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2002
Mugs Stump Award Winners:
Cordes/DeCapio—South
Face of Denali
Kelly
Cordes & Scott DeCapio
 Scott
DeCapio and I landed on the Kahiltna Glacier on May 19, 2002
with ambitions for a new route on Denali’s massive south
face. Our hope was to first repeat a route on the north buttress
of Mt. Hunter, then (after acclimatizing) climb the new route.
Unfortunately, we succeeded at neither. We did, however, have
an excellent trip in which we learned a great deal—lessons
that will surely benefit us in the future. Many climbers complained
about the weather, but it was probably normal for Alaska’s
mountains—just a stark contrast to last year’s
banner season. Stormy weather is a reality of the mountains.
We still enjoyed our trip, and the magnificence of the Alaska
Range.
 The night of May 20, under perfect skies (the weather had
been great for over a week—almost too good. as many
ice routes had already melted out), we made our first attempt
at the awesome north buttress of Mt. Hunter. The face must
be one of, if not the, proudest mixed face on the continent.
It is incredibly steep, and has hosted some of American alpinism’s
standard-setting ascents. Based on conditions, we went for
the 1984 French route, which sees very little sun. The route
climbs a deep, menacing gash until midway up the 4,000-foot
wall, then steps onto the face for the remaining 2,000 feet.
Atop the wall, another 2,000 feet of easy-moderate snow climbing
leads to the summit. Our plan was to utilize the virtually
continuous summertime Alaska daylight and climb light, sans
bivy gear—bringing only a stove, warm clothes (ie. down
parka, extra balaclava and mittens), and food as emergency
gear. This strategy has been our M.O. in the past, and we
enjoy the freedom of moving fast and unencumbered—in
our minds it outweighs the greater security of relying on
extra gear. Starting the climb, we got slightly off-route
crossing the tricky bergschrund, and after 2,000 feet of incredibly
sustained ice climbing, we retreated, not feeling it. Chalked
it up to a "warm-up."
 A few days later, we tried again. On this attempt, we quickly
climbed the gash/couloir, then another 1,000-feet of brilliant
mixed climbing on the face, gaining the buttress’ third
ice band— about 3,000 feet off the glacier—in
only 12 hours. However, the climbing had taken its toll -
while we were able to simulclimb on every “pitch”(the
hardest climbing was about WI5), it was solid ice (no snow
rests) the entire way, and never less than 60-degrees. Such
sustained terrain, not allowing the “micro-rests”
often found within pitches on many alpine routes, fatigued
us more than we’d anticipated. We began to get sloppy.
Dangerously so. We knew we needed to find a place to rest
and brew, but we were suckered into thinking practically all
of the rocks, as seen from below, would be flat on top. We
wasted three hours climbing around the ice band before finally
taking 30 minutes to chop butt-seat ledges into the ice. Rookie
mistake. At that point we were exhausted. We sat on our ledges
in the ice and brewed, napped (barely - we were sitting upright
on an ice face), and tried to rest for about five hours. We
tried to continue after the rest, thinking that traversing
the ice band to reach the Bibler Come Again (of the Moonflower
route) exit would be best (the French route continues above
on very, very steep, difficult-looking ground). We grossly
underestimated the distance of this traverse, and after several
hundred feet worth of miserable traversing on the steep ice
band, we decided to abort our attempt. Fatigue had robbed
us of our will, and was affecting our ability and judgment.
 We reversed the endless traverse and began to rappel. About
2,500 feet up, I noticed about an inch of sheath missing from
one of our 7.6 mm twin ropes, exposing the floppy core strands.
Of course the chop was near the middle of the rope. Scott
was wasted and fell asleep at nearly every anchor after drilling
our V-thread. I wasn’t much better, but fortunately
recalled how to salvage the damaged rope into a retrieval
line, safely connect it to the other, and rappel on the intact
line. This allowed us to make full 60-meter rappels, albeit
on a single 7.6 mm—three lockers through the belay device
for friction. Our attempt took about 34 hours round-trip.
In retrospect, this was an incredibly valuable learning experience—we
learned that we can’t “sprint” everything
(which we’d been having great success doing on less
sustained routes), and the importance of pacing and fatigue
management. I don’t believe I’ve ever learned
as much on a route as we learned in this failure.
 Following a few days of rest, we began the slog up the West
Buttress route. First, however, we hoped to take a cache of
food and camping gear into the east fork of the Kahiltna Glacier,
below our proposed objective - Denali’s south face.
However, after three days spent camped at the junction (~
7,000') of the main Kahiltna and the east fork, without any
visibility (stormy weather), we could wait no longer and continued
up the West Buttress to acclimatize. We left a cache at the
junction, and figured we’d just have to carry heavier
loads to the base of the south face later. The bad weather
was essentially the start of an almost three-week spell of
stormy conditions.
We moved up to 11,000' one day, camped, waited in more bad
weather, then ascended to the Advanced Base Camp of Denali’s
West Buttress at 14,300' another day. There, we waited out
bad weather and allowed our bodies to acclimatize to the altitude
for several days. We spent about ten days at this camp, making
solo acclimatization runs to higher altitudes. One day, leaving
individually at separate times, we each ascended the remaining
6,000' to Denali’s summit (20,320'). But we weren’t
there to just bag the summit by the easiest route. Unfortunately,
the reality is that this was the closest we came to touching
the south face. The weather continued to be unstable (mostly
bad). We descended to our cache at the junction with the east
fork, hoping the weather would break. We waited out more miserable
weather, spending another four days camped here. Finally,
the weather got semi-good, but after all of the snowfall the
route would need several days to clean up. Scott had three
days remaining until his flight home. We skied into the east
fork, knowing we didn’t have time or conditions, but
hoping for some good views. Indeed, the east fork is incredibly
impressive—outrageous unclimbed lines abound - but we
still never got to clearly see our primary objective. We moved
camp back to the landing strip (southeast fork of the Kahiltna),
and after four weeks in the mountains, we flew out to Talkeetna.
Scott flew home, while I stayed in Talkeetna for another ten
days. During that time, I was indirectly involved in the rescue
of Jack Tackle from Mt. Augusta’s northwest face. Jack,
a friend and hero of mine, was seriously injured and stranded
midway up the face. I was called as a ground/climbing crew
for the rescue, in case the helicopter couldn’t retrieve
him. I ended up waiting in the helicopter hangar, and was
not needed beyond coordination and communication assistance.
Fortunately, in an incredibly dramatic and daring effort,
the helicopter (rotors 15 feet from the wall!) and its crew
plucked him from the wall. Jack is recovering well.
Overall, while we are naturally disappointed that we didn’t
succeed in climbing any of our objectives, we realize that
in coming back, and in learning about ourselves, the trip
was a success. Big routes, in good style, don’t come
easily. We hope that our efforts represented the spirit
of this great award. We are both incredibly grateful to
you, and all of those who support the Mugs Stump Award,
for this tremendous opportunity. In a world laden with
over-commercialized ascents, unsubstantiated hype, and
movie-crew climbing, you are helping to keep the soul of
alpinism alive. Thank you.
Kelly Cordes
Photo Key (in order of appearance):
Scott DeCapio
traversing the 3rd ice band on the N Buttress of Mt. Hunter.
Kelly Cordes photo.
Kelly
Cordes climbing steep ice on the French Route, Mt.
Hunter. Scott DeCapio photo.
Kelly Cordes on the 3rd
ice band, about 3,000' up, of Mt Hunter. Scott DeCapio
photo.
Scott DeCapio resting on
a ledge chopped into the 3rd ice band and viewing avalanches
3,000' below, from the N Buttress of Mt. Hunter. Scott
DeCapio photo.
After
34 hours, Scott DeCapio rests, exhausted, on the Kahiltna
Glacier after a failed attempt to repeat the French
Route on Mt. Hunter. Kelly Cordes photo.
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