Читать книгу Edge of the Map - Johanna Garton - Страница 12

EYES GLUED TO THE PAGE of a North Face catalog, Chris sensed something click. The climber in the photo was on a summit in Alaska. Below him a layer of wispy clouds hung as the sun set in golds and crimson. Making it to the top of Nordic Mountain in Wisconsin had been a thrill, but this . . . this seemed a thousand times more exciting.

Just enough to intrigue her, the image led Chris to a presentation at the Atlanta Climbing Club in early 1993. The speaker had recently returned from Argentina, where he’d climbed Aconcagua, the highest peak in the Western Hemisphere. His slides showed a gradual ascent over the course of roughly twenty-one days. In the final shots, he kneeled on top, smiling. At 22,837 feet and lit by a sky of liquid blue, the alpinist looked elated.

Chris was fascinated. The speaker talked about the hardships, altitude sickness, the climbers who’d failed and those who’d arrived unprepared. “I’ve only been at this a few years, but the physical challenge is addictive.” Dressed in jeans and a crew-neck T-shirt, he was appealing in a rugged sort of way. And older. He looked to be in his forties. The fact that he was talking about something she was increasingly fascinated by was a bonus.

“So after all this,” he said, “if you feel like climbing is something you might want to take a crack at, you should go big.” Ending the talk, the speaker added, “I’m heading to Bolivia in a few months. That’s what I’d consider challenging! If any of you are takers, come on up and chat. I’ll stick around for a while.”

Chris rose, waiting for the crowd around the climber to thin. When he seemed free, she eased forward, full of wonder as she approached. “I think I might be hooked,” she announced, shaking the speaker’s hand. Their eyes connected as he laughed at her opening line. His hair was streaked with gray, matching his moustache. The energy she felt from him during the presentation proved stronger up close. He seemed a mix of wise and dynamic, and she sensed immediately that they’d get along.

“I’m Christine Feld. I loved your presentation.”

“Keith Boskoff,” he said. “You’ve got a little experience in you for something like Bolivia?”

She hadn’t. “Not tons, but I pick things up pretty quickly. Just took one course at the Sporting Club at Windy Hill. Did a little climbing with a friend of mine in Michigan, too.”

“Michigan? You’re from the Midwest?”

“Wisconsin.”

“A cheesehead! A Wisconsin girl goes to Bolivia. I’m liking this image,” Keith said. “Got any gear after that course at Windy Hill?” He shifted his weight, crossing his arms as he sized up the short blond woman in front of him. Her build was solid. Not lithe or wiry like the women at the climbing gym he was used to seeing. She looked strong, capable of endurance—qualities he knew were important trekking miles at altitude.

“A backpack,” Chris said. “That’s it. But I just got a raise, so my credit card is ready to be put to use. You might look at me and think I’m not up for it, but I’ve got three older brothers so I can handle myself. I’m into all kinds of sports. Tennis, barefoot waterskiing, running, racquetball.”

Keith looked at the fiery woman before him. She seemed like the real deal. “Tell you what. Let’s get together, rope up, and I’ll give you a few more pointers.”

Chris and Keith began training together, a partnership that turned into romance with ease. He was seventeen years her senior and owned an architectural firm, a career that allowed flexibility and enough money to support his climbing habit. Chris committed to her new interest by purchasing gear and absorbing the knowledge she’d need for the sport she would grow to love. She was an uncomplicated girl from the Midwest. Yet at age twenty-six, she was a natural for the sport. Years as an engineer had sharpened her analytical skills. Patience had grown from struggling to keep up with her brothers and then leading teams of men at Lockheed. And she was resilient—a gift from her German-bred, pragmatic parents.

THE SPORT OF CLIMBING, SOME say, is misunderstood. What the average person might see as a sport for the selfish or those simply needing an adrenaline rush, climbers observe as a way of life. Athletes capable of sorting through technical challenges rise in the sport. Those at the top of their game are typically articulate and astute about the risks involved in scaling rock, ice, and high peaks. Their wish to survive and enjoy the thrills captured by being in nature generally outweighs their desire to walk close to death. They don’t have a death wish, but a wish to live in a way that few others understand. Elite athletes and those involved in extreme sports have a focus and drive that underlies their approach to each move.

“It’s a type of alive—not like a party, but like being at one with the world. It’s being in tune,” notes Eric Brymer, a professor of exercise and sport science at Manchester Metropolitan University in England. “These athletes may have more to tell us about what it means to be human than the rest of us.”

Mountaineer Conrad Anker, who has spoken frequently of the ethos of climbing, states, “If you’re not scared at least once a week, maybe once a month or once a year, you’re not living life. Some may think it’s a very frivolous pursuit, obviously we’re not curing cancer, we’re not even curing the common cold, but there’s this drive that humans have to explore and to see what’s over the horizon.” While climbing does indeed foster a connection with the world in a unique way, it’s hard to argue that the sport is not also one wrapped in danger. Entering the orbit of climbing means hearing refrains like these:

My family told me when I got into this that they’re worried they’ll lose me.

I was warned that I was going to lose people I loved.

If you can’t handle death, you shouldn’t be in the business of climbing.

Given that new methods and equipment are constantly being developed, breaking climbing down into all its varieties is a nearly impossible task. Rock and ice climbing are perhaps the most accessible and well-known forms. The advent of climbing gyms has allowed beginners to swiftly master new skills no matter what the topography or climate of their surroundings. Once adept at working with the necessary gear, climbers can incorporate what they’ve learned into mountaineering, which often includes both rock and ice climbing.

Chris dove in, training under Keith’s watchful eye. His vocal, highenergy temperament contrasted with her private, steady nature. As she did with all new interests, she wanted to excel and put silent pressure on herself. In Chris, Keith saw a tenacious partner who could push him as much as he pushed himself. Since losing his parents in a plane crash in his twenties, he’d felt alone in his life. But he felt close to Chris, who soon became the primary recipient of his love and attention. The pair fell in love over the next two months. “It’s the greatest love I’ve ever had,” Keith wrote in his journal. “I love every move she makes and everything she says.”

In turn, Chris fed off Keith’s knowledge, gobbling up every bit of information he provided on how to become a better climber. They spent weekends rock climbing in Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee. During the week they’d go to the climbing gym or strap on seventy-pound packs and run up Stone Mountain to gain the endurance needed to summit Tarija Peak in Bolivia. Visiting from Wisconsin, Joyce marveled at her daughter as she ran up and down the mountain four times in the time it took Joyce to hike it once.

Unaccustomed to having a climbing companion able to keep pace with him, Keith found his passion for the sport and Chris growing exponentially. Chris continued to push herself and often hiked to the limits of her ability to build endurance. Glancing behind his shoulder on one of their weekend training sessions, Keith noted the look of frustration on Chris’s face. He forged ahead as she tried to keep up, tripping over rocks as her legs felt heavy. He told a fourth, then fifth story about a climb he’d enjoyed. Each story had a goofy sidebar punctuated by hand gestures and impressions.

“Come on, Chris. Not much longer,” he said. “Turnaround point is just up over this ridgeline.”

“I’m fine,” she said, in an unconvincing tone.

He stopped and turned, shifting from storyteller to cheerleader. Chris slumped onto a boulder, unlacing her boots.

“Look, this isn’t going to happen overnight,” he told her. “You’ve been sitting in a cubicle at Lockheed for two years. Don’t expect so much from yourself.”

“Dammit, Keith. I said I’m fine so just . . . space, please.” Her exasperation exposed, she reached down and pulled off both boots. In a flash, she threw them beyond the path, watching them roll down into dry brush. Head in her hands, she sat unwilling to make eye contact or admit weakness.

Keith hadn’t seen this side of her before. He leaned on his trekking pole as he reached down to retrieve the boots. “You’ll need these. Like I said, the turnaround point is just up over that ridge.” He handed her the boots with a gentle smile, which she briefly returned. They continued the hike, finishing in silence laced with triumph.

WITH THREE WEEKS TO GO before the Bolivia trip, Chris found herself in Colorado undergoing a crash course in ice climbing from well-known mountaineer Thor Keiser, who would be the lead guide on their climb. Just a year earlier, Keiser and French climber Chantal Mauduit had been rescued by climbing greats Scott Fischer and Ed Viesturs on K2, perhaps the most treacherous of the world’s 8,000-meter peaks. Chris had begun to master the lingo and dig into the personalities in the climbing community. Her time in Colorado was an opportunity to expand these skills.

Keiser took Keith and Chris to climb a classic pillar of ice in the Vail area called Rigid Designator, which rose 115 vertical feet. With a cauliflowered base rising into an upper column of beautiful ice, if Chris topped out on her first visit here, she knew it would be quite an accomplishment in her young climbing career. On day two of their attempt to scale Rigid Designator, Keith had Chris roped, and he stood below her on solid ground, belaying her from thirty feet. The day prior, he’d fought all the way up, while she’d managed to scale only about half of it before stopping in exhaustion and rappelling down. She’d vowed to get to the top before they left Colorado. Confident in her skill, Keith placed a bet with Thor, the loser paying for dinner in Bolivia.

Passing her previous stopping point, Chris paused, adding long ice screws into the frozen wall as she rose. She swung her ice axe, making contact with pale blue and splintering frozen shards that bounced off her helmet. Higher she climbed, taking a moment to rest, turn back, and look at the view. The altitude, often a factor for new climbers, failed to bother her. Her breathing remained smooth, her heart rate low, and her head clear. On a wall of ice at nearly nine thousand feet, Chris felt challenged but strong.

As her breath created puffs of white, Chris came close. With a final, calculated hack into the ice, she pulled herself to the top of the pillar. A hundred feet below, Keith let out a hoot. He and Thor stood amazed at the feat, which had taken only a few hours for a relative novice. Keith gripped the rope in his guide hand, leaning back as she slowly descended.

“You owe us dinner in La Paz, dude,” Keith told Thor, laughing. Almost mumbling to himself, he said, “I’ve got to marry this girl.”

MOUNTAIN GUIDE HECTOR PONCE DE LEON heard Chris laugh. Not just once, but many times, interrupting the intensity of the climb. The clients on his 1993 guided Bolivia trip seemed drawn to Chris’s energy. At altitudes over twenty thousand feet, she seemed untroubled by the difficulties with food and physical limitations that usually worried novice climbers. Keith had expressed concern about her pushing too much, too fast, wondering if she realized how hard the challenge would be. But Chris’s first foray outside the United States showcased her ease in places far from home and high in the clouds. She appeared to be made for life in a tent on a high ridge.

“I just didn’t feel like I was guiding her. Not at all,” Ponce de Leon said. Thor had asked the Mexican guide to help him lead their small group on climbs of several peaks in Bolivia, and he recalled being surprised by their tenacity. “Chris and Keith wanted more than regular clients. They asked for an extension of the normal itinerary. She wanted extra climbs everywhere we went. Her physical and mental strength were outstanding. I was impressed.” Ponce de Leon remembered her laughing a ton, “having a great time . . . she was just all over the place. She was putting up tents and doing things that we weren’t expecting clients to do. After that, I knew I needed to keep track of her.”

Guides often gripe about high-maintenance clients, but Chris brought lightness to the team. Still a beginner in the world of climbing, she inhaled everything about it. Wrapping her arms around the sport, she was learning that climbing wasn’t always comfortable. It was full of snow, cold temperatures, and potentially sleepless nights in thin air. But she relished the hardships that scared away many mountaineers. In South America, Chris hit her stride while Keith and the guides watched with admiration.

Their climbing journals shed light on this glorious experience:

[Chris] It’s my first time in a third-world country. I’m with Keith and I’m loving it. What could be better? This is like everything I dreamed mountaineering to be and then some. I think this trip is going to be a turning point in my life. Actually, Keith was it first. I love him dearly. He thinks I’ll be the next [pioneer climber] Kitty Calhoun. I have to prove myself and be tough and aggressive and show no pain. I think I’ll find out what I’m really made of.

• • •

[Keith] Chris is like a wide-eyed kid. She loves this place and appreciates the culture and the atmosphere more than any woman I’ve ever met. She is amazing, unusual and loving. If we do K2 in 1995, she’d be the first American woman. Anyway, one step at a time.

LESS THAN A YEAR AFTER taking to climbing and mountaineering, Chris closed out 1993 by summiting 19,341-foot Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania with Keith. He had proposed to Chris on a hike, and she said yes enthusiastically. They raised glasses of whiskey after their summit, toasting the future, and married the next year in Atlanta. The wedding was attended by Robin and Joyce Feld. Their daughter’s wedding cake was made of bagels and bananas, a far cry from the traditional buttercream version the Felds had envisioned for their baby.

“I kept going to Atlanta by myself to see them,” Joyce recalled. “They were full of adventure and I liked adventure myself.” Adventure for the newlyweds included a honeymoon in Asia. It was October 1994 and 22,500-foot Ama Dablam in postmonsoon Nepal called to the pair, who sought to become the first American couple to summit that peak. Completing their goal on October 25, Keith and Chris were jubilant, deciding to remarry at the base of the mountain in the village of Pangbouche. Music blared from speakers set up by villagers. Once word had spread that an American couple planned to marry, the village came alive. A Buddhist monk provided blessings. Chris and Keith became instant celebrities, draped in traditional Nepalese clothing. They danced to local music that spilled into Michael Jackson. Chris’s hair was caked with celebratory yak butter as Ama Dablam rose in the distance.

Ama Dablam—technical to ascend and stunning to behold—was the highlight of their mountaineering career so far, both as individuals and now as a couple. Mountaineers who summited the highest peaks in the Himalayas often visited historian Elizabeth Hawley in Kathmandu after their expeditions. With sharp attention to detail, Hawley questioned them closely to confirm their ascents. She spent decades verifying the achievements of climbers and recording them in an extensive database, which is still used today (Hawley continued her work until her death in 2018 at age ninety-four). With their summit of Ama Dablam, Chris and Keith received their first mention at her hand:

Ama Dablam in the post-monsoon. A total of 50 men and women summited Ama Dablam this season, including Americans Keith Boskoff and Mrs. Chris Boskoff.

—Himalayan Historian Elizabeth Hawley, American Alpine Club Journal

THOSE WHO CLIMB FREQUENTLY BECOME aware of a spectrum concealed in the upper echelon of the sport. Therein lies a vast array of attitudes about the element of danger. In perilous conditions, often the most compelling for elite climbers, the margin of safety is thin. It can be an illusion. The point where the reality of safety ends and the illusion begins differs for each individual. Reducing the risks in elite climbing is an effort involving speed, efficiency, and safe practices. When all three of these systems fail at the same time, extreme danger surfaces. Putting yourself in the same situation over and over again and walking away can feel like a gift of survival, when really the odds are no different than they are at a Las Vegas blackjack table. Or as one Seattle mountain guide explained: “It’s like an all-you-can-eat buffet for some of these climbers. Those first four plates taste delicious, but it’s that last piece of bacon that might send them over the top.”

Chris had been climbing a few years with some success, and she found the exhilaration of the sport addictive. In Appleton, she frequented a new climbing gym whenever she was home visiting her parents. The locals, unaccustomed to a climber of her caliber, gave her a wide berth. “When she came in, it was pretty much all business. She was totally on a mission,” remembered Paul Kuenn, who owned Vertical Stronghold, the Midwest’s first climbing gym north of Chicago. “People would generally let her do her thing, but they’d definitely stare. Every now and then I’d overhear someone saying, ‘Man alive, that woman has been on the wall for over two hours and she hasn’t put her feet down.’ She crossed from one end to the other.”

Kuenn had arranged the holds so Chris could travel 170 feet sideways by going around the bouldering area, changing directions, and coming back without stopping to break. “This is Wisconsin, so there weren’t exactly tons of people who knew who she was as her ascents became bolder,” he said. “But eventually she was in all the climbing magazines. It’s funny, she really didn’t care about any of that. She wasn’t into celebrity. She’d come to the gym and bring her mom to watch. The two of them together—decent, humble Midwesterners.”

CHRIS AND KEITH CONTINUED TO scrape together vacation time, finding long weekends to flee Atlanta for greater challenges throughout 1994 and 1995. On one such getaway, New Hampshire was the destination. Relative to the mountains of the Greater Himalayas or the Andes, Mount Washington in the White Mountains of New England pales at 6,289 feet. Yet its proximity to the intersection of several storm tracks makes it one of the deadliest mountains in the United States. Catching storms from every direction, the mountain faces brutal gusts that can come out of nowhere. Small outbuildings at the peak are chained to prevent destruction. In 1934, a wind speed of 231 miles an hour was clocked at the mountain’s observatory, a Northern Hemisphere record that still stands.

Wind buffeted Chris and Keith as they began their attempt on Mount Washington’s northern face. “Ready, Chris?” Keith called. He stood a distance from her, on a wall of steep ice.

Unanchored but roped to Keith, Chris looked down, double-checking the toe straps on her crampons. “Yeah, one sec. I wanna make sure I’ve got these tightened.” A blast of air trapped her words, carrying them away before reaching Keith. Leaning over, she caught a glimpse of the rope, furiously uncoiling. Reacting immediately, Chris jumped hard on her ice axes with her body to arrest Keith’s slide. He had been caught by the gust, knocked off balance, and was plunging down the ice in a near free fall. Digging into the ice with her crampons and tools, Chris stopped his fall, hoping the axes would hold.

A sharp pain rocketed through her hand, radiating up her arm. Sensing that the axes were holding firm, she peered down and saw her husband’s face—a look of horror as he lay flat against ice. His fall had been stopped. Silently, Keith made his way back to her, relying on his crampons and pulling only gently on the rope as he heard his wife’s cries and saw it wrapped around her hand.

“Keith, are you okay?”

“I’m okay. Don’t move. I’m coming to you. Don’t move your hand.”

Her left hand gripped the ice axe, her right hand was limp against the handle of her second axe, bones crushed underneath skin. “I think I broke my hand, Keith. Dammit.”

“You broke your hand but you saved your husband,” he said. “You saved my life, you ridiculous woman!”

The chill of the snow was no match for adrenaline. Chris and Keith held each other, breathing heavily. Her hand was battered, but her confidence high. She’d weathered her first big test. Keith leaned over and kissed her. She smiled, then winced.

“That’s enough for today,” he insisted. “Let’s go fix that hand.”

Walking to the car, she said, “I’m ready for more.”

“More? How about we talk about more after dinner once you’re in a cast?” He knew she was ready for the big ones. “Those eight-thousand-meter peaks are no joke. You’re gonna need both hands for those.”

“I can be ready,” Chris said. “By summer. Broad Peak. Scott Fischer will be there and it’s our time, too.”

“Scott’s been climbing for ten years. He’s done K2 and Lhotse. He could probably do Broad Peak in his sleep,” Keith said.

“I’m not going without you,” Chris pressed. “Are you in or out?”

“After today, I owe you one. I’m in. Broad Peak, it is.”