Iceland Traverse 2015

The tempting thing to do with a blog like this is diarise it. I won't. So here's the quick facts, then a bit of editorial...

September 25th - October 1st 2015 - Black Ice Expedition. North-South Traverse of Iceland.

Day 1: Akureyri North Coast to Laugafell Refuge. 45 miles 7hrs01. 7020ft.
Day 2: Laugafell to Nyalidir Refuge. 30 miles. 5hrs00. 4274ft.
Day 3: Nyalidir to Veraslir Refuge. 35 miles. 5hrs24. 2642ft.
Day 4: Versalir Refuge to bottom F26. 23 miles. 4hr1. 2888ft.
Day 5: F26 to Landmanalauger. 20 miles. 3hr21. 3306ft.
Day 6: Landmanalauger to Posmork. Aborted. 7 miles. 1hr33. 2905ft.
Day 7: F208 to South Coast. 62 miles. 9hrs14. 5245ft.

Total
Distance - 222 Miles.
Run Time - 35:34:01 (Moving Time).
Cumulative Time - 6 Days 8hrs.
Elevation Gain: 28280ft.

Background

This trip was the brain child of Robbie Britton. I took my hands off of the wheel for perhaps the first time ever and let Rob arrange sponsorship, the logistics and the film crew. The idea was to traverse Iceland from North to South on foot in a 5 - 10 day time frame. Ground and weather conditions would be the primary dictators of that pace. We had no designs on an FKT if one should even exist. We wanted to enjoy the landscape and the expeditionary nature of such a run, whilst adding a degree of difficulty to it. The camera team of Dan and Iain would travel the ground with us in a 4x4, primarily in order to shoot footage for a short film of our adventure, but also to support us where required.

The film will tell far more than I am able to here, so I look forward to being able to share that.

We were graciously sponsored and funded by Lyon Equipment. Lyon are the UK distributor for many of the best outdoor manufacturers in the business and our kit lists included but were not limited to:

Julbo Eyewear
Petzl Headlamps
Exped Duffels, Tents, Poles, Sleeping Mats, Pillows and Sleeping Bags
Katadyn Water Filter
Optimus Stove and Pan Set
Light My Fire Cooking & Eating Utensils
Trek'n Eat Outdoor Meals
La Sportiva Footwear and Clothing (James)
Gregory Packs (James)

Robbie and I have also worked with Profeet for many years and Robbie posted daily dispatches which can be found here.

We also enjoyed nutritional support from Gu Energy (James), Chia Charge and Tribe (The Team).

The Run

There was a good amount of press coverage over the trip, and Iceland Magazine's article sheds a light hearted but realistic view on our adventure here.

Much of Iceland's coastal scenery mirrors the Lake District

In the end, we came away with much more than I'd hoped. It truly was an adventure. There were many times that individual factors threw themselves in the way of our ultimate success. In no particular order, the major elements & obstacles on the trip are listed below. The running was in many ways, the most straight forward part.

- The high petrol consumption of our 4x4 (incidentally if you ever go off roading on serious terrain, a Suzuki Vitara should only be considered the second very worst option - a Duster is the worst). 40km in, the gauge was showing we wouldn't even make it to half way across the highlands, with the nearest petrol station over 200km away. In the end we went with it to the end of Day One and made a decision to proceed based on the heavy duty nature of the first section, and the fact that the gauge had been going up over the last 20 km. GO FIGURE. When we made it to the petrol station 4 days later, it was with a palpable sense of relief.

- We were told we'd reach impassable river crossings on route, that the 4x4 would get stuck in the volcanic ash and we'd have to dig it out. Neither happened. Though how much of that was chance that full winter seems to have come slightly later than normal, who knows. I do know that we saw only one other human in the first 3.5 days, suggesting we were fairly 'out there' in terms of seasonality and timing.

One of many river crossings on day 1

- The headwind was horrendous. It's easy to say oh yeah there was some wind out there it really affected us, but there were times when running downhill was harder than running up. It also brought ambient temperatures of 0-5 degrees to way below freezing. Had we gone from South to North I would be confident of us having covered the 222 miles at an average of around 50mph. I hadn't expected it to be that much of an issue.

- The temperatures, combined with rain, sleet, snow and the wind made for at times, incredibly challenging conditions. Day 3 was the highlight, when I personally went through all 3 sets of waterproofs and finished in full ski gear including a down jacket and my Russian down mountaineering gloves. That's sure to look professional on film. The risk of cold related illness was exceptionally high and we both relied on all of our experience as well as the support of the crew to be able to keep moving forward. What made it more painful than anything else is that because of the complete lack of vegetation or relief, we could see weather coming for us from up to 30 mins out.

Weather ahead in a rare view of blue sky

- We had no plan for sleeping except camping. Which to be quite frank in some of the wind and weather we faced, would have been nearly impossible on open ground. To get around this, our first 3 days we camped in: A toilet block, a closed refuge with no heating (actually real luxury), a cow shed full of cow shit. These experiences really added to the adventure.

- We 'blew' two whole days, by running to Landmanalauger at the start of the world famous Laugavegur hiking trail, to be told by the refuge owner that literally nobody else was going out on to that trail at this time of year. Weather, snow depth, height of river crossings were the reasons. We went anyway having considered all the risks. In the end, in the worst weather of the week, we turned around less than an hour in to the next day. I know from experience that I can't stand up in 60mph winds, and for a while, both Robbie and I had to lay on the ground on a ridge in order not to be blown off. Linking arms we made it another 1.5km higher before descending cloud together with snow and the wind speed, brought our decision to retreat. When we arrived back at the refuge, the driver of the jeep who was supposed to be ferrying in Dan and Iain called and said that he couldn't get across the river in his car. We would have stood no chance at that crossing or many of the previous, and we would have been forced to make anything up to a 50km retreat with limited rations and emergency gear only. We covered ourselves by taking full down gear and sleeping bags on what was 'only' a 55km day, but it would have been sketchy and time consuming.

- The following day we planned to run out via the F208 Dirt Road east, which during the night got washed away by the glacial outburst off of the Vatnojokull. The video and images we saw afterwards were actually quite scary. Again, we avoided potentially being trapped or worse by the deluge.

- So with our first two routes to the coast literally wiped out, we were left with a 100km road run to the sea, headed west out of the highlands. I was slightly apprehensive of such a long day but in fact we ran a consistent pace for just over 9hrs to make a 99.23km trek to end the journey.

So that's it for now, the trailer and video that Dan and Iain will produce, will give a much better insight in to this trip than my words ever could. Here's a bunch of initial photos I took on my iphone over the course of the week.

What an adventure it was and I'm delighted to say that we worked better than I ever could have hoped, as a team. It's a week I won't forget in a hurry.

Rob is actually in this picture. It was too cold to stop so I hiked on ahead whilst he attended business. It's easy to wander off route in poor weather when there are no features to refer to.

Yours truly in terrain blending desert with the Lakes

Rob making his way on the smooth crushed lava road to Landmanalauger

Iain and Dan also had to battle the weather all week to get the footage they needed.

The beginning stretch of the final day, with temperatures well below zero

With 10km to go, a huge bank of weather missed us by a few kms and instead presented us with a double rainbow. 

Jake

Elbrus 2015

Mt. Elbrus is one of those places you probably most often hear about in a pub quiz. What's the highest point in Europe? Mt Blanc! Nope.

As a teenager, I consumed every book on mountaineering and climbing that I could. Over recent years, my running has taken to higher reaches. The Lake District, The Alps, The Rockies, and the cross over between run, hike and climb becomes blurry in those environs. It's an area of the sport that Killian has brought to the relative masses (in fact you can see Killian attempting Elbrus in the film Dejame Vivir). Moving fast in the mountains requires skills gained through experience in terms of navigation, gear, clothing, footwear and technique.

I've been keen for some time to make a transition in to the higher mountains. We are incredibly fortunate here in the UK. With the Lake District, Snowdonia, The Brecons, The Peaks, The Scottish Ranges, we have opportunities to experience 'real' mountain conditions almost year round. Being up on the tops in bad weather in the British mountains often brings a severity of circumstance, explained with a wry smile to someone with 4000m+ peaks on their doorstep who thinks you must be joking. For me, the Lakes have been somewhere to work on mountain conditioning, navigation, fitness and gear choices, always with the opportunity to retreat or amend a route to safety in a relatively short amount of time. Without a question of a doubt my best running experiences of the last two years have all been in the Lakes. Whether it be a winter day dealing with verglas on the rocks of Wetherlam, a spring round of the Buttermere fells in exceptional weather or the Bob Graham Round in late summer, I've learned a lot. 

When my good friend Hully rang me this Spring and asked me if I wanted to accompany him to Russia to climb Mt. Elbrus, I jumped at the chance. I shared a tent with Hully in 2007 at the Gobi March and we have since gone on to other adventures together including the 4Deserts Series, Comrades, Ironman and Leadville 100. It was a week after the 2011 Leadville 100 that Hully found himself caught in a bush fire during Racing The Planet's Kimberleys 100km Race. He suffered burns to over 30% of his body and together with Turia Pitt, Kate Sanderson and Martin Van Der Merwe, has had a long road back to recovery. His story is an incredible one.

Elbrus. West Peak and high point to the left. 5642m. East Peak - 20m lower - to the right.

The Mountain

Elbrus sits at the head of the Baksan Valley (2100m) in the Caucasus range which separates Russia from Georgia. Recent fighting in the South Ossetia Region and terrorist attacks related to the Russian mafia and the displaced Islamic & Russian populations make the region an interesting one to visit. The foreign office advises against all but essential travel. The reality however is that since severe issues in 2011 when the entire region was closed off, the Russian military presence has been dramatically increased. Passes between Russia and Georgia are closed and the area is tightly controlled. Elbrus is a valuable entity for the Russian government.

We arrived in Terskol, the village below Elbrus via a 4hr minibus transfer following flights from London to Moscow and on to Mineralyne Vody. The trip was an 11 day itinerary building in acclimitisation, before gradually ascending camps up the mountain, leaving three potential summit days to end. 

Our guide Sasha, part of the company Adventure Alternatives, turned out to be an incredible source of information and experience, as a published author, rafting champion and successful mountaineer. On summit day we were joined by his second in command Sasha 2. Between them they had over 230 Elbrus summits to their name. What we couldn't work out was why his two rucksacks were so heavy. However once we reached the high camps we found out he'd packed his books to sell to other climbers. And that he'd carried up six small bottles of vodka. He let us share one. We got no commission on book sales.

The first two days we hiked around the border military zone and up to a prominent observatory, both at 3000m altitude. The relief in the area is dramatic with 4500-5500m peaks dropping down 3000m+ to the valley floor. Views of iconic peaks like Ushba and Donguzorun sent the heart racing and imagination running wild. Elbrus is a very different mountain however. A volcano with two creaters acting as twin sentinels dwarfing everything around, with rough lava fields spilling down underneath the giant ice cap which covers the summit reaches from 4500m+ year round.

Donguzorun and the 7 Glacier

On Day Three we began our first forays up the mountain. Each day we would hike to a new high point, before returning to sleep at lower altitudes and then taking the lift up the following day to our previous high point. As easy as that sounds it also involved man handling 30 cardboard boxes of food and drink, plus 15 kit bags full of climbing gear. First we went up to 3000m, then the famous barrels camp at 3700m through the Lava Fields.

Hiking the Lava Fields at 3500

Next on to the National Park hut (shipping containers) at 3850m. Upon stepping off the chair lift at the highest point lifts travel up the mountain, we saw the rescue team bagging up a body which wasn't the ideal welcome on to the glacier. Sasha pointed out however, that it was as likely to be that of a WW2 soldier (the Germans fought the Russians all the way up here) as it was a climber or skier. The following day we finally arrived at camp s-hole at 4100m via a Snow Cat. 

The Train

The View from 4700m. Ushba is the highest/ twin peak just right of centre

Out on the glacier in the La Sportiva Batura 2.0

Each day I felt strong as we took our time hiking up, the others in the group Frederica, Tony and Hully also responded well to the altitude and we were forming a very strong group. Sasha seemed happy. 

Day 5 and 6 we hiked up to 4750m and spent some times on basic techniques including use of harnesses/ slings, ice axe arrests and getting a feel for the double skin plastic boots and crampons we would need for a very cold and wet summit day. One thing was clear, this mountain had been abused by generations. The toilets were long drops straight down on to the glacier. Human waste just sitting frozen on top. With such heavy melt due to the late season, we came across everything you can imagine as we hiked up the mountain not limited to plane fuselages, bones, frozen shit and WW2 Shrapnel. If you could admire the view and not look down it was a help.

The Toilet. Great view out. Just don't look down.

The weather all week had been exceptional but true to form, come our summit window, things looked very poor indeed. Because Elbrus sits so high above everything else, it creates it's own weather system. The summit was often shrouded in cloud blowing fast across it's upper reaches. 

In the end we decided to go for it at 0200 on the Monday morning, our earliest possible date. The previous night, Sasha had come to our container and told us that four climbers, three Polish and a Russian, hadn't returned from their summit bid that afternoon and were missing. Because the weather was windy with very low visibility and heavy snow there was no option to attempt a rescue. We could be the first to come across them (I think that was his point anyhow).

At 0200 we jumped in the snow cat up to our high point, designed to facilitate summit attempts when the weather window was small. Stepping out of the Snow Cat in to another world at 5100m was quite the experience. We were immediately buffeted by the strong winds and encassed in snow/ ice from the air. I had on all of my listed summit gear and more.

(La Sportiva Base Layer, Centurion Tee, La Sportiva Icon Pullover, La Sportiva Pegasus Lightweight Down, La Sportiva Cham Down Jacket and Storm Fighter Waterproof. Lightweight Tights, Ski Pants and Waterproof Overtrouser. Two layer balaclava and Julbo goggles. Lightweight fleece glove and enormous Down Over Glove. Footwear - La Sportiva Batura and Petzl Vasak Crampons, Drymax Cold Weather socks + Thick Fleece socks. Petzl Summit Evo Ice Axe. Exped Poles. Exped Dry Bags & WP Phone Cover. Petzl Aquila Harness, Two slings and Karabiners. Pack Wise I carried 25 litres with bottles inside my jacket. Petzl Nao 2 with spare batteries which functioned brilliantly in minus 16, 35km winds and heavy snow which was good to find out!)

We moved off in a train, and quickly it became apparent that the two Sasha's were having trouble picking the line due to the weather and darkness. GPS devices were referred to and we zig zagged up and down the flank of the east peak until we found the bottom of the rocks which gave us a line around to the saddle. Between the East and West Summit cones is a small but prominent saddle which offers the perfect resting post between the two stages of the climb. The saddle is quite the arena, with views down both the North and South sides of the mountain, destroyed tents and a disused refuge housed in amongst the rocks.

From the start of the day I had felt dreadful. Weak and sick with no drive. Partially the altitude but partially the level of clothing I had on. Instead of stopping to remove a layer I plugged away and built up a heavy sweat under my top half. Before we'd reached the saddle I had already started to drop back from the group by 10 - 15 yards (almost out of sight) and had torn my trousers with lazy crampon placement. What concerned me most is that I had quickly begun to lose concentration and developed apathy towards the climb. The weather made this incredibly risky where a stronger climber on the day would have felt realtively secure. 

Sasha shouted in to my ear on the saddle and asked if I was ok. I simply responded that I had no power, no drive. He told me to go down immediately. The weather was just starting to clear and after pushing a Mars Bar down I told him I knew when I was going to far and I hadn't reached that point as yet. The issue with the top of Elbrus is that there is no rescue. You and your team are solely responsible for making it back down safely. The next forty minutes we began the steepest part of the climb but I found myself asking Sasha to stop as I knelt down for a break. That was the final straw and I spun on my heel and began descending immediately. In real terms I was at 5425m. 200m vertical and 900m horizontal from the true summit. Roughly 90 mins of climbing as it was that day. It was a simple decision borne out of not putting either myself or the rest of the group at risk. As they say getting up is optional, getting down is mandatory and without being dramatic the risk was too great. 

I arrived back in camp a few hours later. The other three summited 2 hours later and made it back down for a circa 11 hour round trip. Elated to have been granted the window to complete the climb. There was still no sign of the 4 missing climbers, however Sasha had found poles and a backpack on the summit plateau which was an ominous sign.

Upon arriving back down the valley we learned from the rescue man that the three Polish climbers had perished, suffering from a navigational error leaving the summit plateau they descended in the bad weather and became stranded, eventually succumbing to hypothermia likely whilst we were commencing our climb. The Russian climber had fallen in to a crevasse. A very sad note to leave the mountain on.

Elbrus is a very simple climb. As long as you respect the mountain. I certainly learned as much by turning around as continuing on. Much as when a race doesn't go to plan. 

For me the disappointment of not reaching the summit wasn't particularly great initially. Whilst the others had harboured different ambitions, bagging another one of the 7 Summits in Hully's case, the purpose of the trip had been testing my body at higher altitudes, work on fundamental mountaineering techniques, gear choices and operating within an expedition framework. The summit would have been a nice bonus. Of course with the benefit of time, one naturally begins to feel the need to go back and reach the high point. For me it will be a very different trip the second time....

Here is a great little video that one of our party, Tony, made of the entire trip, 13 mins of footage encompassing all 10 days.


 

1:30 - Observatory Climb
2:13 - Ferrying Gear on to Elbrus 
3:00 - 3000m. Lava Fields 
3:54 - Snow Cat above 3800m 
4:23 - National Park Hut 
4:37 - 4000m. Glacier. 
5:13 - 4500m. 
5:29 - 4750m. 
6:15 - Ice Axe Arrest Work. 
6:31 - Camp Shit Hole 
7:32 - 5300m. The Saddle. 
7:55 - Western Peak 
8:17 - 5450m. Fixed Lines. 
10:30 - 5642m. The Guys on the Summit.