The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley): A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest; Peak in North AmericaStuck, Hudson
History
The Ascent of Denali (Mount McKinley): A Narrative of the First Complete Ascent of the Highest; Peak in North America
Stuck, Hudson
McKinley, Mount (Alaska); Mountaineering -- Alaska -- McKinley, Mount; Stuck, Hudson, 1863-1920 -- Travel -- Alaska -- McKinley, Mount
It was in the Grand Basin that the writer began to be seriously affected
by the altitude, to be disturbed by a shortness of breath that with each
advance grew more distressingly acute. While at rest he was not
troubled; mere existence imposed no unusual burden, but even a slight
exertion would be followed by a spell of panting, and climbing with a
pack was interrupted at every dozen or score of steps by the necessity
of stopping to regain breath. There was no nausea or headache or any
other symptom of "mountain sickness." Indeed, it is hard for us to
understand that affection as many climbers describe it. It has been said
again and again to resemble seasickness in all its symptoms. Now the
writer is of the unfortunate company that are seasick on the slightest
provocation. Even rough water on the wide stretches of the lower Yukon,
when a wind is blowing upstream and the launch is pitching and tossing,
will give him qualms. But no one of the four of us had any such feeling
on the mountain at any time. Shortness of breath we all suffered from,
though none other so acutely as myself. When it was evident that the
progress of the party was hindered by the constant stops on my account,
the contents of my pack were distributed amongst the others and my load
reduced to the mercurial barometer and the instruments, and, later, to
the mercurial barometer alone. It was some mortification not to be able
to do one's share of the packing, but there was no help for it, and the
other shoulders were young and strong and kindly.
[Sidenote: Tobacco]
With some hope of improving his wind, the writer had reduced his smoking
to two pipes a day so soon as the head of the glacier had been reached,
and had abandoned tobacco altogether when camp was first made on the
ridge; but it is questionable if smoking in moderation has much or any
effect. Karstens, who smoked continually, and Walter, who had never
smoked in his life, had the best wind of the party. It is probably much
more a matter of age. Karstens was a man of thirty-two years, and the
two boys were just twenty-one, while the writer approached fifty. None
of us slept as well as usual except Walter--and nothing ever interferes
with his sleep--but, although our slumbers were short and broken, they
seemed to bring recuperation just as though they had been sound. We
arose fresh in the morning though we had slept little and light.
On the 30th May we had made our camp at the Parker Pass; on the 2d June,
the finest and brightest day in three weeks, we moved to our first camp
in the Grand Basin. On the 3d June we moved camp again, out into the
middle of the glacier, at about sixteen thousand five hundred feet.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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