The Next Horizon

by Chris Bonington

  That night the weather broke and they found themselves in the direct path of a constant torrent of spindrift which came pouring down from the upper reaches of the face. It penetrated behind their tent, and pushed them inexorably off their ledge, till they were hanging from their ropes. Inside a bivvy tent in bad weather it is almost impossible to remain dry – breath and steam from cooking condenses on the walls and inevitably runs into clothes and sleeping-bags. By morning their gear was soaked through, and they were beaten. They baled out at dawn and fled back to the valley. The Eiger – and the Germans – were winning.

  The following day the weather improved and the Germans were back on the face, where they continued to work their way slowly up to the foot of the First Band. They dug out a snow cave immediately beneath it and this was to prove to be the secret of survival on the face. A tent bivouac sack is of limited use, since once the weather breaks, it is almost impossible to remain dry inside one – as Dougal and Layton had just discovered to their cost. In a snow hole, however, it doesn’t matter what the weather does – once the cave is dug you can remain inside it for as long as your food lasts. There are no condensation problems and there is an inexhaustible supply of water from the snow that comprises the walls. Even if there is a hundred-mile-an-hour gale outside, the air is quiet inside the cave and the temperature remains the same – just below freezing mark.

  But we still had to learn the snow-hole game. It was becoming increasingly obvious to me that our little team of three was inadequate for the style of siege operation which was seemingly essential if we were to have any chance of success. At the very least we needed four – two men to go out in front to make the route, and place a continuous line of fixed ropes, and two men to ferry loads behind. The entire concept of the climb had changed and with it my role. Before, there was no question of my venturing beyond the bottom of the face, since the team planned to cut adrift from the bottom and make a single push for the top. Now, with a continuous line of fixed ropes it was possible for me to go very much higher up the face, getting better photographic coverage of the climb and, at the same time, helping the team by being a fourth man. When they got high enough to make their bid for the summit, I could then either come back down again or accompany them all the way to the top. At an early stage of the climb, John had invited me to join them fully, but though I toyed with the idea, I never felt totally committed to the climbing; whether because of the strength of my own interest in the photographic coverage of the climb, or an awareness of the risk-level still involved in that final push, I am not at all sure. Having got out of the project once, I never really felt like committing myself totally to it again. Nevertheless, there was a part-commitment. We now had to adapt to the Germans’ siege tactics, digging a snow cave at the foot of the Rock Band and laying siege to the Band. They had already started at a point about 200 feet to the right of the Eiger Station window, up an obvious fault. The line Layton had chosen was very much more direct, and also looked considerably harder. Layton, Dougal and I set out in the early hours of the 28th February, for the foot of the face. The Germans were already ensconced below the Rock Band. We climbed the fixed ropes of the bottom third of the face in the dark, reaching the foot of the rock-wall in the dawn. Whilst Layton climbed, and Dougal held his rope, I was to dig a snow hole. The first problem was to find the right kind of snow. I needed compacted old snow of sufficient depth to tunnel into till I reached the rock, and then to be able to make a room large enough for four to sleep in. It had to be in a place where the hard underlay of ice was well covered, for it is near-impossible to cut away large quantities of ice – in winter it is much too hard and it would take all day to dig away a small ledge, let alone a room.

  I was learning the hard way. We hadn’t thought of taking a shovel and I quickly discovered how inadequate an ice axe is as a tool for digging. But how about the Germans, next door? They had dug a vast cave which they called the Ice Palace. They had everything, and were sure to have a shovel. Could I ask them? If so, would I make our team beholden to them? What would John think of that? We were still deeply suspicious of each other and had had only the briefest of conversations to determine some kind of modus vivendi on the face.

  We had agreed that both parties should use the line of fixed ropes from the bottom up to the foot of the Rock Band. Thus far, honours had been fairly even, for although the Germans had made the bulk of the route in the first 1,500 feet, Dougal and Layton had climbed the last 500, which gave, technically, the most difficult climbing. Now we had chosen separate lines, ourselves going for a series of ice gullies once we had reached the top of the First Band, and the Germans heading up the line of a rock buttress to its right. The big problem would come above the Flat Iron bivouac, in the upper part of the face, for there seemed only one feasible line up this, and whoever got there first would be able to stay in the lead. It was like Patagonia all over again, with our team once again outnumbered. This was not mountaineering in the pure, uncompetitive sense, but there was no doubt that the competitiveness added a touch of spice.

  But now, on a more practical level, I wanted to borrow a shovel from our competitors – but should I? No, it could possibly put us in their debt; and so I chipped away with my miserable little axe for another half-hour. Or could I? What harm was there in it, anyway? They could only say No. Finally, I made up my mind, swallowed pride and crawled out of the short burrow I had dug, to borrow from the hated next-door neighbours.

  There was a purr of a petrol stove from their burrow; a delicious aroma of fresh coffee wafted from its entrance. I poked my head through. ‘Guten tag.’

  A grunt.

  There was only one of them in the cave, looking very comfortable wrapped in a sleeping bag on a foam mat. I tried some English. ‘Do you think we could borrow your shovel?’

  ‘I don’t know at all. Why didn’t you bring one up yourselves?’

  ‘We never thought of it.’

  ‘Perhaps this will make you think a little better before you set off,’ he said, sounding very self-satisfied – the cat teasing the mouse. It was time to start a different tack – if he was going to be pompous, then two could play at that game!

  ‘Don’t you believe in some fellowship amongst mountaineers? I know you’re not particularly glad that we’re here, trying to do the same route as you, but what possible difference to the eventual outcome can it make if you lend me your shovel? It’ll just make it either easier or a hell of a lot slower for us to dig out a bloody snow hole.’

  ‘I cannot possibly let you have the shovel before consulting my colleagues,’ he replied. ‘I shall be talking to them on the walky-talky in an hour or so, and shall let you know then.’

  I returned, mortified and very angry, to our miserable little burrow and vented my feelings on the snow – every blow of my axe plunging deep into a Teutonic head. The trouble was, you needed an awful lot of axe blows to clear very little snow. About ten minutes later, there was a little cough from behind me. I turned, and there, wearing a wicked little grin, was the German. I was to learn later that it was Peter Haag, co-leader of their team: ‘I have been thinking; it is petty not to let you have the shovel. I haven’t waited to ask the others. You can use it if you want – come and have some coffee cognac when you’ve finished.’

  We had begun to establish a sensible relationship on the face, and as time went by, and we got to know each other as individuals, our lurking sense of competition was accompanied by a growth of real friendship. Peter was one of the few members of his team to speak good English. He had recently finished a degree course in engineering, and was a cheerful happy-go-lucky individual who could never have maintained a savagely competitive stance for long. Jorg Lehne, his co-leader, on the other hand seemed the typical Teuton – harsh in manner with a limited, beer-cellar style of humour, competitive to the end.

  Peter and I talked for a bit until, with renewed vigour, I set to work on the snow hole with my borrowed shovel. It made all the difference. You could use the b
lade of the spade to shape out big blocks, and then could shovel them out from behind quickly and easily By the end of the day I had a room big enough for two. From time to time I climbed out of the hole to photograph Dougal and Layton. Dougal was belayed about halfway up, hanging from a piton and, above him, Layton was slowly and methodically pegging his way up the wall.

  Climbers are never easily impressed by the progress of others, but Layton’s ascent was truly amazing, for the rock appeared to be completely blank, with no cracks for his pitons. Most climbers would have drilled holes for expansion bolts and, in fact, the Germans used several on what seemed an easier line round the corner. This big, gangling man, however, who seemed so ill at ease and awkward on the ground, was in his element, using every little weathering he could find on the surface of the rock. After taking a few pictures, I returned to the hole to dig out some more snow.

  The weather seemed to be getting a little worse. It had started with a perfect dawn: a carpet of cloud at our feet shut out the intrusion of Kleine Scheidegg, its railways and ant-like skiers; overhead the sky was a clear pale blue. But the weather can change fast on the Eiger, and is always unpredictable. A line of high grey cloud had raced in from the west, settled on the summit rocks, and imperceptibly had slid down the wall. A few snowflakes drifted lightly round the grey air – first a flurry and then a steady fall. In a matter of minutes, the spindrift avalanches began to career down the face, their augur a dark shadow, a sibilant whisper, and then an all-penetrating, suffocating downpour of snow crystals infiltrated every chink of clothing and froze any exposed skin. It piled on top of the climber, trying to take him down, down, down into the snows at the foot of the wall.

  Climbing was impossible in these conditions. Dougal and Layton started to bale out. Worried about them, I looked out of the hole. I could hear shouting, didn’t want to leave the shelter of the hole, but the calls became insistent, with a raucous quality of emergency. I swung out on to the fixed rope and worked my way across in a lull between avalanches. Dougal was about a hundred feet above me, hanging upside down!

  ‘I’m stuck,’ he announced, very matter-of-fact. ‘The bloody rope’s jammed. I think I’ll have to cut myself free. Can you get a knife?’ At this point he disappeared in another spindrift avalanche. I hunched into the snow, waiting for the worst of the torrent to rush past and then swung across to the Germans’ snow hole to borrow a knife. Dougal must have been hanging for about half an hour before I managed to tie the knife on to the end of the rope for him to pull up. His position was still risky. Had he made a single mistake, cutting the wrong rope, or unclipping himself incorrectly, he would have fallen, with little chance of survival. He succeeded in cutting away the jammed rope, and got back to firm ground. A few minutes later, Layton, frozen solid and tired from his nerve-racking climb, joined us.

  ‘I’ve had enough, man,’ he told us. ‘I’m going back down till this stuff clears up.’ At this, he plunged down the fixed ropes and soon vanished in the swirling snows. Dougal and I decided to stay up there, spending the rest of the afternoon digging out the snow hole. Outside, the snow was gusting in a high, blowing wind, but inside we were happily unaware of it. Snow holes were, undoubtedly, the secret for tackling big walls in winter.

  Next morning, on finding the snow scudding down the face, we did some more digging, to make the cave big enough for four, afterwards retreating to the bright lights of Kleine Scheidegg. The contrast was, at one and the same time, confusing and yet attractive. On the face life was simple – merely a question of survival. From there, the tiny black dots of the skiers skimming down the Lauberhorn and round the Eiger Gletscher Punch Bowl, were as remote from us as if we had been on another planet. Nearer at hand, the tourists who gazed down at us from the Eiger Window, like so many people goggling into an aquarium, were completely removed from our own private world of wind, snow and rock. What was real – their world or ours? I suspect it was theirs. Back at Scheidegg, we were still in a make-believe atmosphere – this time with a touch of MGM or Paramount included – a world of glamour-story fantasy, of Chateaubriand for two, eaten by one hungry climber, of bucketfuls of champagne, all paid for by the Daily Telegraph magazine, and the endless interest of the press and tourists.

  This kind of atmosphere is meant to be totally abhorrent to climbers and climbing – men of the mountains should be seeking the quiet of the hills, escaping from the vainglory of press coverage – yet I wonder. My position was different from that of the other three. I was part of the media; was the exploiter rather than the exploited and, I must confess, I thoroughly enjoyed it, with the excitement of calls to London and the challenge of getting film, taken on the face, back as quickly as possible. Pete Gillman shared in his side of the story. His own report was factual and accurate. Certainly in no way did he sensationalise the story as so many reporters working for the popular press are tempted to do. Was what we were doing against the interests of mountaineering? I don’t think so. It certainly made a lot of people aware of what climbing can be like. Some elements of the press played on the level of competition which undoubtedly existed between our team and the Germans, but this, in fact, was a competition that was slowly being reduced through our growing knowledge and interdependence upon each other during the climb itself. This also came through slowly in the press reports.

  I sometimes wonder how John, Dougal and Layton felt about it all. John, undoubtedly, revelled in it. This did not mean that he was doing the climb solely for honour and glory – his love of the mountains, his need to extend himself to the limit, to find new horizons, went much further than that – but the glory was part of the attraction, as it is with most men.

  Dougal on the other hand – silent, introspective – went through it all as though hardly aware of it. I think he accepted the circus at the bottom of the mountain for what it offered him – a comfortable bed, limitless food and booze – the means to carry out his ambition, to stretch himself to his own limits on the face. And Layton, very much the same, had the least ego-drive of the three. He just liked climbing, finding a fulfilment of his abilities and confidence in himself on a vertical rock face which he did not find in everyday life. At Kleine Scheidegg he ate huge meals, paid long and earnest court to the attractive, but perhaps a little straight-laced postmistress at the station and, after a few days, became impatient to do something – go up on the face – go skiing – go to Leysin – it didn’t matter, but Layton was always searching, a little lost, with a touch of indefinable pathos in his make-up.

  In those early stages of the climb we yo-yoed back and forth between Kleine Scheidegg and the Rock Band, forcing a few more feet, and then retreating through the bad weather. There was always the temptation of the comfort of the hotel. The only man of either team who firmly rejected this indulgence was Peter Haag, who steadfastly stayed on the face, living in the Ice Palace.

  Back at Kleine Scheidegg, our own party was now increasing. Peter Gillman was permanently installed. I had asked for an assistant, and the picture editor of the Telegraph magazine had signed up Don Whillans, who was staying in Leysin at the time. He was working at the American School, as the sports master and proctor, the latter being the equivalent of housemaster, or custodian of the pupils’ morals. I felt a little apprehensive about the choice, since I knew that John Harlin and Don Whillans had little in common. Don had previously turned down John’s invitation to join him on the face, distrusting his logistic planning and, I suspect, resenting his flamboyance. In Don’s down-to-earth description – ‘A load of bullshit!’ In the event, he was able to give only limited physical help, either to me or to the team. On the one occasion he ventured on to the face with me, he was troubled by an acute attack of vertigo, an illness which has troubled him from time to time over a long period, and he was consequently forced back down. He did help, however, in getting together much of the extra equipment which we now found we needed and, at the same time, providing a practical and at times drily humorous element of common sense to our councils.


  We had a courier, in the shape of Dougal’s current girlfriend, an attractive Canadian girl called Joan. Her job was to carry my exposed film in a hired car from Grindelwald to Zurich Airport. Unfortunately, she was not the most brilliant of drivers, and after she had crashed the car twice, writing it off completely on the second occasion, we felt it was time to look elsewhere. This seemed a heaven-sent opportunity to get Wendy into the act, and I phoned her one night, to suggest that she fly out to Zurich to become the team’s courier.

  ‘But what about Conrad?’ she asked.

  ‘Can’t you find anyone to look after him for a couple of weeks?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Please, love, it’d make all the difference in the world if you could get out here. I’m missing you like hell, and it’s such a heaven-sent opportunity. The Telegraph will fly you out, and pay you whilst you’re here.’

  ‘I just don’t know. I don’t like leaving him.’

  ‘Think about it. I’ll phone you back this evening.’

  Wendy thought about it and, finding she was able to leave Conrad with some friends in Moor Row, a nearby village, finally decided to come. However, when she arrived at Kleine Scheidegg three days later, thoughts of Conrad and how he was, constantly nagged at her.

  I had desperately wanted her with me, but in fact we saw all too little of each other. When she was at Kleine Scheidegg, I was on the face helping the climb and taking pictures – and as soon as I got back down, she had to collect the film from me and dash off to Zurich, an exhausting three-hour drive on icy roads.