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  ‘Those buggers’ll go for the Central Tower,’ said Don.

  ‘You never know,’ said Barrie. ‘I think I talked them out of it. They can’t possibly use our fixed ropes, and we’ve got the only line up the Tower.’

  ‘I shouldn’t be so sure of that,’ I said. ‘All they’ve got to do is climb one of the cracks on the side of the pedestal, and they could come out above the ladder. If they get into that central dièdre, we could never get round them.’

  ‘Well, we’ll get them well wined up tonight, and persuade them that there’s a good route round the back of the Tower,’ said Barrie.

  ‘You’re not going to shift them by giving them a bit of booze,’ said Don. ‘In one way, you can’t blame them anyway; calling ourselves the South Patagonia Survey Expedition! How the hell did they know we were going to be a climbing expedition? If you haven’t got proper permission for us to climb the Tower, Barrie, they might well have us moved off altogether. I reckon that’s what they’re up to now.’

  ‘In that case let’s move up to the foot of the Tower,’ I suggested. ‘I can’t see a policeman walking all the way up there. Anyway, unless we find a way of living immediately below the Tower in this bad weather, we’re going to waste the first windless day in getting back up there. How about pulling Camp II back into the woods, just below the glacier, and sitting it out there?’

  ‘I think that’s still too low,’ said Don. ‘What we could do with is some kind of hut where Camp III is, just below the Tower. You could then keep a pair in it the whole time, and they could just nip out as soon as the weather got fine, and be on the Tower in a couple of hours.’

  ‘It would be a hell of a job getting materials up, though, wouldn’t it?’ said Derek.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Don. ‘All you need is a solid framework, and you could make the walls out of tarpaulin.’

  ‘There’s a lot of timber in Juan’s wine store,’ said Vic. ‘I’m sure he’d let us use it. It would be ideal for the frame. We cut it to size down here and then carry the whole lot up.’

  Don and Vic went off to find materials for the box. Thus was born an important new concept in expedition tentage, which was to enable us to beat the high winds of Patagonia on this trip, and which, eight years later, in a more sophisticated form, was to play a vital part in our ascent of the South Face of Annapurna.

  The presence of the Italians had acted as a catalyst, giving us a stronger sense of purpose and unity than we had had for some time. That night, as we prepared the communal tent for our reception, there was an atmosphere of almost childish gaiety. Wendy, wearing a pullover of brightly coloured patches, looked positively seductive, curled up on one of the camp beds.

  ‘We’ll have to leave you here on your own to receive the Italians,’ suggested Derek. ‘You might be able to turn their thoughts to other things.’

  Meanwhile, Don and John Streetley were fooling around, Don climbing on John’s shoulders, dressed in a long cagoule, to resemble a misshapen seven-foot giant. We were all excited, talking louder than normal, getting a kick out of the potential threat of the situation. It was the feeling of people about to go to war – a little apprehensive, yet excited at the same time.

  And then the Italians arrived. There were more handshakes, a pretence at bonhomie, but the conversation soon lagged – apart from anything else, we spoke too little of each other’s language.

  I found myself sitting next to an Italian called Nusdeo. We talked in broken French, our only mutual language, and quickly exhausted the normal conversational gambits of what each had climbed, and whether we had any mutual climbing acquaintances. He had been on the North Wall of the Eiger only a few days before Ian and me, making the first true Italian ascent. And then the conversation lulled. Because I couldn’t think of anything else to say, I asked if they intended to tackle the South Tower. He looked embarrassed, muttered something about being obliged to go for the Central, for this was the objective their club had sent them to tackle. There was a strained silence in the room, and the Italians left soon after.

  As they trooped out of the tent there was an even stronger sense of unity and determination in our group.

  Don summed up everyone’s feelings when he said, ‘If those buggers think they’re going to push me around, they’ve got another thing coming to them.’

  I don’t know what the Italians made of us. They must have noticed the huge pile of empty beer bottles outside the tent. We had been in the area for a month, and had obviously made very little progress; at this stage, they had no concept of how savage the weather could be – that the principal problem of climbing in Patagonia was mere survival in the high winds rather than technical difficulty. We were a good deal younger than they, and seemed less well-organised. I suspect we had much the same appearance as Britain did to the Germans in 1940 – disorganised, few in numbers, and fairly contemptible.

  ‘We’ve got to have it out with them,’ said Don, ‘and find out just what they’re planning to do. If we’re not careful, they’ll be shinning up our fixed ropes.’

  ‘How about formulating some simple questions with a “yes” or “no” answer?’ I suggested. ‘We can then go over to see them tomorrow and nail them down to some kind of commitment.’

  ‘That sounds all right,’ agreed Don. ‘What we want to know is – are they going for the Central Tower or not. If so, do they intend to use our col? And if they do, are they thinking of using our fixed ropes? If they do, some bugger’s going to get a bloody nose.’

  Next morning, Don, Barrie and I went over to the Italian camp. Barrie acted as spokesman, asking the questions we had formulated the previous night. Their leader repeated Nusdeo’s assertion that they had to tackle the Central Tower, since this was what their club had financed them to climb. He also complained bitterly that they had no idea that an expedition called the South Patagonia Survey Expedition could possibly have designs on difficult rock peaks.

  Barrie ignored this complaint and went on to the next question. ‘Well then, are you going from the Col Bich?’ This was the col between the North and Central Towers. It also gave the only obvious route up the Tower. The answer was ‘yes’ once again.

  ‘But we are already established on the Col Bich with fixed ropes going up one crack line. You don’t intend to use our fixed rope, do you?’

  They showed every sign of indignation that we should even make such a suggestion. Taldo, a big tough character, who was the most friendly and outgoing of the Italians, was very positive, smashing his fist into his hand to emphasise his assertions that they wanted an Italian route, a solely Italian route, up the Central Tower, totally separate from any ‘voie Britannique’. There was no sign of Aste; and Aiazzi, his climbing partner, just sat it out in the corner, his face expressionless.

  We returned to our camp and Don, Vic, John Streetley and Ian Clough, the practical men of the expedition, began building the prefabricated hut – our secret weapon to beat the Tower. Don Whillans and Vic Bray were the craftsmen, cutting the timbers to the right length and marking out the tarpaulins. At the end of the day, they had completed the hut, tacking the framework together and fitting over it the tarpaulin shell. Even the hinged door was complete, with its written inscription, HOTEL BRITANNICO — MEMBERS ONLY. Each component was then numbered and the hut was dismantled, ready to be carried to the foot of the Central Tower.

  It was New Year’s Eve, and that night the bachelors welcomed it in with a hard drinking session. The feeling of unity in the group, engendered by the presence of the Italians, was still not sufficient to overcome their resentment of the girls’ presence, and they preferred to celebrate in masculine seclusion. As a result, I slipped away early, and was asleep well before the arrival of 1963. I woke early to the sound of rain pattering on the tent.

  The weather was as bad as ever, but I was anxious to get the prefabricated hut established as soon as possible so that we could take full benefit from the first break in the weather. There was a risk that the Italians, reachi
ng the col and forcing the crack line to the side of the pedestal which we had climbed, would establish their route in the big groove that was the main feature of this facet of the Tower and, seemingly, the only way up it.

  Capturing the enthusiasm of the rest of the team was no easy matter. The Base tent was surrounded by the debris of the night before, and they all had splitting hangovers.

  ‘What’s the point of going up in this kind of weather?’ said Derek. ‘The Italians aren’t going to do anything on a day like this. Remember, they don’t even know the way up through the forest yet.’

  ‘But we’ve got to keep our advantage,’ I replied. ‘God knows, it’s little enough. They’ve only got to push one pitch up from the col and they’ll be out in front. Short of having a dobbing match halfway up the Tower, we’d never get past them. We must get a pair established below the Tower as soon as possible.’

  ‘I agree with Chris,’ said Don. ‘Now that we’ve got the box made we want to get it into position quickly.’

  ‘In that case, how about getting our camp on the glacier pulled back into the woods today? That will give us a secure intermediate camp. We can then carry the box up tomorrow and erect it at the site of Camp III,’ I suggested.

  ‘Sounds all right,’ said Don.

  And that settled it; with Don on my side, the rest soon agreed to abandon the comfort of Base Camp, and return to the front line.

  It was nine o’clock in the morning before we were ready to set out. The dismantled hut weighed, with all its timber beams and heavy tarpaulin, about 250 pounds, but divided amongst the seven of us, the loads were a reasonable weight, though some of the timbers were awkwardly long. We left camp surreptitiously, anxious to avoid being seen by the Italians with our secret weapon. Progress up the Ascencio Valley was slow; the rest were suffering from severe hangovers, and the seven-foot-long timbers kept getting caught in the branches of trees and undergrowth. Once out of the forest and on the glacier, it was even worse. The wind whipped across the snow, treating the timbers of the box as sails. It was difficult, anyway, to keep one’s footing on the snow-covered boulders of the moraine, and in the wind we were blown about like a helpless flotilla of dinghies, capsizing in hidden snowdrifts and foundering amongst the jumble of hidden rocks. It was three o’clock before we reached the camp on the glacier. The cave we had excavated under the boulder was full of snow and the gear and food were buried beneath it, a mess of unwashed pans and broken food boxes.

  ‘You left the place in a hell of a mess,’ I told Barrie. ‘Couldn’t you have washed up and sorted the place out before coming down?’

  ‘You’d have left it in no better state,’ he replied. ‘It’s all very well to talk, but it was all we could do to keep the tent up, the wind was so bad.’

  ‘So bloody what! You could still have done a bit of tidying up. We’re not on a Boy Scouts’ picnic, you know.’

  But almost as my temper flared, I felt ashamed of my lack of control. It was an anger born from the cold driving wind, and my resentment of the invidious position in which I had been placed in relation to the other members of the expedition because of Wendy’s presence in base camp. In the micro-world of an expedition the pettiest details, like an unwashed pan or an irritating mannerism, are blown up out of all proportion.

  But there was no time for anger now. We were battered and half-frozen by the winds, and only had a few hours of daylight to retreat to the woods and put up a new camp. We grabbed tents, cooking stoves and a few dirty pots and pans, and fled back down the glacier to the woods. In these conditions, the mere act of living, trying to stay dry in a waterlogged tent, lighting a fire from wet wood, took up all our energies. During the entire period we had been in the vicinity of the Central Tower of Paine, we had had only about two hours of technical climbing; the rest of the time had been taken up in our losing struggle with the weather.

  When we woke in the morning, everything was muffled and quiet. We were near the height of the southern summer, and yet the scene outside the tent could have graced a classic Christmas card, with every branch weighed down by snow. We were so exhausted from the previous day that it was eleven o’clock before everyone had emerged from their sleeping bags and breakfast was cooked.

  ‘I think we should try to get the hut up today,’ said Don.

  ‘Christ, have a heart,’ said Derek. ‘I’m shattered, and I think we all are. Can’t we leave it until tomorrow? The Italians won’t get in front of us in this.’

  ‘Okay. Fair enough, but we must get it up tomorrow.’

  ‘We’re going to need some more food as well,’ I suggested. ‘Someone had better go back for some.’

  ‘Well, what about you and Barrie?’ said Don. ‘You’ve got your women waiting down there for you.’

  And so it was agreed. Barrie and I set out through the forest, all silent, rather mysterious and very beautiful under its mantle of snow. We heard the sound of distant talking.

  ‘Could be the Italians,’ said Barrie.

  ‘We’d better avoid them,’ I suggested. ‘The less they know about our movements the better.’

  And we slunk through the trees like a pair of partisans; I must confess, I’ve always had a fondness for playing at soldiers and, on the whole, found the Italian threat thoroughly stimulating.

  We returned the following day with big loads of food, to arrive just after the others had returned from putting up the box. They were all jubilant. It had been a savage day, blowing hard and snowing in gusts, but in spite of this they had lugged the timbers up to the site of Camp III, and had erected the hut in position. That night I felt a tremendous feeling of affectionate loyalty to the others. We seemed, at last, to be on the way to beating the elements. The camp in the woods was well sheltered and storm-proof, and, with a bit of luck, the hut would stand up to anything the wind could do round the foot of the Towers.

  ‘We’ve put it up, so you and Barrie might as well go and sleep in it tomorrow,’ said Don.

  ‘That’s all right by me,’ I replied, and let myself drift off into contented sleep. Next morning I woke to the sound of the wind howling through the tops of the trees and the patter of snow on the roof of the tent. I stayed in my sleeping bag, reading, delaying the moment of decision when I should have to leave the comfort of the camp in the woods for our vigil high on the flanks of the Paine.

  Don shook me out of my lethargy. ‘Well then, are you going up the hill today?’

  It was two o’clock in the afternoon, and we’d barely have time to reach the hut before dusk. The weather seemed to be clearing, with patches of blue being torn in the high flying cloud; and then the clouds themselves began to disintegrate into broken gossamer that merged pearly grey with the brilliant blue of the sky. The covering of snow that had made the going so difficult two days before had now been blasted away by the wind to fill the dip between the moraine ridge and the slope leading up to the Towers. Following the crest of the ridge we were able to reach the site of our former Camp II quite easily, but in a matter of minutes the weather changed yet again. As we collected a few extra tins of food from the dump we had left in the cave, there was a roar of wind. It raced down the slopes of the Paine, its front defined by a crest of swirling powder snow, and hit us with a solid force, hurling us to the ground. All I could do was cling to a rock, fearful lest I should be blown away – load and all. Our progress became little more than a crawl between gusts, as wave upon wave of wind rolled down and engulfed us in its demonic fury. I was tempted to turn back, but kept going on two scores: partly out of anxiety for the state of the hut, wondering whether anything might have worked loose in the wind, but more, I suspect, from a fear of appearing to be weak in the eyes of the others.

  The hut was still standing, a solid haven against the fury of the wind. It was about seven feet long, five feet broad and four feet high; squat, ugly, yet completely functional – the only habitation that we could have carried up from the valley and which would stand up to the winds.

  We spen
t three nights in the hut and each day tried to make progress on the Tower. I was convinced that we had to climb in the bad weather and high winds, even if it only meant making token progress, so that the moment the weather did improve we should be poised to make a bid for the summit. It was easy to formulate such a plan in the comfort of Base Camp, but the reality of wind-battered rock and ice vanquished resolution. It was all we could do the first day to struggle up to the foot of the Tower and improve the line of ropes we had left on our previous visit. The following day it had started to snow, but hoping that this might be accompanied by a drop in the strength of the wind, I persuaded Barrie to come out once again. The rocks were covered by a white blanket; what had been a walk the previous day was turned into a precarious climb; ropes were concealed and, once discovered, were coated in ice. It was as bad as climbing the North Wall of the Eiger in a winter’s blizzard. We reached the Notch, to find the rocks ice-plastered and ropes frozen in wire-like tangles. My resolve faltered, faced by the sheer immensity of discomfort and cold, and the snow that plastered the rocks, penetrated clothing, froze hands. So often, climbing becomes a battle between resolution and self-indulgence. How far can one force one’s body on in face of such discomfort? My emotions said ‘fight on’, but common sense counselled retreat. After all, we could only climb a few feet beyond the high point on a day like this, and with a good 2,000 feet to go, it became pointless when balanced with the risk and suffering we would undergo for so tiny a gain. We turned back, and as we went down the clouds began to scatter, the wind dropped and the sun began to warm us. Should we turn back and have another go at making progress? I looked at Barrie, wondered if I dared suggest it, but then abandoned the idea. The best part of the day was gone and we were established in retreat.

  Don Whillans and Ian Clough were waiting for us at the hut. It was their turn to stand sentry, and it looked as if the weather might at last show us some favour. We pressed on down to Base Camp for a rest – I, torn between the pleasure of seeing Wendy and the longing to be back on the mountain, obsessed by the fear that Don and Ian might snatch a couple of days’ fine weather to climb it while I was resting.