Julie…”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

In the cold darkness of both the mountains and my mood I felt as if a warm glow was inside me. Those few simple words from the heart had a profound effect, they helped me to reconcile with myself and to finally fall asleep. I knew others felt the same as Julie, she was just the only one to say it to me.

By noon of the next day we were a team again. A couple of people held grudges but it only bothered them. Late that next afternoon Don appeared with a half gallon of cooking oil. Apparently our old oil was tainted and we had all contracted food poisoning in varying degrees. We all laughed it off. We didn’t have time to be upset. In a few days we would meet up with the other patrols and split into new groups for the last five days of the course. This made our last few days together go a lot more smoothly. In hindsight I think we fared quite well for a bunch of 18 yr olds from across the country who had never met before.

I still see one of the monsters from that day. For years I thought he would burst out in the open with no warning and at first he occasionally did. Then I realized he was just a part of me so he stopped bothering me.

There was no need to fear. No need to run. Once you know your monster is there, once you accept that, you find they are much easier to control. Most days I never see it yet some days it seems to always be there. So I work to remember why it’s my monster and that helps me shove it back in time out.

The entire experience really summed up the whole point of an Outward Bound course. To Serve, To Strive and Not to Yield. All in equal amounts.

All names have been changed save my own to respect privacy. The picture is not from the course, our weather was much worse. We made the summit of Mt. Yale two days before the story.

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