June
23, Pisang, Manang region of Nepal:
I
wake up before 5 a.m. to see alpenglow on the slopes
of the mountains. I dash out of the still-sleepy teahouse
and up the hill. Halfway up, I stop to catch my breath
and hectically set up the equipment in fear of losing
the magical dawn light. Nearly three miles higher than
me, the summit of Annapurna II pierces the denim sky.
Yesterday, all I saw was the glacier's crevassed bluish
tongues under the veil of clouds, but now the mother
of the glacier is showing off the majesty and splendor
of her treacherous north face to the first rays of the
solstice sun. I trip the shutter again and again, change
the roll, and keep on shooting. Awestruck, I pause and
study the relief of the snow cornices and the sharp
ridges; I wonder what the feeling is to meet the sunrise
up there, when the world beneath you is still drowned
in darkness and the sharp cone of the peak's shadow
cuts through the thin, icy air.
Kaloyan Kapralov '05 went to Annapurna as a photographer,
but left captivated and determined to return as a climber.
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by Peter Rice '05
photo: Kaloyan Kapralov '05
One day nearly 40
years ago, Gary Ziegler '64 was ascending the steep, icy
slope of Nevado Contraherbas, a 20,000-foot peak in Peru.
Suddenly, an immense slab of the mountain below Ziegler's
boots broke loose with a loud crack. Clutching an aluminum
tube he'd anchored just a little higher into the mountain,
he looked down in numbed silence as the rumbling cloud of
ice and snow fell several thousand feet down to the glacier
below. Death would have to bide its time.
To Ziegler and other high-altitude mountain climbers, events
like that are all part of the game. "It's almost like
in a combat situation. You just bite the bullet and keep
going. Your focus is on surviving and moving on," says
Ziegler.
So how is that survival instinct nurtured at Colorado College?
It can't be coincidence that so many climbers find
their way to CC or is there something about CC that
creates climbers?
The reasons CC alumni climb mountains are as diverse as
the climbers themselves. Some do it for the personal challenge,
others for the beauty of nature, and still others for the
opportunity to absorb another culture and way of life. All
of them, though, seem to like the dramatic break from their
usual lives.
Location and Legacy
What makes CC a haven for climbers? A good question with
an easy answer, as it turns out: location, legacy, and block
breaks."Being in Colorado, you¹ve got proximity to
the mountains and great weather," says David Conlin
'99, who can be found climbing alpine rocks or sheets of
ice when he's not doing graduate work in ecology at University
of Colorado-Boulder.
Colorado College's proximity to the Garden of the Gods
and Cheyenne Cañon certainly doesn't hurt, and even the
curriculum adds to the outdoor experience. "My first
two classes were geology, and we spent the first seven weeks
touring and camping through the Rockies," says Brian
O'Connor '82. "I now look at a mountain with greater
knowledge and appreciation."
Thus inspired, many CC students and faculty pioneered the
earliest major climbs of the Rockies. Among them was political
science Professor Albert Ellingwood, who taught at CC from
1914 to 1919 and famously climbed La Plata Peak in central
Colorado by a harrowing detour now known as Ellingwood Ridge
one of three high-elevation features in Colorado named
for him.
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