Carolyn Bandel roped up to participate in the Northern Trust Mont Blanc 2008 Challenge, and climbed until there was nowhere else to go
"What goes up the mountain, stays up the mountain," is a truism I have grown to adore. But after seven intense days surrounding an ascent of Europe's tallest mountain by a team of climbing novice investment professionals in aid of charity, it would be a shame to keep it all up there.
As the hustle and bustle in the French town of Chamonix wakes up the surrounding Mont Blanc massif, the snowy peaks that accessorise the region's trophy mountain have already long been sparkling in the August sun. No taming of this shrew for us yet though - we leave Mont Blanc behind to meet our guides. They will take our excited group of 20 up some of the gentler peaks in preparation for our final ascent.
This final climb, planned for 26 August to raise £37,000 for Sense International for a new learning centre in the east of India for deaf and blind children, is unintentionally timed around an angry war of words over free access to the mountain after its worst avalanche for a decade, which killed eight climbers shortly before we are supposed to be up there. But the blue skies in the valley at Le Tour don't give away anything of this imminent tragedy to come, and we make our way up to the Albert Premier refuge, our first point of call.
Our journey begins from behind the hut on the north bank of the Tour glacier, mostly used as a base to climb the two most popular mountains of the Tour basin - the Aiguille du Tour and the Aiguille du Chardonnet. The team, led by organisers Jerry Biggs and Gilly Green of Northern Trust and Thames River Capital's Jeremy Charles, chairman of Sense International, uses the edge of the glacier as a learning ground to navigate first steps on crampons, roped-up to prevent disappearing acts down the steep crevasses, the hungry fractures in the glacier.
Over the next few days the chirpy Paul Rice from Northern Trust's Limerick office, Dutchman Marcel Schaap from Aegon, Goldman Sachs' ‘army boy' Andy Deeley, the optimistic Gary Mansfield ("I have only one condition for marriage: She has to be a billionaire"), together with he remaining team members, Jim Connor and John Dallas, from Morse, James Coats from Nevsky Capital, Thames River Capital sunshine Nikki Williamson, Peter Anderson of Barings, Northern Trust flag-bearers Wayne Bowers, Andrew Rosenstein, Laura Williamson, Mark Warren, Charlotte Wilson, Sean Petralia, Will May, and, last but not least, me, get to know each other in this terrain, developing some taste for alpinism.
Leaving the glacier behind the next morning, the Col sup. du Tour displays an impressive view, with the Aiguille du Tour (3,544m) standing proud on the left, while Aiguille du Col du Tour drapes out on the right. We traverse the Trient glacier on our way to the merry wooden Swiss Cabanne du Trient (3,170m), though a steep climb up to the Swiss border and the neck breaking scramble by my team mates Gary, Andy, Jerry and Marcel up the Aiguille du Tour becomes an experience that none of us will forget in a hurry.
Still, the guides keep us safe, leaving a lasting impression by teaching us to master climbs we never thought possible. They are a quirky bunch, equipped with enormous patience: the stoic Rémi, for instance, would brave a hurricane and come out singing; rosy-cheeked Jérôme laughs crevasses in the face - even when Paul Rice completely disappeared in one; as a Tigger to everyone's Winnie the Pooh, Jan is always bouncy and Sev gets on with the job, whether he has to drag you up or not. Albeit an easy equation, a true passion for mountaineering drives every one of them.
Bewildered by mountain impressions, our return to the valley is emotional, not only because buddies, united by three days of new experiences, are divided into pairs, but because the group is split in two: 10 can stay at the Tête Rousse hut (3,167m), while another 10 will sleep 700m higher on the edge of a cliff in the Goûter hut. Attempting the summit from Tête Rousse is the greater fitness test, requiring two to three hours more climbing.
Starting my final ascent from Goûter at 3am on 26 August, my new guide, Aymeric Clouet, and I blink at the convoy of head torches which soldier through the sparkling snow. Our climb would finish long after dawn, slowed down by the effects of such altitude. Aymeric encourages me to concentrate on his walk - one foot in front of the other - as passing team mates, ecstatic to have got so far, wake me up occasionally. Still, the five-hour climb didn't prepare me for the point when there is finally nowhere else to climb: I'm on the top of Europe and feeling like it.
Endlessly feeding me tea and chocolate, Aymeric confessed he was one of the few who got rescued from the avalanche only 48 hours earlier, making it an emotional and difficult journey for him too, despite having climbed the world's most challenging mountains and losing friends to the rocks on the way. He wrote to me later: "I don't know if it is the price to pay to live my passion, but I am sure my passion is stronger than anything else. It gives me the strength to continue this way of life."
Back down, the rope that had become almost an umbilical cord was undone and we made our way to ever-sunny Chamonix to celebrate our victory. An incredible trip had come to an end. As Jeremy Charles put it: "We have all tested ourselves by going outside our comfort zones, down crevasses, up ridges and rocks, on crampons and rope, over ice and snow, within noisy, smelly dorms... and beaucoup de curry poulet. We will have stories to tell for years and years - and they will get longer and longer."
Sense International website: www.senseinternational.org
Website Sev Marchand: www.guidesandco.com
Website Aymeric Clouet: www.shiningwall.com
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