Bear Grylls (13 page)

The colour of the ice where we were was dark blue, and pinnacles reached over us, 100 feet high. It seemed unstable and flaky, and was beginning to drip from the heat of the sun. It is at this
time, in the mid-afternoon, that the Icefall is most dangerous, as it melts, and parts begin to collapse.

Racing all in one go under these overhangs that cast menacing shadows was impossible; the body wouldn’t allow it. Repeatedly we would be halfway through, then would be forced to stop and
recover our breath, still deep within the jaws of the overhang. But there was nothing we could do; the body had to stop and get more oxygen.

Once safely out the other side we would sit and recover and encourage the other to follow quickly. We were new to the Icefall and were trying to learn its tricks.

Soon we were out of the nasty section and back among more familiar territory; ahead we could see the plateau where we had left the Sherpas. We passed through the part that they had been
repairing. We could be no more than 100 metres from the Icefall doctors now. I was looking forward to seeing them, and then getting down. We had been in the ice for almost nine hours now and were
tired. Little did I know that the day was far from over.

As I came round the corner of a cornice, I could hear the whispered voices of Nima and Pasang nearby. Energy flooded back and I leapt from ice block to ice block down towards them. Ten yards
later I needed to stop and rest; they were close now. I smiled at the sound of their hushed and tentative tones.

I unclipped, and clipped into the next rope down, and leant against the ice, recovering. Suddenly the ground just opened up beneath me.

The ice cracked for that transient second, then just collapsed. My legs buckled beneath me, and I was falling. I tumbled down, bouncing against the grey walls of the crevasse that before had
been hidden beneath a thin veneer of ice.

The tips of my crampons caught the edge of the crevasse walls and the force threw me across to the other side, smashing my shoulder and arm against the ice. I carried on falling, then suddenly
was jerked to a violent halt, as the rope held me firm. The falling ice crashed into my skull, jerking my neck backwards. I lost consciousness for a precious few seconds. I came to, to see the ice
falling away below me into the darkness, as my body gently swung round on the end of the rope. It was eerily silent.

Adrenalin soared round my body, and I shook in waves of convulsions. I screamed, but can’t remember what. My voice echoed round the walls. I looked up to the ray of light above, then down
to abyss below. Panic overwhelmed me and I clutched frantically for the walls. They were glassy smooth. I swung my ice axe at it madly, but it wouldn’t hold, and my crampons just scraped
along the ice. I had nothing to lean against, no momentum to be able to kick them in. Instead the flimsy stabs with my feet hardly even brushed the surface of the ice. I clutched in desperation to
the rope above me, and looked up. ‘Hold, damn you. Hold.’

I grabbed a spare jumar device from my harness. (This is a climbing tool that allows you to ascend a rope but won’t allow you to slip down.) I slapped it on to the rope as added security.
Suddenly I felt strong pulls tugging on the rope above. They wouldn’t be able to pull me out without my help. I knew I had to get out of here fast. The rope wasn’t designed for an
impact fall like this. It was a miracle that it had held at all, and I knew it could break at any point. The pulls on the rope above gave me the momentum I needed to kick into the walls with my
crampons. This time they bit into the ice firmly.

Up I pulled, kicking into the walls, a few feet higher every time. I scrambled up, helped by the momentum from the rope. Near the lip, I managed to smack my axe into the ice and pull myself
over. Strong arms grabbed my windsuit and hauled me with great power from the clutches of the crevasse. They dragged me to the side, out of danger, and we all collapsed in a heaving mess. I lay
with my face pressed into the snow, eyes closed, and shook with fear.

Nima and Pasang sat with their heads in their hands, breathing heavily; then glanced furtively around. Known to be two of the bravest, most hardened men of Everest, the Icefall doctors now
looked visibly shocked. They knew that it had been close. Mick was still trapped on the other side of the crevasse that had collapsed. Nima laid a ladder down and Mick shuffled tentatively across.
He put his arm round my shoulder and said nothing. I was still shaking.

My confidence plummeted. Mick had to escort me the two hours back down the Icefall. I clutched to every rope, clipping in twice. I crossed the ladders a different man; one who had experienced
that thin line between life and death. Gone was the brash certainty of before, when I had confidently shuffled over them. Instead each one now took me what felt like an eternity to cross. My
breathing became harder, and all my strength seemed to leave me.

My elbow was stiff and swollen, having been smashed against the hard ice walls of the crevasse. I tried to use my good arm to descend with, but I knew it didn’t bode well.

Lying in my tent alone that night back at Base Camp, I found I was shaking as it began to dawn on me just how lucky I had been. Undoubtedly I owed Nima and Pasang my life.

I wrote:

CHAPTER EIGHT

The morning of 1 April was glorious. Sitting on the ice in the warmth of the morning sun, I started to stitch my ripped kit. My elbow was still swollen and ached annoyingly
whenever I bent it. Mick sat beside me and we talked of the mountain and everything that lay ahead. It was all that was on our minds.

‘At least I don’t have to explain to Neil and Henry that you’re no longer with us,’ Mick said jokingly. ‘Although it would have meant I could have your roll-mat, I
suppose.’

‘Thanks for that, Miguel,’ I replied. ‘Anyway if I had copped it, then you’d have nothing to do today – talking of which, can you give us a hand stitching this
gaiter?’

We felt happy as we peacefully sat and worked. The others were now only two days away.

That afternoon, as we reclined in our separate tents, sprawled out like two Pompeiian philosophers contemplating the wonders of the great outdoors, we suddenly heard the voices of two females;
we came alive at once. Only minutes earlier we had felt so lazy that we had argued over whose turn it was to go and refill the waterbottles ten yards away; now, inspired by the sound of two girls,
we both leapt out of our tents like primed gladiators.

‘Hi, are you an expedition climbing here?’ one of them asked.

‘Ah yes, um, that’s right,’ I replied. ‘You look tired, can I get you . . .’

‘Yeah, come on in and grab a cuppa,’ Mick replied, bustling past me, and beating me to the mark.

The afternoon was spent in happy abandon as we whiled away the time, chatting in the mess tent. It turned out that the girls were out in Nepal for three weeks, with a party of trekkers. They
were the only ones from the team to reach the goal of Base Camp. The rest of the team had given up, too exhausted.

‘All the boys were so gung-ho, and called us “slow coaches” the entire way, but we’re the only ones to have made it in the end,’ they said.

It was a familiar tale. Altitude is a great leveller, and time invariably proves that the tortoise up high always beats the hare. These two tortoises were the prettiest we had seen in a while.
The yaks didn’t get so much as a passing glance for the rest of the day.

The afternoon, though, was soon coming to a close.

‘Look, you guys better get going before it’s dark. You’ll need three hours at least to get back to Lobuche down the valley,’ I said with great pains. Mick looked like a
homesick boy, saying goodbye to his parents for the first time; but only I could tell.

They filled their flasks with hot tea, and began to wrap up warm. As they did so I scribbled a note to Shara, and wrapped it in a home-made envelope, addressed to her home, back in England. It
read: ‘Don’t forget me while I’m away. You have my word I’ll come back. I love you. Happy belated birthday. Bear.’

They carried it back with them, promising to post it on their return to civilization. I said I would have to owe them the postage, and longed more than ever to see Shara. I had told her nothing
about my fall, I thought it better that way. I just hoped my note would reach her. Three weeks later, Shara picked up a tatty envelope that had just flopped through the letter-box to the floor; she
picked it up, opened it and smiled.

That night, the two of us were alone again. The wind blew gently across the glacier; I lay curled inside my sleeping bag, listening to its rhythm, until eventually sleep swept
over me. My body needed this rest, and I slept until just before dawn.

Lying in those early hours between four and six in the morning, I allowed my mind to drift. I was getting used to this place now. I felt safe in the seclusion of my tent; and was coping better
with the low temperatures at night. My confidence was slowly coming back.

By the time we emerged that morning, the two Icefall doctors had already left to work in the Icefall. They had had their rest day and were eager to try and push the route through to the lip of
the glacier; all the way to Camp One. They had started early. Our day carried on in the blissfully slow pace that characterizes so much the reality of mountaineering – the ‘rest’
times.

The human body has to rest in between bouts of extreme physical exertion. The altitude means that the body is already under pressure as it tries to cope with the lack of oxygen in the air, and
thus these periods of recovery up high need to be longer than at sea-level. The body is fighting two battles: the thin air, and then the recovery. It takes time and patience, but because you are
away from the hassles of ‘normal’ life, you feel free to soak up the energy that the hills around you provide. There is time to just be.

Late afternoon, an increase in noise from the mess tent meant that something was wrong. We went to find out what was happening – more from curiosity than anything else. We weren’t
prepared for what had happened.

‘It getting late. Where Icefall doctors?’ Thengba mumbled. ‘Normally back two hour now. Dark not so far way.’

He was right. At 6.30 p.m. most nights now, it would get dark and the stars would begin to appear in the night sky. It was already 5.30 p.m. and the sky looked somehow different and menacing;
something felt not quite right. ‘Why were the doctors so late?’ I could find no answers.

Mick and I scanned the Icefall through the binoculars; we could see nothing that resembled tiny figures on the ice above us. The wind had been slowly picking up all day, and as dusk fell, the
Icefall became hidden in a swirling mist. The other Sherpas and Thengba were frantic. The doctors were still not back.