Finding sanctuary in the storm
This was not a day for poor decisions: it could get me lost, or worse, Nick Allen writes.
The rain was falling uphill, parallel with the windward face of the narrow ridge. The sound of the wind was immense: booming bass notes were drawn out through the sharp gullies, the mid-tones howling as the air tore on the rocky outcrops and screamed through the tussock.
The rain pelted my jacket, making its own plastic noise. I’d drawn the hood tight, creating a narrow slot just big enough to look through. The raindrops striking my uncovered face stung, as did the bite of the wind on my exposed skin. Visibility extended only a few metres in front of me, the ridge bleeding into the angry grey ahead and below.
I gave a small tug on the straps of my pack, drawing it in closer to my body, making it more secure as the wind attempted to claw it from my back. I had only been on this ridge once before, and then when it was covered in snow. In the absence of snow, there were occasional hints of a path in the mosses, tussock clumps and scree slopes. But they were only hints: there was no marked path or route by which to travel. I had neither a sense of direction nor a frame of reference other than the upward rise of the ridge and the gradual gain of my altimeter.
The ridge, leading to Te Atuaoparapara, climbed steadily and seemed repetitious: a few steps across the unstable scree turned into a scramble up rocks and tussock, then scree and scrambling again.
I knew I was on the ridge and that, if I needed to, I could use my altimeter to pinpoint my location on the map carefully sealed in a zip-lock bag in my chest pocket. I knew where I was, I had a place to stand, and the lack of visibility did not need to worry me.
Gusts of wind carrying sheets of rain buffeted me as I found myself increasingly exposed. The enormity of the storm and the precariousness of my position dawned on me. I drew my hood tighter, took a deep breath and exhaled. The senses of being at home and of living in fear are both states of mind.
In the past, I’d allowed myself to worry in circumstances much less severe, putting myself under needless stress – stress that can lead to poor decision-making. Today was not a day for poor decisions: it could get me lost, or worse.
I took stock. My jacket, impervious to the rain and wind, sealed in the warmth trapped by the fabric of my fleece pullover zipped tightly around my neck. My pack sheltered my back and shoulders from the driving chill of the wind. I had been in these conditions before, and my gear had proven itself strong and reliable – there was no need to worry. I was well clothed and prepared. I felt deeply at rest and secure. I had nothing to do but to be, to move and to enjoy the savage beauty of the storm. I was at home in the space extending just a few millimetres from my skin.
I was surprised by this sense of at-home-ness, particularly given its contingency on my ability to move. To stop moving would surrender the layer of warmth to the cold. In the face of the antihome – cold, vulnerability – home felt most sweet.
I reached the trig marking the summit feeling unassailable, even slightly smug. I took shelter and removed my pack. The wind lashed the outcrop, making it difficult to stand. Its cold fingers drew the warmth out of my back, now damp with sweat and unprotected.
I suddenly felt the pressure of urgency. My home was under threat. This was no place or time to rest. I opened the chest pocket of my jacket and pulled out my phone and map. Both were in sealed ziplock bags but neither was dry. The map had largely disintegrated into the water pooling at the bottom of the bag. My sense of place now relied only on my memory, and on my ability to follow the ridge back down to the hut. My heartbeat quickened.
Even more alarming was the realisation that my phone had stopped functioning properly. There was too much water inside the bag. I needed to turn the phone off to protect it. I watched the phone power down. Security was slipping away, and fear laid siege to repose.
I put the phone inside my pack and stood to leave. Facing the brunt of the storm, I started to shiver.
High above the Haast Valley, I shot a glance back down into the deep blues and blue-greens of the land below: golden-green ridges, topped in snowfields that caught the growing yellow of the sky. Below I could see Brewster Hut, the point from which we had started several hours earlier, perched on the tussocked edge of a glacial shelf that dropped steeply in the valley.
The scene was astoundingly beautiful, but I felt agitated. I was walking up Mt Armstrong with some friends and we had reached yet another false summit – the second we had encountered that morning. A false summit, like a mirage, holds out the promise of arrival and homecoming. Spurred on by the draw of the peak, we pushed up those last few metres, kicking our crampon-toes hard into the crusty snowpack, racing to the top.
We arrived heaving for air and bent over, hands on burning legs, only to find that there was no arrival – nothing but another departure. The false summit leaves you wanting, disappointed, exiled.
‘‘F... this,’’ my companion said as he looked up towards the summit.
‘‘It’s only another hundred vertical metres or so,’’ I replied, looking at my altimeter. We stood for a moment. The sun was low enough to shine beneath the cloud out to the east where it was still clear. I looked to the left, across to Mt Brewster. Cloud was streaming over the peak, the wind aggressive and cold. These were harbingers of an approaching front.
‘‘I think we should press on.’’ We started up the slope again. I was feeling tired. I was unwell. I was supposed to be resting. In fact, I had walked and scrambled my way up to Brewster Hut with the express purpose of relaxing, of recovering a sense of place, and not of climbing. I had just finished writing a book. Never had I done anything so gruelling. Never had I felt so far removed in alien spaces from any sense of secure repose. I wondered if I would ever again experience that wholeness of self that comes with home. The struggle of writing had left me exhausted. I struggled to find anywhere to stand.
That’s why I was here, returning to a space that had once provided a sense of home. Arriving at Brewster Hut, I had met a team of glacier guides set to climb Armstrong. They were an exciting bunch, fun and lively, and on a whim I decided to go along.
I knew I should have stayed and rested, but the lure of the peak was too great to ignore. The ice broke brittle beneath our feet, shattering as we punched through the rime that had covered the face of the mountain, the ice shapes showing the contours of the wind. We were only a few metres from the top now, and despite the deep fatigue I pushed on to the lonely cairn that marked the summit.
The view was astounding, and offered a clear sight up and down the Main Divide. My eyes ran up the ridges, through the gullies and along the saddles to the peaks around me. I found myself suddenly overwhelmed by a sense of potentiality.
Hundreds – a lifetime’s worth – of possible climbing objectives and routes opened up. Innumerable expressions of home lay before me, waiting to be found. The solidity of the mountains, the force of their unyielding stand against time, gave me a sense of security: in my lifetime, these mountains would never cease to provide opportunity. A sense of repose came flooding in. There was nothing left for me to do but to simply enjoy being.
For just a moment, it felt as if I’d been afforded a glance through that door upon which I have been knocking all my life, into the truest sense of home.
❚ This is an edited extract from Home: New writing, edited by Thom Conroy, Massey University Press.