Meet the patients we climbed for in the Tetons!

The wind began to blow, and hail came down like little balls that fill bean bags. Setting up a tent in a hail storm is quite the challenge. As soon as we got the poles up, on person had to jump inside to keep it from blowing away off the mountain ridge, while the other person, finished setting up the tent and got the gear inside the tent. The person inside the tent had to keep shoveling out the hail stones and try and keep the inside of the tent dry.

One the tents were up, we huddled down inside our sleeping bags and tried to get warm. The wind rattled our tent and you could hear a constant pelting of the tent with hail, hoping it would hold up. After about 45 minutes to an hour, the hail stopped and the wind died down. We emerged from the tents to see a blue sky and the wind had blown most of the hail away. It was looking like it would be a spectacular day to summit the Grand the following day.

We made dinner, laughed, picked out our route along the southeast ridge, the Exum route and got back into our tent around 9 pm. As we attempted to get to sleep early, anticipating a before sunrise start towards the summit. However, the wind picked up again as the sky went dark and here came more precipitation. We couldn’t see what it was in the darkness of the tent and suddenly a tremendous flash of light and immediate Thunder. The sound as head-splitting. Wow, that lighting must have hit very close. We continued through the night to try and sleep, but the tent was shaking all night. The temperatures plunged well below freezing and we used every bit of clothing, beanies, coats and socks that we had to try and fend off the cold. At some point in the dark night, you just start hoping that morning will come so you have something to do, and some hope of getting warm again. Finally around 4 am we put on our headlights and looked out. We couldn’t believe our eyes! It as as if Elsa from frozen had come in the night and coated everything with snow and ice!

The rock next to us meant to be as a protection was encased in icicles and a sheet of ice called verglass. The grand was covered in a couple of inches of snow with some areas having 6 inches of drifted snow. Two of our team members didn’t get their boots under enough cover and were filled with ice and snow. We tried repeated to get our stove to work and it wouldn’t, so no warm oatmeal, no warm tea. In fact at this point, nothing was warm. We recognized that given our team’s gear, experience and the current conditions, we were not in a position to safely attempt the last little bit of the Grand Teton. We felt quite discouraged given the months of training we’d put in, but as they say in mountaineering, “When you dance with the mountain, the mountain always leads”

We decided to head down, discouraged, disheartened, frustrated by not meeting our goal to get to the summit. It was cold, and still dark and the storm was still going, but not with as much gusto as the night before. In this rather low state of mind, in such a high vantage point, the sun rose on the eastern horizon and the clouds began to part. With the mists of the clouds incompletely covering the striking ridge line of the Grand Teton, and the glitter of the new ice and snow twinkling in the early morning light, we all stopped and watched as we witnessed one of the most beautiful sunrises of our lives. It wasn’t what we had planned for, it wasn’t what we had trained for or set our hopes on, but it was so beautiful and peaceful. We felt that all the effort was worth it after all. We took that moment to snap a photo with the medals we carried 5,000 feet up this mountain and thought of the journeys of each of our patients. Their journeys too may not have gone they way they thought or planned, but just hold on, the sunrise may be the best one you’ve ever seen.