Woke up last, camp alive with activity, packing up to descend the Muldrow. I had a 4 minute conversation with Libbles on the SAT phone.Collapsed camp and only had a hot chocolate before setting off down the Upper Harper glacier which presented high crevasse risk. On the way down the Harper most of us had some experience of crevasse action, twice my legs went into slots, a forewarner of the quality of snow we were facing. Reached Browne’s Tower for lunch before descending the steep Karsten’s ridge, which proved to be an epic descent. What initially seemed a straightforward if steep snow ridge proved difficult primarily due to the snow conditions and secondly with Rodney ‘bum sliding’ patches of the ridge making down climbing difficult. The heavy packs and sleds pulling you made life interesting. Feeling strong at the top, I tired with the frequent stops and perhaps the lack of a substantial breakfast. As I tired I took a couple of minor tumbles but rapidly lost confidence in my ability to descend which results in angling more into the slope resulting in less traction with your crampons. One more fall where somebody else had fallen just previously (Rodney or Mike?) and a short steep ice climb led us to the NOLs campsite where they provided much needed hot drinks in exchange for a few bars with the time now 11pm. Tea had never tasted so sweet. Reversing the order with Dave and our rope now going first and with slightly firmer snow we descended down to the Muldrow in good time and reverted to snowshoes on the flat, crevasse ridden glacier. The promise of a prepared campsite the NOLs team had just vacated drove us on for another couple of hours before locating the camp at around 2.30am. Chris’s team came in 30 minutes later looking how we felt. Despite a broken tent pole everyone was in good spirits in this lower altitude after a tough days descent.
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