I’d been in Chamonix three days, and already I’d fallen down an unexpected snow slope in the Aiguilles Rouges and had a run-in with a fervently anti-British campsite owner. An eventful trip already, but alpinism was what I was here for - all that remained was to learn how to do it properly.
I was to learn by the strange process of Convillisation. Unique to British mountaineering, the efficiency and speed with which new, competent young alpinists are produced these days is worthy of a well-oiled machine. Every three days a batch of approximately eight untreated raw products known as “Scottish winter climbers” or similar enter this great system. Then having been thrown down a few crevasses, dragged out of bed at 4am, and marched to the top of a 3,500-metre peak they pop out the other end as the finished authentic article. Foul smelling, sleep-deprived and with an appetite for unnatural quantities of pasta and baguettes. In short, alpinists.
Jonathan Conville was a competent young alpinist who died at 27 on the North Face of the Matterhorn in the winter of 1979/80. Set up by his parents in Jonathan’s honour, the Conville Trust provides young, hard-up mountaineers with the chance of three days professional guiding for the almost incidental sum of £58. It costs them £180. Many of the current crop of leading UK climbers first started out on a Conville course, and with summer approaching, it’s nearly time for the next batch of proto-alpinists to pack their bags. Maybe you’re even thinking of applying yourself - so let me take you inside the machine.
After playing about on the aptly named Mer De Glace (Sea of Ice) and practicing crevasse rescue on the Glacier Du Tour (my partner here, the vertically-challenged Tony, was unable to pull me out), our Conville course culminated with an ascent of the Aiguille Du Tour via the Normal Route, “facile” but a route nonetheless. Sleeping, or not , at 2,700m had been interesting since it was the first time any of us had spent a significant amount of time at height. Even so I rose with ease at four, tremendously excited at the prospect of my first real alpine route – one with snow, crevasses and the potential for dying a horrible death. As we trekked up the glacier towards the Col Superieur Du Tour in the shimmering pre-dawn light, I was the happiest man in the world. The only time I had previously seen the Alps was in the heat of the day, and despite the inconveniences of having to leave my bed at an unnatural hour, this beat it hands down.
As we reached the Col on the Franco-Swiss border, we were greeted with a fantastic view stretching across what looked like the whole of the Alps. It might as well have been, you could pick out Monte Rosa, the Alps second highest peak, and many other 4,000ers including the unmistakable spiky mass of the Matterhorn. One day, one day, I thought. The view just got better and better as we scrambled to the summit, marvelled at it even more and turned back towards the hut. The time was only eight, though it seemed to be well-past lunchtime. On the way down we encountered what the French call a “bordel”, literally a “whore house” and meaning any chaos caused by incompetence. A party of about ten Italians, all on the same rope, were attempting to descend a scree slope, but had taken a completely different route to everyone else and were causing rockslides and general mayhem.
No such bordels for us though, in the company of our experienced guides. The experience was invaluable. I was well aware of the theory of how to climb a mountain in the Alps, but to be taken on a practice run like this was priceless. I had learned the basics, met some potential climbing partners and was well and truly set up for the rest of my five-week trip.
A few days later I teamed up with three of my fellow Convillists and trekked up the Mer De Glace with a view to attempting Original Route, a 400-metre rocky number on Aiguille De Ciseaux. We had been deeply frustrated by weather forecasts over the last few days, but it was great that we could still get out. Indeed our day on the Ciseaux took place beneath a blanket of low-lying cloud, although we were occasionally allowed a fleeting glimpse of an atmospheric looking Grand Jorasses. Despite the lack of a constant mind-blowing panorama the route was a good ‘un. It was all graded 4+ and below, but there were still a few very exposed lead pitches. We reached the top of the route at about five, and began the abseil down. Perhaps as two faff-prone first-time British alpinists at the end of a hard day, a multi-pitch abseil was asking for trouble, and for about six abs we would set off predicting “one more after this”, every time discovering that “one more” took us nowhere near the bottom! It was a good first foray into the range though. We were on track.
After our day on the Ciseaux I could be accused of biting off a little more than my grade-hungry teeth could chew. A route-finding error on the North Spur of the Chardonnet resulted in a long and problematic retreat and a 19-hour day, and as a rope of three we faffed for England on the Aiguille Dibona in the Ecrins. After these two fine displays I decided to be a little more conventional, and instead turned my hand to that practiced art of first time alpinists, snow-plodding.
The Gouter Route on Mont Blanc has come in for some bad press of late. Anyone can do it, right? City workers, Japanese tourists, clowns on unicycles juggling a pair of DMM Raptors? It seems to have become the preserve of those who work in an office in London, need to enhance their CV and hire a suave looking guide named Francois. But I loved it. From the moment we left the hut at 1.30 and began the trudge up the first snow slope, the thought “This is MONT BLANC!” reverberated excitedly around my head, and whether I liked it or not, this was the undoubted highlight of my trip.
What made it even better was that once we’d overtaken two or three parties just before the Dome De Gouter, we were the first on the route. Yesterday’s storm had brought fresh snow, no trench to follow, we were route finding. We were making that trench. To us, this wasn’t the tourist route on “the Blanc”, this was a serious alpine route on the highest, grandest mountain in Western Europe. The immaculate snow ridge we followed just after the Vallot hut only served to reinforce this. There were spectacular cornices and seracs, too - silent, deadly yet beautiful in the eerie pre-dawn light. This, for half an hour or so at least, was our mountain.
The mist cleared just after we’d left the summit, and the sunrise brought with it some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen. There were wisps of low-lying cloud encircling the Chamonix Aiguilles, the Aiguilles Rouges reared up, dark and jagged against a bright pink sky, and most inspiring of all was the towering, white-capped dome of Mont Blanc staring down at all before it – brooding and serene in the soft orange glow. We stopped every few metres to take photos, congratulate each other and just take it all in. “We’re alpinists”, was our proud feeling, and we weren’t just still alive but more alive than we’d ever felt before. And without the Conville course, well, who knows?
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