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Approaching the Face
Our first full day out on our own was spent in a quick sortie up the South face of Mt Aylmer...

A not-too-early start saw us roped up and walking across the Tasman Saddle in the early dawn light. John pointed out the lay of the crevasses and we sidled quickly across to the base of the peak.

With a little uncertainty, we picked out respective paths onto the face itself. Geoff and I chose a nice ice bridge spanning a crevasse at the base of the face, immediately below a nice short section of near vertical ice, which then gave way to a gentler slope of what appeared to be a consistent grade for as far as we could see. Nick and John decided on another bridge further to our right, offering access to an easier slope of more consistent grade.

Initially I walked with Geoff to the face, but as I stood beside him on the narrow bridge of ice, staring into the yawning blue chasm below, I felt it was probably wiser to back off a little distance and let Geoff fix a belay whilst belayed himself. 'Just in case' !

A couple of minutes of silent waiting and then Geoff looked over to me and said quietly, " OK ... On Belay!"

This is it... I'm doing it for real now !

Gingerly I stepped forward onto the bridge and squared myself before the wall. My first strike with the axe did not fill me with confidence. Not high enough. Not hard enough, and too far to the right. Sparky's' hammer bites nicely though and I front point up a little. Right then... now I'm off the deck and really leading... on ice!

The Climb
Onward and upward I went, slowly feeling my way and not getting any more comfortable about it. The bloody axe was just way too long for the length of the hammer!. I couldn't make it bite anywhere near as well. Every time I try to look up my helmet was stopped by my back pack. I had to twist my neck sideways to get any sort of view upwards. The friggin' mittens robbed me of any dexterity at all and worst of all seemed to make the tool handles slippery. I was just not happy! Off to my right I could see Nick was steadily leading his first pitch and was a little way ahead of me.

I'd only gone about 2-3 meters up and the angle suddenly eased off to about 50 degrees, and I felt better as I climbed over the transition. Looking down between my feet as I stepped up, I caught a glimpse of Geoff crouched at his belay, peering solemnly up at me, and watching every move. It occurred to me that if I came unstuck here, I'd quite likely turn Geoff into a pincushion, landing on him with my crampons. Trying to push that thought from my mind I kicked myself up another step, and still looking down, watched in horror as the rope kicked off a small lip and swung effortlessly into the path of my swinging boot. Crampon points forward. In slow motion I watched as one of my front points neatly speared the rope and pinned it to the face. There is only one thought rattling around in my head now... FUCK ! FUCK !!! FUCK !!!!!!

Geoff was still looking up at me as I waggled my foot in the air trying to dislodge the rope from my front points. It wasn't cut through, but it was punctured. Very carefully now, I stepped up a bit more and decided that I should probably re-attach myself below the damaged part of the rope. With the easing of the slope it was easy to stop and free my hands. I cleared away the surface ice and twisted in one of my screws. Initially it went in well, but got very difficult to turn. My 2nd hand jobs didn't have the neat little handles Geoff's monsters had! As I was still holding on with the hammer for balance I could only turn it with my right hand. Pushing too hard, I manage to succeed in popping my thumb backwards from it's socket. The sudden pain adding to my increasing frustration caused a long string of expletives to come flooding out. Using the ball of my hand I get the screw all the way in and clip into it. Ahhh... relief.

Feeling a little better about life now, I put a second screw in, and pulled up the rope. Clipped into a bight below the crampon damage, and prepared to bring Geoff up. I'd only gone about 10 meters but that was enough for now. I need to sort myself out. "Geoff, Come up", I called. Geoff must have been keen to move by now. I'de been moving and exerting steadily for a while now and was quite warm, but Geoff's been crouching in the shadows with not much to do and must have been freezing.

He quickly striped his belay and climbed up to meet me. By the time he got to my stance, I'de managed to get my head (and thumb) together a bit better. I'd ditched the mittens and my thumb was hurting like a bastard, but for all that, we were both secure, and in the growing light of the day, climbing the icy face of a mountain peak !

Geoff led off, onwards and upwards. His path took him over to the left which is good. A fall there wouldn't land on me. Nick and John were into their second pitch with Nick leading again. They were actually pretty close to us now. It seemed kind of cosy working as two separate teams, but as close as we were. All too soon Geoff was calling me up. He had done about 40 meters. An excellent innings.

I stripped my belay and plodded up in his tracks. The sun was getting fairly high now and would soon be on us. Above was nothing but white face and blue sky. As I reached Geoff's stance I glanced up to see Nick belaying John. Nick was about 10 meters above us on our right. Following the snaking line of their rope upward, I could see John starting a new stance about 30 meters ahead of Nick , but over to our left. (Much where our line was taking us), putting us in between the two of them. Geoff passed me the hammer and asked how was going. Chatting quietly and exchanging light banter with Nick, we both looked up and were surprised to see that Johns' gone !
 

The Monster
Actually, he wasn't really gone. He just wasn't in his stance anymore. In fact, he was sliding past us at a huge rate of knots, cluthcing the rope to his chest and saying.
"OOOoooOOOOOooOoOOOOooOOOoOooOOO".

Instantly Geoff and I both threw ourselves to the face burying our tools to the hilts and with one voice yelled "Nick! Hold!".

Time stands still ...
Nick holds.
Time stands still ...
John bounces to a stop at the end of the rope, by now about 20 meters below us.
Slowly time starts again ...

The taught rope between John and Nick's belay, was running across the back of my head and shoulder, but John's slide had pretty much been fully arrested by then. From my semi pinned position I saw a 'flash' in the snow, as Johns' big wooden handled axe slipped down the slope, following John's trajectory. Geoff' saw it too and again we yell, in unison.

"John... Your axe".

With perfect precision, John leaned out and snatched it back as it slid past him. Whew, a close call averted.
Looking up at Nick now, we could see he's been pulled up from his stance and was hanging upside down in his belay, still holding the rope locked off.
"Nick!", Yells Geoff, "Your axe too..."

Nick's axe was lying about 2 meters below him on the slope, caught in a loop of rope. Carefully he pulled up the loose end until it dragged the axe close enough for him to reclaim. Unfortunately he knocked his hat off in the process and with just a hint of irony, we watched it hurtle past us and disappear down the slope we had just spent the last 30-40 minutes climbing. Oh well ... better the hat, that the axe.

Our confidance in ice-screws has reached new heights !.

John carefully got his footing and without skipping a beat, simply started kicking steps back up the slope again.
Geoff and I disentangled ourselves from the rope and, now satisfied that everyone was OK,  continued the next section.
Heading off to the left as much as possible, to give Nick and John room to maneuver away from the rock band above us, my lead was uneventful and after what seemed an age, Geoff called out for me to stop. Thankful at being able to rest a tad,  I dug a 'T'-anchor and brought Geoff up to lead the next pitch, which he did in fine style. The sun had risen quite high by now and despite the excitement of the earlier events, this was the most memorable image of the day for me.

The Summit
Below us the entire Upper Tasman Glacier was stretched out in all it's splendor. Way, way, way below, I could make out the little dots of the ASM class going through some crevasse rescue training. Briefly I wondered if they had seen our misadventures before. Probably 'not', I assumed. (As we later found out, I couldn't have been more mistaken, in fact, a year later we found that stories of Johns' slide ar still being recounted back at the ASM).

Above me was a steep slope of seemingly perfect snow and ice, ending abruptly in a seemingly perfect cloudless sky. Way above me, right at the boundary where white met blue, and joined to me by my starkly purple rope, was the brightly colored speck of Geoff, as he kicked and stomped his way upward towards the top that was still hidden from us. Sunlight glinted off his axe and snow and ice exploded into the air as he worked his way over the corner, out of he shade and into the first rays of the full sunlight above.
As quickly as the image imprinted itself on my mind, he was out of sight. Gone just a surely as if he had climbed into the very sky itself.

The only indication of his progress now being the snaking upward of the rope, and the sporadic chunks of debris falling down as he dug an anchor to bring me up. I followed  up in extremely good spirits. Finally, this was what we had come here to do. And we were doing it ! The rope had run short about 15m from the summit and Geoff motioned for me to continue. In front of me now was the last small ridge before the top. Having been in the sun for a few hours now, the ice on the top was quite soft, and eagerly I plugged my way up through it, to the short slope on the left hand side of the ridge, and walked carefully to the very top. Nick and John were a short way below on the right hand side. I pushed both my stake and axe into the snow and clipped them both, while calling to Geoff to come up, and in a few minutes all four of us were standing at the top of our first real climb together. An excellent opportunity for photos and to survey the awesome country on the other side of the range.
This had been a 'pretty easy climb', I was thinking. Little did I know what getting back down would be like.

Getting Back Down
In truth, getting back down via the West ridge was pretty easy too, although I absolutely freaked out at the rock step.
I was already feeling a little exposed as we stepped from the security of the snow onto the sloping rock. A huge crevasse loomed below the rock looking for all the world like a bottomless pit. On the other side of the rock ? About a 1 km fall into the Whymper Glacier to the North. Geoff and I sat back and watched as Nick and John carefully picked their way down the sloping rock steps. Their crampons making metallic clicks and scrapes as they moved. Almost casually they both reached the final steps, (the ones closest to the gaping crevasse), and jumped to the level patch of soft snow beyond. Geoff looked uncomfortable, and I could feel my own uncertainty rising by the second. Glumly we scanned the rocky outcrop behind us for an easy anchor point.

No luck there.

We either had to construct a fairly elaborate anchor and leave it behind, or just walk down without one. We went without an decided to let Geoff go first while  belayed from a comfortable sitting position. This worked well and then  it was my turn. I got about half way down and suddenly it was all just too much for me. I was perched on an outward sloping rock step, with a huge gulf yawning open just below me, absolutely convinced that if I moved even a muscle, I'd simply slip off the face of the earth. Knowing I couldn't just sit there, I tried to move forward, froze and pushed myself back again. Nick was looking stressed. I knew I was making far too much out of this, but I couldn't stop looking into the maw of the hole below me. Geoff called encouragement and pointed out where to put my feet, but what I really really wanted was a good hand hold or two. And on that rock there just bloody weren't any! Even the cracks in the rock were too small and they all faced out anyway... Little by little I slid myself forward and down towards Geoff and after what seemed like hours, slithered to the safety of the snow. Immediately all was OK ... The rest of the walk back to Kelman Hut was uneventful, with the exception that Nick managed to detour to find and retrieve his errant hat. That's gotta make his day brighter !

A New Legend is Born
Dinner that night in the hut was a very noisy affair as all the groups melding into one, excitedly re-counting the days adventures.
Suddenly Adam turned to us excitedly and asked ...
"So that was YOU guys up on Aylmer! .. WHO HAD THE MONSTER ?!?!?"
We all looked back blankly .. "Monster?"
"Yeah, I was just standing there screaming and pointing, my class thought I'd gone nuts!... Who took the big slide ?"
"Oh... that !... That was nothing ... just a little slip !...", John sipped his brew and grinned quietly.

Both Geoff and John called a rest day for tommorow, but with the perfect weather conditions, Nick and I decided to try our luck on the Hockstetter Dome traverse.
Throughout dinner and the rest of the evening I found my self staring out of the windows at the looming bulk of the 'Dome across the glacier from us. Trying to spy the route we would be taking. A restless and disturbed sleep heralded out early morning start.