Kachina Peak, NM
I had just returned from a week in Monterey, California (elevation ~0'), on the previous
night. I wasn't sure if this week was going to make me lose some of my high-altitude
acclimation or not.
Scott and I met at Robin's house at 5:15am. Robin, being a food snob, had cooked scones from scratch for us while we went over our gear one last time. We were on the road at 6:00 heading for the Taos ski valley. The drive took just under two hours. We parked at the Twining campground parking lot and use the porta-potty there. Once I had applied moleskin to my feet (new boots still not broken in) and we were geared-up, we took off on foot to ascend the ski runs. From the lodge to the top of the highest run is about at 2,400' elevation gain. This represents 2/3 of the total planned rise for the entire trip. I found myself extremely slow-going on the ascent. Even on the easier portions I was having to stop and rest far too often. My legs were almost always anaerobic, it seemed. With help from Scott and Robin I was able to set a really really slow pace that would keep me from stopping quite so much. At any rate I was definitely a limiting factor on the way up. We climbed the lower ski slopes on a maintenance road that winds up from the lodge to the top of the first long lift. This took us over two hours. From there we climbed a really steep (see photogallery) black diamond run which got us close to the top of the hill. One more run, this one a blue square, brought us up to the cabin at the top of the highest ski lift in the system at 11,800'. At this point we left the trails and bushwacked up through the pines to an antenna farm at unnamed 12,012'. This marked our finally having gained the ridge we would follow for the remainder of the trip. After a bathroom break near the antennas we were ready to proceed. Up to this point the weather had been wonderful. We were above snowline from the outset, but the temperature wasn't far below freezing, there wasn't much wind, and the sun was out. There was some cloud formation visible as we climbed the upper part of the ski runs, but nothing too horrible. Once we gained the ridge, however, we could see to the southwest, where the clouds were coming from. A dark storm front was hovering off beyond South Fork Peak and Vallecito Mountain. Also once on the ridge we had the pleasure of a strong wind - we switched over from ear bands and caps to facemasks and goggles, and we donned our wind shells. Travel along the ridge was a relief after all the constant ascending of the ski runs. I was very pleased with my new winter gear as I was quite comfortable despite the rapidly worsening weather. The climb from the weather station to Kachina took us just over two hours. After passing a small cabin on the ridge just below the treeline we emerged onto the slopes of Kachina which consisted largely of loose rocks about the size of watermelons. With about a foot of snow in most places and the relatively steep ascent, this was a pain. There were a lot of bad steps that could easily have damaged an ankle. Also, as we ascended Kachina, the weather worsened considerably. The storm moved over us and the snow began to fall. Visibility was still ok as the cloud ceiling was above us, but it wasn't far up and it was clearly descending. The summit of Kachina is barren and desolate. The view of Lake Fork Peak was impressive, it seems to rise up very sharply from this angle. In the snow and clouds, very little else was visible so the sharp northern face of unnamed 12,535' looked like an imposing monolith. My condition was deteriorating. I was feeling a bit nauseous and I had a constant headache. I was breathing hard at any effort. We talked about this for a bit and came to the conclusion that none of us had eaten enough since breakfast. We ate some power gels and snickers and pressed on. When we had descended into the saddle between Kachina and unnamed 12,535', the storm had envealoped us. Visibility was minimal and there were very strong winds and lots of snow. We could still see the face of 12,535' ahead of us but now it seemed even larger. Seeing the enormity of the climb ahead of us, I made the judgement call that I couldn't trust myself to get over that in my condition and in this weather. Scott wanted to go back to the cabin on the far side of Kachina and making camp there, but we ended up finding a spot to pitch the tent nearby on the saddle ridge. Just off the east side of the ridge there was a spot that wasn't quite horizontal but was considerably less vertical than the rest of the ridge. We had to pack down the drift into a flatish tent pad. Robin's 3-person, 3.5 season tent had a great vestibule that could hold all of our gear, but it was also so large that it took up all of the available flat area. A few steps away from the tent the ground dropped away at about 45 degrees. Needless to say this was a sub-optimal camping location. But the next best thing was the cabin on the other side of Kachina and the weather nixed that possibility. Once we had the tent rigged and the gear stowed, we got inside and I began cooking dinner. I was so hungry now that my stomach was really hurting badly. In addition, Scott was starting to get a really bad migraine. We had chilimac and macaroni & cheese for dinner, along with some cliff bars and tea. We melted a bunch of snow to refill everyone's water bladders and nalgenes. The cooking and melting process took another two hours. By the time we turned off the stove, it was getting dark. Even though it was only 7:00pm or so, I went to sleep in my bag wearing all of my gear except my boots, gloves, and windshell. Sleep lasted about 1.5 hours. I awoke to the sound of thunder and wind racking the tent pretty hard. The tent was holding up just fine, but it was definitely loud. I should have packed earplugs. At this point it was snowing hard outside and the accumulation on the top of the tent was impressive. We would hit the side and hear it slide down, and ten minutes later there would be another good layer. After a few hours of this the slides had produced large drifts along the edge of the tent that were approaching 2-3 feet in depth. The wind outside added to the drifting and by 1:00am, the snow had almost covered the entire tent. With the tent sides covered in thick wet snow, our air vents had been sealed off. I started noticing around midnight that I was having a hard time breathing and that my chest was really tight. I mentioned this to Robin and he said he was feeling the same thing. He suspected that we were lacking appropriate ventillation. To alleviate this and to prevent the tent from collapsing, Robin got out and dug out the tent. This process took about half an hour. The fresh air in the tent was welcome, but it would take me all night to recover and feel like I could breath normally again. I got out of the tent at about 4:00am to go to the bathroom. At this point the storm had subsided. There was still dim lightning flashes somewhere in the distance and there was blowing snow in the air, but there wasn't much accumulation. It was, however, a total white-out and I couldn't see where the ground near the tent fell off into the valley, so I didn't stray far. I brushed off the remaining snow from the tent and went back inside. There was still a lot of wind that would periodically batter the tent. By this time there was a fair amount of condensation inside the tent and when the wind would blow it would rain down on us. The cold water on the face combined with the lound wind noise is a great way to not sleep. I managed a couple hours here and there, but not enough to count for much. Once it got light around 7:00am, I was anxious to cook up some oatmeal and hot chocolate. Robin was also awake, but we didn't want to wake up Scott since he was in a lot of pain from his migraine and we figured we all needed as much sleep as we could get. When he woke up at 8:00, I went to work heating water. We made hot cocoa, coffee, and oatmeal. In my estimation it was the best breakfast ever. The process of getting everything packed up and the tent struck was a long one, but we were ready to roll by 10:00. It had snowed about two feet of fresh powder over night and it was drifting to 6' in places. Unfortunately the weather was still against us. It wasn't too windy or cold, but we were well within a cloud and had next to no visibility. We headed down the ridge towards Lake Fork Peak, but when we got to the ascent of unnamed 12,535', Scott indicated that he was uncomfortable continuing with no visibility and no experience on this route. I seconded the opinion and we made the decision to turn back. In my mind this did not represent a failure on our part. Even though parts of the trip to this point had been miserable, I was having a great time. To be honest it was a relief to hear Scott say he wanted to turn back as it shortened the remaining trip distance by about 10 miles and I was still exhausted from lack of sleep. I would have liked to have gotten to Wheeler, Simmons, and Lake Fork, but they're not going anywhere... The climb up Kachina from the south side was much easier than from the north. We couldn't see the summit until we were almost upon it, but it didn't seem to take very long at all. Once there, Robin suggested that we take the fastest way down and just go straight down the snow slope of steepest angle towards the ski area, rather than following the ridge the way we had come yesterday. We judged the avalanche risk to be minimal in this area so we went for it. The rapid descent was very enjoyable. The snow was deep enough that we could glissade down portions. I tried to take some pictures but my camera had frozen up and wasn't working. My hydration hose was also solid which was a bit of a concern. However, the trip down wasn't nearly as taxing and I required less water. There were some parts near the top when the visibility was low enough that we couldn't see any trees or rocks, only each other. It was total white out. Very odd. Before too long, we made it down to the tree line and could see a ski lift tower down in the distance. Travel down the slopes was extrordinarily fast and in no time we were down on the ski runs making our way back towards the lodge. I suppose I shouldn't find it too surprising, but once we were about 1500' down from Kachina, the sun came out and the temperatures rose. My water unfroze. Kachina and Lake Fork were still packed in clouds, but at least the weather where we were was pleasent. Even the wind was gone, now that we were amongst the trees. In fact, towards the bottom we were getting uncomfortably warm and had to stop several times to remove layers. Once we made it to Lake Form Steam at the valley floor, it was a simple matter of following the stream back to the lodge and the car. This was about 1.5 miles on fairly level terrain. My pack was adjusted poorly and my shoulders really started to kill me, but I knew we were close enough that I could get by. Seeing the lodge appear around a corner was the most welcome site in the world. There were numerous people around the lodge area walking their dogs and taking little low-altitude day hikes. We probably looked odd coming out of the woods with all our gear. With a change into shoes and stowing all of our gear in Robin's SUV, we headed out and back to Taos for some pizza at Taos Pizza Outback. In the end, we only finished about 1/3 of the planned route. But despite the weather and acclimation pains we had a great time and we considered the trip to be a success. Written by Mouser Williams on 2002.10.27
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