We arrived at the base of the crux pitch. Fiona pulled on, but almost immediately her foot slipped and she flopped onto the rope. “All good. Get the jitters out!” I encouraged her. She pulled on again, and suddenly was, again, hanging on the rope. “Deep breaths. Calm your nervous system.”

Something I’ve always loved about big wall free climbing is the performance pressure – when you’ve spent months dreaming and preparing, a week of travel and then BOOM you are hundreds of meters off the ground with a hard pitch of rock climbing staring you in the face! How do you try your best, while holding the weight of the entire challenge lightly?

When Fiona invited me on this trip, I was hesitant. My relationship with climbing had been rocky for the past year and a half, as I recovered from burnout and worked to reframe a healthier mindset as a full-time professional climber. Would this trip help me on this journey? Or would I be overstimulated and stressed? I especially didn’t want my own baggage to negatively impact the team’s experience.

Today we still needed to climb seven more pitches to reach the bivy ledge, with all our equipment (food, water, stove, sleeping kit). We couldn’t spend too long here. How can I best support Fiona in a vulnerable moment like this? I was all too familiar with the feeling. Before my burnout, free climbing remote walls had been my niche expertise! Time to listen, empathise.

The youngest of the crew, Fiona had brought us together in a group chat months earlier with an ambitious objective in mind: to repeat a 1000m high remote alpine big wall, with technical difficulties up to 5.13. I’d only climbed with Fiona and Alexa a handful of times, and I’d never met Cat… But as early as our first team video call, I felt such a strong sense of compassion, a willingness to listen and a shared drive to support and empower each other that I excitedly committed to the adventure.

On her sixth attempt, Fiona made it through that first boulder and took it another 40m, past multiple harder sections to the chains. Heck yes Fiona!

The winds raged all night and we barely slept. Huge gusts kept catching the underside of my bivy bag and slamming it down onto the rocky ledge with a loud thwack! Alexa and Fiona in the portaledge were getting slapped in the face by the fabric walls. In the morning our hands were numb with cold, as we cupped our fingers around our coffee mugs discussing who would lead the 5.11R pitch directly above our camp…

Today was Day 4 on the wall. I shoved my cold toes into my climbing shoes and set off up the pitch, moving carefully so as to not dislodge any of the loose blocks and flakes – definitely the most “heads up” pitch of the route so far. Eventually I clipped into the anchor and Fiona and Cat followed cleanly up to me. The next pitch was the last crux pitch — a short and fierce 12d downclimb. This is an oddity unique to big wall free climbing where, in order to connect the “freeable” lines of weakness up a big face, the most viable option is in fact climbing downwards for a pitch (and often slightly sideways).

“I’m keeping my puffy pants on for this one,” Fiona said, shoulders hunched and tense as if relaxing would allow any heat to escape from her core. She pulled onto the rock and began traversing and downclimbing away from me. The pitch was puzzling — where does it even go? But Fiona worked it out, falling off many times until she had a sequence. Cat and I watched and provided input or suggestions when asked.

A neat thing about being on this wall with this team was that we all had quite similar body shape and dimensions. A sequence of moves that worked for one of us often worked for all of us. In this way we could take turns figuring out a pitch and then sharing what we found with the teammates, so everyone could progress as quickly and efficiently as possible.

I pulled onto the wall next, remembering Fiona’s moves, and executing them in order. At one point my foot slipped and I instinctively tensed my whole body, just barely avoiding a fall. I let out a loud grunt at the effort. Then swung my feet desperately back onto the wall, and lurched through the final sequence of hard moves. Feeling my arms running out of steam, I threw wildly at a bit of rock Fiona had marked with a chalk tick. To my surprise, my fingers slotted into a deep pocket and I was still on. Deep breaths, as I transitioned into the easier climbing. That was close!

Cat gave the pitch a try next, but fell off in the crux. All good, she’ll have another go after some rest. At this point Alexa was in position to take some photos and film. Fiona sent, and then her and I continued on to fix the next two pitches while Alexa stayed back to support Cat. When Fiona and I later rappelled down to the bivy ledge at dusk, Cat and Alexa had dinner ready for us. This team is the best.

On Day 5 I woke with a tummy ache and didn’t manage to eat any breakfast. Cat and Alexa went first, and by the time Fiona and I started ascending the ropes I’d been to the bathroom three times. Diarrhea. I felt terrible. I threw some extra wag bags into our day pack and hoped it would improve….

We caught up to the other girls just as Cat was finishing a heady lead on a 5.10R. After this we climbed as two teams of two. Fiona and I had planned to swing leads. As I led the next pitch, I felt like I was dragging my body through molasses. Every move was an effort and I’d have to take several breaths before the next one. Was this the effects of altitude? Cumulative exhaustion from the trip? Had I eaten something bad or caught a bug? After that Fiona graciously offered to lead the remainder of the pitches to the summit. Such an angel.

We reached the summit at 7pm. Standing, the four of us, on the little tippy top of the pinnacle, we had 360 degree views of snow capped ragged mountains and valleys stretching as far as the eye could see. We allowed ourselves ten minutes or so to take it all in. Then Alexa set a timer on her camera to get a group summit photo, and it was time to start moving again. We only had a few hours until dark, which was definitely making us all feel a little nervous. Not much room for error if anything happened on the rappels, especially with the storm on the forecast for the next day…

At 4am we stumbled into basecamp to find a nice note and a jar of Nutella our friends had left out for us, anticipating our return. A light rain began to pitter patter on the group dome walls, eerily shortly after our return. We plopped ourselves down at the wooden table, too tired to make any more decisions. Too wired from the intensity of the long day. We passed spoonfuls of Nutella among us, wide-eyed in silence and a deep shared contentment and gratitude. In a moment we would get up and go to bed. But not just yet.

Trip Climbing Summary:

• The American Way (950m, 5.13a), Slesova — Free repeat, fixing the initial crux pitches and then a five day wall push, including weathering a small storm! FULL TEAM*

• Perestroika Crack (900m, 5.12a), Slesova — Onsight, until a few pitches from the summit (because it was a beautiful sunset and it’s about the experience not the checkmark!) Cat and Bron

• A handful of smaller missions close to camp.

*We fixed and worked the first four pitches, sending the first three before our wall push (except for Fiona who sent pitch 2 – the crux – on the actual push). All pitches were led and followed cleanly, except for pitch 7 (the offwidth) which was aided by Cat at midnight and then top roped cleanly by Fiona and Bron. The following day we had an unexpected storm, which thwarted any ideas of rappelling back down to lead it cleanly. Cat did not send pitch 13 (the downclimb) due to dropping a climbing shoe. Fiona and Bron each sent every pitch, Cat came close but was too zen to care about the checkmark and Alexa climbed a lot of the route while also capturing rad photos.

Photos by Alexa Flower