Part of this story has been previously covered in a printed piece entitled ‘A Day in the Life…Part 2’
Tantalus was the father of Pelops, Niobe. and Broteas, and was a son of Zeus and nymph Plouto. Eventually he became one of the inhabitants of Tartarus, the deepest portion of the Underworld, reserved for the punishment of big time evildoers, and if you read on, you will see that he qualified as such…
Tantalus was initially known for having been welcomed to Zeus’s table. There, he is said to have abused Zeus’s hospitality by having stolen ambrosia and nectar to bring it back to his people, and revealed to them the secrets of the gods. Most famously, Tantalus offered up his son Pelops, as a sacrifice. He cut Pelops up, boiled him, and served him up in a banquet for gods in order to the test their omniscience. The gods became aware of the gruesome nature of the menu, so they did not touch the offering; only Demeter distraught by the loss of her daughter, Persephone absentmindedly ate part of the boy’s shoulder.
Clotho one of the three Fates, was ordered by Zeus to bring the boy to life again. She collected the parts of the body and boiled them in a sacred cauldron, rebuilding his shoulder with one wrought of ivory. (Those shoulder surgeries can be bothersome for sure.)
The Greeks of classical times were horrified by Tantalus’s doings; cannibalism and filicide were atrocities and considered taboo.
Tantalus’s punishment for his act; now a proverbial term for temptation without satisfaction (the source of the English word tantalize),was to be cursed with eternal deprivation of nourishment. Come to think of it not unlike most of my climbing trips…
If you have ever driven up the highway between Squamish and Whistler, you are treated to a magnificent view of rugged mountains off to the west.
This range extends approximately 31km north-south and 20km east-west. The centre lat/long being: 49° 48′ N; 123° 18′ W
The mountains consist of:
Tantalus: 2,603m
Dione: 2,589m
Serratus: 2,321m
Pelion: 2,312m
Alpha: 2,302m
Ossa: 2,261m
Ionia: 2,137m
Lydia: 2,100m
Red Tusk: 2,100m
Pandareus: 2,099m
Niobe: 2,021m
Pelops: 2,015m
Zenith: 1,981m
Omega: 1,918m
Iota: 1,830m
Thyestes: 1,697m
The catch being that all of this magnificent rock and ice lies on the yonder side of the Squamish river. Not the easiest place to get to. There are some options however. Some more appealing than others; the poison always being within the dose.
A Zen roshi and a Hindu Guru were walking together along a riverbank and decided to visit an adjacent island. “Let’s walk to the island” said the Guru. “Why not take the ferry?” replied the Roshi. “Because” said the Guru, “I’ve spent twenty years learning how to walk on water” “Why take twenty years learning how to walk on water”, asked the Roshi, “When you can take a ferry for a penny”
– Zen Story
Commonly used approaches to the area include:
Boating across the Squamish river, which necessitates of course, a boat, and the wherewithal to navigate it across a fast flowing river. Start well upstream if you can.
The cable car. This method has two sub-options. One is using the actual cable car itself. This will require tribal permission and very unlikely to receive. The other is to tyrollean the cable. Trespassing, and no doubt frowned upon by the the band.
Using any of the three aforementioned methods will require you to then hike and bushwhack from sea level to the alpine… 4 hours to Lake Lovelywater alone. There is an ACC hut here. Reservations required. And from there there are various routes to the alpine, depending upon climbing objective.
Float plane. This will also deposit you at the aforementioned Lake Lovelywater. From here it is still a fair hike with some bushwhacking to any climbing.
Helicopter to the Habrel Hut; located in the Serratus-Dione col. This being by far the quickest and most painless method (except to your wallet). The fine folks at Blackcomb Helicopters will help you out here.
Less common approaches…
From Woodfibre. There is a route over Mt. Sedgwick and Mt. Conybeare that will take you to Lake Lovelywater. The issue here being you need to get to Woodfibre. At one point in time there was a scheduled ferry, but since the mill closure… no more. So you will need your own boat or a hire water taxi from Squamish.
From Sechelt. Yep, you read that right. Take the ferry from Langdale to Gibsons. Drive to Sechelt. Take a boat or floatplane to the head of Salmon Inlet. Hike some logging roads and bushwhack some, and you will eventually be ‘pretty close’ to the Red Tusk, and the western aspect of some of the peaks such as Lydia, Ionia, and Pandareus.
From Zenith Lake. One could use this mostly bushwhack approach for Zenith, Pelion, and the northern routes on Tantalus itself. You will still need a private watercraft to cross the pesky Squamish river however.
From Ashlu Creek. From the Ashlu creek road, take the trail to Sigurd Pk. Bushwhacking and whatnot will provide an approach to Pelion and Ossa.
“If there is a deeper and more lasting message behind our venture than the mere passing sensation of a physical feat, I believe this to be the value of comradeship and the many virtues which combine to create it. Comradeship, regardless of race or creed, is forged among high mountains, through the difficulties and dangers to which they expose those who aspire to climb them, the need to combine the efforts to attain their goal, the thrills of a great adventure shared together”
– Sir John Hunt
We had been rock climbing at Squamish for over a week, and our big crew of rock climbers and boulderers finally dispersed to the four winds. All that remained were three old alpinists in various states of dishevelment, disrepair and decrepitude, waiting on an airstrip for a break in the clouds for our helicopter. A very pleasant surprise birthday gift from my climbing partners was that they picked up my share of the tab for the flight.
Waiting for our chopper
We had a fine collection of bad knees, hips, hamstrings, fingers, toes (or lack thereof) and necks; not to mention bad eyesight, hearing, hair loss, coffee addictions, and some serious ‘out-of-shapeness’. I recall that it was so bad in fact that even if you pieced together the best parts of all of us that you would still be short of one good climber. We had big plans and big packs. This was a real recipe for buffoonery if there ever was one.
Our stupor was broken when the chopper pilot returned from a low level flight for another concern, and gave us the old thumbs up. Apparently there were some openings in the clouds and so we hastily and chaotically threw our kit into the chopper and within a few fabulously expensive minutes were noisily deposited on a snowfield in the Serratus-Dione Col. And then there was silence.
Being hardy (and cheap) we eschewed the use of the newly constructed Habrel Hut preferring instead to seek the comfort of cramped tents on rocky and uneven ground next to the dilapidated and rodent infested Red Tit hut. However due to some carelessness of a guide and to our not too unsubstantial code-breaking skills we eventually gained access to the Habrel, but refrained from using it, other than to marvel at its construction and amenities, and marvel at the fact that Fred had been here several days ago. That guy really did get everywhere.
Our camp
The view from camp
A lot of my tales have some obtuse coffee component to them, and this one is no different. We had brought paper filters and coffee to make tasty mugs of joe and take the chill off. Imagine our dismay when it came to light that we had neglected to bring the lightweight filter holder. By the gods!!! Fortuitously we found a scrap of cardboard outside the hut and by using it and some rocks we were able to McGyver a suitable replacement. Which was fortuitous for us because socked in conditions kept us in camp, and there was naught else to do but drink coffee and swap lies.
Coffee
We finally got a good weather day and planned for the standard route on Dione. But it was not without some minor excitement before we actually headed out.
As is our usual routine we lolled around camp making barista quality coffee prior to doing anything else. As we were nursing our java’s someone noticed something moving towards us on the snowfield below and to the west. It turned out to be a grizzly bear. We kept drinking our coffee and started wondering what on earth he was doing up here, where he was going, and the nature of bear behavior in general. After musing on this for some time we eventually realized that maybe we should do something or we would still be discussing all things ursine as he moseys into our camp. ‘Care for a cuppa, Yogi?’ KK and I collected the food and stored it in the vestibule of the fancy hut, while Bill kept watch. Eventually he lost sight of the animal, and luckily we didn’t see him again (The Bear that is, not Bill…) A bit disconcerting, losing sight of it, but it all worked out and soon we were back on track to think about beginning to get ready to maybe do some climbing.
The Habrel Hut with Dione in the background
After an hour or so of snow slogging, and some loose and exposed class four rock we got to the base of the summit pyramid. We were now faced with the crux, which involved a big heart stopping step over a moat that must be twenty metres deep at least. Wrangling fear really is one of the keys to the inner universe. Once across that there were several pitches of stiff class three that deposited us on the small summit of Dione where of all things, we saw a hummingbird. Tantalus itself is only a stone’s throw away. So close yet so far. An uneventful series of rappels and down-climbs had us back to our camp by late afternoon.
The moat
The summit of Dione
Our next day held a twofold purpose. One was to do a recon of a route to Lake Lovelywater where we had told the chopper pilot to pick us up on Saturday, and the other being to climb Alpha. Unfortunately, where we are camped is not the best approach for our intended route on Alpha. We started out by descending about four hundred metres to the glacier below the North Face of Serratus. This face was also a proposed route for us, however looking at it showed it to be quite broken up. We might have been able to pick a way through if we were really motivated and if we had some ice tools as opposed to the piolets that we did have. Once below the face we then had to regain all of that elevation lost. Bill was out in front and hammering out a pretty tough pace. It was all KK and I could do to keep up. Once in the Alpha-Serratus col things didn’t look so good. Bill dropped over the side for a look-see and came back with a grim report. We were cliffed out and would have to do some blind rappels to get down. I scouted up the ridge towards Serratus looking for an alternate route, but came to a knife edge section that also looked unhealthy. After a brief confab back in the col we decided to retrace our steps to camp. At least we had a fine day of exercise in the hills. Bill kept the same insane pace all the way back. The man is the alpinator, and I am rapidly disintegrating into anaerobic meltdown.
Serratus in background
It was apparent that this route was not going to get us to Lake Lovelywater. We were a bit worried about the ‘normal’ high country route around the southeast due to some recent info a guide had given us, especially with the big sacks, so we were in a quandary. The weather was currently okay and we still had an opportunity to try and contact the chopper to see if we could get out that day as opposed to trying to wait for Saturday and possibly lose our weather window. So that’s what we did. We were able to get through on the cell phone, and arranged for Bruce to pick us up within the hour. We hastily packed up camp, and were waiting on the ice field as he landed his machine. Almost unbelievably it was only minutes later we were drinking beer in Squamish, and planning our next adventure.
Waiting for chopper on the way out
Soundtrack available soon on Local Boys Records
House Rent Blues – George Thorogood
Dire Wolf – Grateful Dead
Bear Mountain Picnic – Bob Dylan
Edward the Mad Shirt Grinder – Quicksilver Messenger Service
Cocaine Blues – Johnny Cash
Ride my Llama – Neil Young
A Tantalus range traverse in a day from Squamish has been postulated to be possible by one of the local hard men. I don’t know if he or anyone else has cracked this one yet. One would need to be highly motivated, skilled and fit and have the Greek gods watching over them…