Canadian Alpine Journal/Volume 1/Number 1/The Ascent of Mt. Macoun

by J. C. Herdman

THE ASCENT OF MT. MACOUN

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By the Rev. J. C. Herdman

Mt. Macoun stands up, like an arched horse's neck, eight or nine miles south from Glacier House, near the summit of the Selkirk range. It is a unique and separate peak, the corner mountain on the southeast of the great Illecillewaet névé, overlooking the Beaver valley, the Prairie hills, the Spillimacheen river, Grizzly creek, and Bald mountain.

The massif was named "Macoun" in 1888 by the Rev. W. S. Green, whose charming book, "Among the Selkirk Glaciers," was published in 1890, in honor of the distinguished Professor, Dominion Naturalist and Botanist, who had spent many summers in the West in the study of science.

In the month of August, 1902, I made the first ascent of this mountain with Edouard Feuz, Sr., one of the most capable of the guides brought out from Switzerland by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. Not only romantic, but in every way enchanting, was the day's tour. We left the hotel at 5:20 a.m., took the east side of the great glacier, and as we climbed, the mists were suddenly swept out of the valley by the triumphant sunlight. We passed little streams and cascades, and, at 8 o'clock, gained Perley rock, an island of stones surrounded by snow-banks and ice-tongues. In order to reach it we had to cut steps like a staircase up a steep snow-slope. So delightful was the view from this platform of rock, that we spent ten minutes looking at the mountains and the scenery. Around us were Mt. Abbott, Glacier crest,

EDOUARD FEUZ OF INTERLAKEN
The Crack Swiss Guide of the Selkirks

Mts. Lookout, Green, Sir Donald, Uto, Eagle, Cougar, and below the séracs of the glacier and many water- falls. Then we tramped up to the crest of the névé, about 4200 feet above Glacier House, and the Illecillewaet valley was suddenly shut out. Instead, a new panorama, south and west, opened up to our eyes: Mts. Bonney, Fox, Donkin, Selwyn, Purity, Dawson, Fish creek. Glacier circle, and many large white snowfields. We kept to the left of the névé, and had no difficulties with crevasses, but our steps were in basins, formed by the winds whirling the snows around. Then Mt. Macoun rose into view. But the problem was, how to get our feet on the mountain? It was surrounded by a high escarpment of snow, with spaces between the vertical banks and the green ice which clung to the mountain sides. Fortunately, scouting about, we found a tongue running out, in a circuitous manner, which joined another tongue, a little lower in height. It was a very narrow peninsula to traverse, and at the end of it we had to step carefully, but the guide jumped from one strip to the other, plunging his ice-axe into the snow, and I followed; thus we reached the side of the mountain in safety.

Next came a difficulty which I have never seen, before or since, in any mountain range: a crack, three to six feet wide, separated the shoulder we were on from the main mass and the walls looked perpendicular. This sharp cut into the mountain may have been limited, but where we stood, because of the rough boulders, there was no way of getting past, and I imagined for some moments that our climb was completely blocked. But Feuz lighted his pipe and studied the walls carefully. Finally he discerned two small ledges, opposite one another, so he descended several feet, leaped over the chasm and rested his ice-axe in a rift between the rocks. Then he cleverly scaled the face of the wall to where a large stone stood, round which he lashed the alpine rope, holding me to the ledge after my jump and pulling me up the steep ascent. But he pulled so actively that I felt myself almost cut in two, and yelled to be released. After this crisis, we were on the under side of the summit. All the way along its crest there was a large cornice, and this was the only occasion when the guide spoke warningly. He told me not even to speak, because, in Switzerland, the vibration of a voice sometimes starts a small avalanche; but we soon found that the overhanging cornice was frozen firmly to the crest, instead of being a shifting stretch of snow. Soon we saw a gap and, cutting holes through the ice, reached the summit. No cairn had been erected there, so it was manifest that no foot had ever climbed the peak. We built up a "stone-man" and left the record of our climb in his care. Then I got up on his shoulder and gave a good leap several feet higher than the summit. Afterwards I learned that Macoun was computed from survey stations as four to twelve feet lower than the Club's standard of 10,000 feet above sea-level, but I feel that I attained the height.

We decided to go back another way. The vertical wall faces at the crack were the difficulty; for the ledge on the opposite side being higher, the jump would have to be strenuous. Besides, Swiss guides always like to make different trails. So we dropped down on the west side of the mountain, leaving at 12:45 p.m. Then we attempted three descents, but found them fearfully precipitous. The guide put me to the front, which was the right plan, for if I had slipped he was there to hold me back with the rope. But we found the descents too dangerous and rapid, and were compelled to climb up again and go partially over towards the south end. Here Feuz lighted his pipe once more, and studied the rock face that we had to encounter. Soon he detected some little ledges and a few crevices. Down we went; never before did I have such a descent. His words to me were reassuring and made me feel a Swiss guide myself. We had to grasp the mountain side two or three times with knees and arms outstretched, as there was no hold for boots and fingers. A little stone struck the guide, breaking the pipe which he had fastened to his vest, while I took calmly some cuts and bruises. The vertical descent soon widened out, and at the southwest end of the mountain, a wide sweep of snow took us clear over to the Illecillewaet neve.

We walked nearly in the centre of the snow-field for some miles, and had to rope up again, getting among complicated crevasses. Then we had a good glissade down to Perley rock and reached Glacier House a few minutes after six o'clock. No one, I understand, has ever scaled this peak since our ascent, but it should be tried again, as the delight of the scenery is unsurpassed. In fact, from the summit of Macoun, I discerned rivers running north, south, east and west: the Beaver, the Duncan, the Spillimacheen, and Fish creek.