Getting High: Confessions of a Peak-Bagging Junkie

By Edna Erspamer

Newly divorced woman, seeking adventure and companionship, discovers the joy of hiking and climbing with fellow members of the Sierra Club. Spurred on by lists of peaks throughout the Southwest and Mexico, she takes pride in getting to the top. Most satisfying are the companionship and the list finishing parties, all inspired by the power of the lists. This pastime leads to conquering the high points of the states, and various high points around the world. Her latest obsession is visiting as many countries as are physically and financially possible. At last count she had reached over 200 destinations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 19, 2009
• ISBN: 9781462831197

Edna Erspamer

Born and raised in Western Pennsylvania, Edna Erspamer moved to Santa Monica, California at age 15. Her keen interest in both travel and nature inspired annual family camping trips throughout the West. After a divorce she became active in the climbing sections of the Sierra Club, where she soon became addicted to conquering peaks. World traveler and adventurer, Ms Erspamer has sought inspiration and thrills all over the globe. A past Sierra Club leader, she was chairman of both Hundred Peaks Section and Desert Peaks Section. She has a degree from UCLA and has completed her first novel.

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Copyright © 2009 by Edna Erspamer.

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Contents

1

GETTING HOOKED

2

THE SUBLIME

3

THE RIDICULOUS

4

FEAR

5

NO PAIN, NO GAIN

6

PEAKS, PARTIES AND PALS

7

ANOTHER ADDICTION

8

ANOTHER LIST !

9

CLEANING THE SLATE

10

AN OVERDOSE

GLOSSARY

FOR MY CHILDREN: ELAINE, SHARON, ROBERT, CARLA, THOMAS and STEVEN

And in fond memory of those patient men who helped me to get high on many peaks, some sublime and some almost ridiculous, but all in the spirit of camaraderie and fun: Dick Akawie, Art Blauvelt, Gene Olsen, Chuck Stein, Bill T. Russell, Dale Van Dalsem and Frank Goodykoontz

And to those who are still helping others get to the top

Many thanks to my editor, Mary Ann Webster, to the photographer Iris Malinsky, the calligrapher Carl Rohrs, and Marco Fantone

1

GETTING HOOKED

The wilderness holds answers to more questions than we yet know how to ask.

Nancy Newhall, This Is The American Earth

My husband Franco and I were sitting in the living room drinking a cocktail and reading the Los Angeles Times when we became aware of a terrible odor.

Our twelve year old son Steven raced into the room. Mom, what’s burning? You haven’t forgotten the rolls again, have you?

Oh, no! I jumped up and rushed into the kitchen. When I opened the oven, black acrid smoke began pouring into the house, and there, on a cookie sheet, were my hiking boots, totally misshapen, melted together.

I wept. Not only would I have to cancel my forthcoming hike, but the boots had become a symbol of my growing independence: it was going to be difficult to come by the money for new ones. I would have to eke it out of my weekly allowance, the grocery money that was supposed to feed my husband and six children.

How did this catastrophe come about? New to the mountain experience, I had signed up with the Sierra Club to go on a weekend backpack in the local mountains.

Anticipating wet ground, I had decided to waterproof my boots (suede leather Pivettas, very popular in the early ’70s before the invention of soft boots). A friend had explained that they had to be warmed after applying snow seal, a wax concoction that has to penetrate the leather. Heat aids in this process, a little heat such as sunshine or the pilot light in a gas oven. I snow sealed the boots and put them on a rack in the oven (since it was raining outside and hence, no sun). I promptly forgot about them. Two days later, when we decided to have steak for dinner, Steven turned the oven up to 600 degrees for broiling.

To look at me you might surmise that I was a normal individual, and indeed I did lead a rather routine existence for the major part of my life: graduated UCLA, married, had six children. I had never gone camping as a child, but I had been exposed to the outdoors. In Western Pennsylvania where I grew up, my family owned a small cottage in the nearby hills (they referred to them as mountains). I spent several summers there, running around in the woods. Later, when we moved to California, a high school friend, Joan Day, invited me to spend two summers in the Colorado Rockies with her and her family. She and I rode horses, hiked, and were relegated to cleaning most of the fish her father caught. On one occasion we rode horses up to the flat tops around 11,000 feet and camped for several days while the men fished. I loved it.

After I was married, I was disappointed to find that my husband didn’t want to hike and backpack with me. Just because he’d been a Boy Scout and had gone on a fourteen mile backpack did not ensure that he liked it. The most I could ever talk him into was an occasional weekend of camping, and our yearly two week vacation trip which consisted of driving hundreds of miles all over the West, with our six children, staying in campgrounds.

A curious thing happened on one of those two-week yearly outings. Something snapped inside my brain. I remember the occasion, a two-mile hike up the Tokopah Falls trail out of Lodgepole Campground in Sequoia National Park. On the way back from the falls I couldn’t keep my eyes off the sheer granite walls on the other side of the river, the Marble Fork of the Kaweah, to be exact. As I looked up to the Watchtower, a giant rock that dominates the glaciated valley, I was overcome with the beauty of creation. I vowed then and there that I would never stop hiking as long as I was physically able; it’s the cure-all, the stress reducer, the definitive medicine for the mind as well as the body.

When I returned home to Santa Monica, some friends, Diane and Harry Kightlinger, told me about the Sierra Club.

Wasn’t he the guy who founded the California missions? I asked

Diane laughed. You dummy! The Sierra Club is named after the mountain range. After she explained the advantages of the club, I joined immediately.

For awhile I was content to go on occasional hikes and a few backpacks, usually taking the children along. My husband used to say, I don’t care where you go as long as you take all the kids along. Can’t get into much trouble that way, right?

I liked the mountains so much that I was often seen with my six kids, ages six through sixteen, plus a friend and her kids too. My youngest, Steven, always had to carry the pots and pans. It was like having my own scout troop. A Sierra Club leader suggested that if I could lead all those kids around I would probably make a good leader of adults, so I signed up for leadership training.

To become an O-rated leader, a person has to go on a few Sierra Club hikes, attend the Leadership Training Program (LTC), take a First Aid course, and then lead two O-rated trips. Mary Ann Webster (then Keeve) and I took the training at the same time. We led our first hike together, a ten-mile walk in the Santa Monica Mountains.

I was becoming independent, little by little – my hiking boots were exposing me to new places, new people, new ideas. Getting married right out of school, having six children in ten years, never having to earn a living other than keep house and raise children, had made me very dependent.

Dr. Kenneth Achity, in his book, The Mercury Transition, How to Escape from a Lifetime Security to follow your Impossible Dream, has invented the term Type C personality to describe the risk-taking, go for it type person. I always knew that I was different, but I had never heard anyone put a label on it before. Many people thought I’d gone bonkers when I left my husband after twenty-four years. I had to follow my dream. Recently a gene for risk-taking has been discovered. Perhaps I have it in my DNA.

When my marriage ended in 1977 I spent more and more time hiking and taking pictures of the canyons and mountains I visited. I worked from these photos to create a series of silk screen prints that I was able to sell through various art galleries. Meanwhile, I took the basic mountaineering course (BMTC) offered by the club, just to see if I could do it, not because I had it in mind to climb any mountains. My three sons, Robert, Tom and Steven, took the course along with me, as did my friend Mary Ann Webster.

In BMTC we first had to do a conditioning hike, at least fourteen miles and 4000 elevation gain. In succeeding weeks we studied map and compass, basic knots, how to pack for the wilderness, etc. Then we made an expedition to Joshua Tree National Park to practice what we’d learned. Here we also did basic rock maneuvers, and a dulfersitz rappel. That’s the kind where you don’t use any hardware, only a rope. The top end is securely anchored. You then wrap the rope around yourself in a manner to produce friction, which keeps you from falling, as you walk down the wall, perpendicular to it. If this sounds complicated, it is. And to Mary Ann and me it was extremely difficult, not to mention anxiety prone. My three boys and her daughter Joanne just loved it. They could have rappelled all day, but we were shaking all over and didn’t want to do any more than the one we had to do in order to pass the course.

We learned how to do a self-arrest on steep snow with our ice axes, how to walk on snow employing the plunge step, how to glissade, how to build a snow shelter (in case you ever got stranded). Then we had a weekend snow camp in the Sierra in order to put it all into practice.

Early the next summer, my hiking buddy, Milly St. Charles, and I read about a trek with the Canyon Explorers Club to the high Atlas Mountains of Morocco. Since we were experienced hikers who liked to rough it, we would have none of those ordinary tourist bus vacations. Canyon Explorers promised us a land where village life is timeless, untouched by the twentieth century, where we could shop in exotic marketplaces, trek through tiny Berber villages, and climb the highest summit in North Africa. We signed up. Within six weeks we had whipped our bodies into shape and were landing in Casablanca.

Where was Rick’s Café, the Casbah, Bogie saying, Play it again, Sam? I could see only customs lines; speech was impossible over the din of human voices clacking away in Arabic or French.

I didn’t pay much attention to Martyn at first (just another guide getting paid to herd us about). But I noted that he was at home in either English, Arabic, or French. His English accent required a bit more concentration than I could muster after the long flight, so when he told us we were going by taxi to Marrakech, I just squeezed into a back seat between Millie and a guy named Fred. These so-called taxis were ancient American sedans, which looked like rejects from a Demolition Derby. We’d been on the road for scarcely half an hour when our driver stopped the car and motioned us into a smoke-ridden, fly infested café. He ordered mint tea for us, indicated where the rest room was, then hastily departed, leaving us bewildered.

I’ve read stories of people being abducted and sold into white slavery in this part of the world, Milly said. We all laughed, but it did seem rather ominous; our driver had disappeared with our luggage, we hadn’t seen anyone else from our group, and no one in the café spoke anything but Arabic.

An hour passed before Martyn appeared and explained that our driver had gone off to help one of the other drivers with a flat tire, and (not speaking English) could not tell us where he was going. Martyn’s accent made a distinct impression on me this time, along with his muscular frame, curly red hair and mustache. Was it my imagination, or did his eyes sparkle when they came close to mine?

Oleander shrubs and eucalyptus trees bordered the Macadam road as we drove south towards the snow-streaked mountains. Soon a tall minaret and palm trees came into view and we drove through the gates of the red-walled city of Marrakech. The driver made his way through a maze of narrow, dusty streets and deposited us in front of an old three storied building near a busy intersection. This dingy nondescript building was to be our hotel while in Marrakech?

Not exactly the Ritz, I said to Milly.

Martyn cautioned us not to drink the tap water or brush our teeth with it without first purifying it with iodine crystals that had been provided to us by the Canyon Explorers Club. My room, which I shared with a congenial couple, was on the second floor facing the street. I soon learned to take the stairs because the rickety elevator didn’t seem trustworthy. Outside my window was a veritable plethora of people dressed in long jelabas and turbans, women whose faces were covered by veils; street urchins, donkey carts, dusty old vehicles held together with wire, bicycles by the hundreds, a few shepherds driving their flocks of sheep or goats; all this accompanied by horns, bells of donkeys, bicycles, buses and cars – truly a mixture of modern and biblical times.

The next day we left in a junk heap of a bus, bumping along over a steep and winding road to out first destination: a tiny village called Imlil, at 5000 feet. Primitive pink stucco buildings surrounded the dusty dirt streets on either side. Chickens, sheep, goats and dogs wandered about everywhere, but the curious children and adults of all ages who came out to inspect us wherever we went were especially numerous. Our quarters, in a hut built by the French Alpine Club, consisted of three dormitory rooms, each containing eight double-decker bunks. As good luck would have it, Martyn and I shared the same room. Later, at happy hour, I offered him a drink from my bottle of Scotch. He told us about some of his experiences in the mountains; how he had guided his father up the Matterhorn when he was only nineteen years old, how he had helped rescue a man who was suffering from snow blindness. My admiration increased with every mountaineering story he related.

We devised a system of cooking meals at the huts by dividing ourselves into groups of four each and taking turns conjuring up gourmet meals out of the food provided by Martyn, namely a variety of tinned and packaged meats and staples from England, supplemented with local vegetables and occasional fruits. The English food was a challenge to any cook, and soon a stiff competition developed among the groups to see who could make the best meals our of such unaccustomed things as steak and kidneys, lemon curd, beef curry, and various sausages.

Every day Martyn led a hike to an interesting place in the mountains, the hikes increasing in difficulty in order to prepare us for the final climb of Mt.Toubkal which was over 13,000 feet in elevation. I was among the stronger hikers and usually up front with Martyn. The day we returned from climbing the second highest peak I said to him, You know, you remind me of a boyfriend I used to have back home. You’re about the same age I’ll bet. I was thinking of John, a tall cowboy type from Utah who was fifteen years my junior.

Martyn grinned and gave me a friendly snicker. Just how old do you think I am?

Hmmm, about thirty-five, I should think.

He laughed. Many people think I’m older. But you’re not too far off. Twenty-eight.

Twenty-eight I winced. I find that difficult to believe. You seem so mature. He was one year older than my oldest child!

At the next hut, ten miles closer to our goal, the sleeping arrangements were similar. There was only one bunk left by the time I got my duffel from the porter, and of course it was directly above Martyn.

Do you always sleep in a tee shirt? he commented, observing my legs as I climbed up to my bunk.

Oh, my God! I screamed. There’s a huge black spider on the ceiling directly above me!

He mimicked my accent, You’re not afraid, are you?

You’ll have to rescue me if it comes any closer, I tittered.

And so the flirtation continued. Martyn would leave me notes with spiders drawn on them in place of his signature.

About a week into the trip we reached the Meltner Hut at over 10,000 feet. It was from here that we were to climb to the summit the next day. On the upper story of this A-frame structure built by the French Alpine Club, two long platforms ran beneath the rafters, with an aisle in between. An enormous mattress stretched the length of each platform, and on these two mattresses we put down our sleeping bags, side by side. Those persons who had to be near the outhouse because of the touristas (our name for the tourist type of diarrhea), and those who snored loudly, were banished to a room downstairs, with people from other climbing parties. Milly noticed that Martyn was downstairs. She went downstairs and asked him if he would like to sleep upstairs with us. Only if I can sleep next to Edna, he said.

My heart leaped.

After dinner, while everyone else was partying downstairs, I felt detached. What I really wanted was to be alone with Martyn. I left the group unobtrusively and climbed up the ladder to the loft. I sat on the big mattress and began writing in my journal. In only a few minutes I heard that wonderful voice, What are you doing up here all by yourself? Want some company? Martyn sat down beside me. I offered him a drink.

We shouldn’t drink too much, he said. We have to climb tomorrow. Just a wee bit. He took a swig out of my bottle and moved a little closer. Just then the rest of the group arrived for bed. After undressing in front of each other so as to reveal as little as possible, the twelve of us climbed into our respective sleeping bags, and settled down to tell a few stories before falling asleep. With Martyn next to me I lay awake, my heart pounding, listening to his breathing. Before long we were exchanging caresses in the dark, trying to be absolutely silent in the process. I’m afraid I didn’t get much sleep that night.

After a meager breakfast we began climbing at seven-thirty in the morning. My lack of sleep, the altitude, and the whiskey I’d drunk the night before combined to give me a pounding headache, not the best condition for climbing 3000 more feet. But somehow I struggled to the 13,655 feet summit. We took