Coast Mountain Men:
Mountaineering Stories from the West Coast
by Gil Parker
Sample Chapter
Roger Neave—"Love the Game Above the Prize"
Our 1977 attempt of the unclimbed peak in the Stikine Range of northern British Columbia was a complex affair, requiring us to fly by bush plane from Petersburg, Alaska, across the narrow panhandle to a lake in B.C., then to transport our gear and ourselves by helicopter to the foot of Mount Noel's south ridge. The remote area offered us stiletto peaks thrusting up from a vast glacier ice cap including, on a good day, distant views of Kate's Needle and the Devil's Thumb.
We camped for a week on the glacier, living in style due to Ralph Hutchinson's foresight and excellent taste in wine. But we worked hard too, climbing the southwest ridge to a bottleneck, then bivouacing among the boulders without a level place to lie down.
We considered getting off the rock ridge and onto the snowfield so I went down for the crampons we'd left in camp. Back up the ridge, overnight it snowed again, soaking our sleeping bags and chasing us back down the ridge, where a blizzard battered our Logan tent all night. After a week of reconnaissance and aborted climbs up and down the ridge, each thrust being parried by a blast of weather, we decided to try a single-day push up the snow face from the glacier.
Climbing in the predawn was cool and the snow crisp. Below the bergschrund we passed huge blocks of snow and wondered where on that open face they could possibly have originated. At the top of the moving snowfield we found a way across the bergrschrund onto the fixed snow on the face, Ralph belaying Roger Neave, then Jim Craig and me, and we angled across the steep face to the west.
But the sun came on strong when least it was needed and the ice runnels were active with slides. We were trying to reach the shelter of a rock rib when an ice avalanche hit us in one of the gullies. We tumbled and slid down the steep snow face, probably 500 metres, before getting stopped by my ice-axe arrest and by Roger falling headfirst into the bergschrund, stopping the other end of the rope.
We extricated ourselves and were amazed to find that none of us was injured, though we had lost two ice axes and a down jacket in the fall. So we climbed back up to the ridge, safer than descending the now avalanche-prone snow route we had come up. While the summit was close, two enormous gendarmes, sheer pillars of rock with unknown difficulties, blocked the way. It was already 6 pm and long hours since our previous meal. Straddling the airy ridge "à cheval," we ate in silence and watched the sun descend towards the Pacific.
We voted. Ralph Hutchinson, who had climbed with Roger on several expeditions, wanted to continue. Jim and I were anxious to get off the mountain, down to safer ground. Roger cast the deciding vote, for retreat. Even so, we were benighted farther down the ridge; at midnight it was too dark to continue. Roger had safeguarded my rope during the delicate descent on the fractured rock as we chose the wrong route, climbed back up, and tried another. The key to safety was his patience; he would not let the extreme awkwardness of our situation panic him. So we sat on a ledge in a near-freezing night and waited for the dawn.
We were moving as soon as daylight allowed, struggling to get blood circulating into our numb extremities. Yet it was 2 pm the next day when we finally reached easy ground, dehydrated and tired. Roger was visibly worn from the strain of the climb and the long night hours waiting. His poise in such trying conditions was born of experience, of surviving many more difficult challenges.
"I've been on just three mountains that I've wondered about ever getting off," Roger Neave told me as we descended the ridge to our camp. "This was one of them!"
Certainly, our attempt on Mount Noel did not compare with the mountains Roger had faced over a climbing career spanning 50 years and five continents. But adventure is not always dictated by the size or appearance of the obstacle faced. In our case, the weather had been inconsistent, dumping us with fresh snow every second day (thankfully not on our bivouac night.) The isolation of the range was an ingredient for adventure; we had to be self-sufficient.
Some people handle the unexpected better than others. Roger knew himself and his quiet patience in disquieting circumstances made him our psychological leader. Small of stature, he made up for that with stamina and endurance. With a thinning shock of white hair, Roger retained the handsome visage of the younger man, especially when he laughed, which he did regularly. Roger had then reached the age of 71, but his career disproved the old mountain truism.
"There are old climbers and bold climbers, but there are no old, bold climbers!"
Arriving from Britain in 1928, Roger and his brother, Ferris, lived in Winnipeg, about as far from the mountains as you can get. But they met Alex McCoubrey, Sr., editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal and later president of the Alpine Club of Canada. With McCoubrey's instruction and with limited practice in the nearby rock quarries, Roger headed for the Rockies.
Mount Louis, little known to the general public, is a climber's dream. Hidden behind Banff's Mount Norquay, the towering limestone spire thrusts upward, defying climbers to find an easy route. In his first season, Roger climbed the peak without benefit of a rope or a partner, a solo ascent! And over the years he was to repeat the climb eight times.
Much of the early exploration and climbing in the Rockies had been promoted for tourism. The Canadian Pacific Railway imported Swiss mountain guides to lead clients on the many unclimbed peaks. But even after they had been there for 30 years, still there were opportunities for first ascents. The Molar Tower near Mount Hector could be seen from the Lake Louise railway station. Roger led the first ascent with ropemates Graham Cairns and Alex McCoubrey, Jr., in 1933.
"It had been attempted by the guides and they had given it up," said Roger. "It was the most spectacular place I've ever been."
That same year the Neave brothers reached the Leaning Tower group in B.C.'s Purcell Range. Roger first sighted the breath-taking granite spires from Mount Kaslo summit. The party forced a route up Campbell Creek to the Fry Creek area, then made several first ascents along narrow and steep ridges with a tremendous drop on all sides. On the last of their climbs in the Towers a storm caught them with lightning, wind and snow. This was another of the three "dicey spots" that Roger remembered on our descent of Mount Noel.
There were other first ascents, such as Needle Peak near Chrome Lake on the B.C. border, done with Alex Corry and Rex Gibson. Gibson was already an experienced climber and would achieve a pre-eminent reputation in Canadian mountaineering. Roger called it "tricky rock climbing;" the 1933 Canadian Alpine Journal was more effusive.
Perhaps the greatest achievement of Neave's long climbing career was the attempt, in 1934, of Mount Waddington in the Coast Range. The peak had been sighted from near Mount Arrowsmith summit in 1925 by the prodigious coastal mountaineers, Don and Phyllis Munday, and they named it "Mystery Mountain." Then they spent several years sailing up Bute and Knight Inlets, searching for access to the mountain. Eventually, they climbed the northwest peak, but realizing that they couldn't reach the main summit from there, they photographed from close range the stark pinnacle covered with ice feathers.
At 4016 metres, Waddington is the highest point in the Coast Range, already touted as unclimbable due to the extreme steepness of the final plinth and the severe weather that plastered ice on the rock year 'round.
With Campbell Secord and Art Davidson, the Neave brothers drove from Winnipeg via the Crowsnest Pass to Williams Lake, then west to Tatlayoko Lake. Their approach was down the Homathko River that drains Tatlayoko through the Coast Range to the Pacific. Swollen glacial streams caused the party to detour—climbing over six hundred metres out of the valley carrying relays—three times to get their gear into base camp.
Leaving the less experienced Davidson in charge of the base, the remaining trio ascended the long Tiedemann Glacier to the start of serious climbing. Using a three man sleeping bag and no tent, they climbed the Bravo Glacier to Spearman Col. After two days of poor weather, dwindling provisions prompted them to attempt the summit in marginal conditions.
"Our surmise with respect to the slope of the strata on that side of the mountain was correct," Roger remembered. "The ledges all sloped in, which made the holds good when you cleared them, a very laborious process, just chipping out every foot and handhold on these ledges. We went up quite a few hundred feet this way. We could do very little belaying, and if anyone had slipped, we'd have probably all gone down."
They made good progress on the east and north sides of the pinnacle, cutting ice from each rock handhold, but were forced to abandon the attempt in deteriorating weather only a hundred and fifty metres short of the top.
They retreated into a crevasse to escape the blizzard, and spent a very cold night. The next morning they probed their way against the blowing snow in a white-out back to camp. The descent of the steep Bravo Glacier, now laden with fresh snow, was fraught with avalanche peril, but they made base camp safely, much to the delight of Davidson, helpless and worried, as the climbers became more and more overdue.
This was Roger's third, and perhaps worst, mountain crisis he mentioned to me on our Noel expedition. Their attempt had not reached the summit, but it had opened up the Homathko Valley access and a new route on the peak. The Neaves had pioneered the way on this difficult mountain and nearly succeeded despite horrible weather that is so common in the region. Subsequent expeditions also failed until, in 1936, Bill House and Fritz Weissner reached the summit via the south face route. The Neaves route was not repeated until 1950.
After this incredible adventure, Roger Neave continued to pile up first ascents and difficult repeat climbs, with a hiatus of a few years when his children were small. Roger worked for Imperial Oil for most of his professional life. I remember his long dissertations on the precautions needed to avoid fires when refuelling aircraft with super-volatile jet fuel. When he retired, Roger and his wife, Fran, moved to a small suburb of Nanaimo, B.C., which gave them easy access to canoeing and climbing.
Roger was often back with the Alpine Club camps as a volunteer leader, climbing the peaks of the Premier Range, the Bugaboos and the Rockies, including Mount Sir Donald in the Selkirks at Rogers Pass. The Club awarded him the Silver Rope medal for his leadership work. Roger served as President of the Alpine Club in '67 and '68 during the pivotal year of the Centennial Range camp in the Yukon. For his many contributions to the Club he was later named an Honorary Member in recognition.
There was one dark cloud during his active years. Roger loved the old clubhouse above Banff on the road to the sulphur springs. He supervised its operations and spent many hours winterizing the cabins. Naturally, he was vehemently against a later decision to abandon the clubhouse and move the headquarters to Canmore.
In the '60s and '70s the National Park authorities wanted to take over all of the public facilities, including the Alpine Club's main clubhouse and mountain huts sprinkled throughout the mountains. Roger contended that a little more backbone was needed by the Club Board to maintain their historic and central location in Banff. But the Club built a new home above the highway northeast of Canmore, a pristine site, but one later to suffer encroachment by riding clubs, limestone mines and industrial parks. Soon the Park administration realized that the ACC did a better job of running mountain huts that they did with their own staff, to the extent that they asked the Club take over the operation of several huts that originally were not part of the Alpine Club network.
Roger climbed internationally, too. He had his season in the Alps, climbing the Matterhorn, Breithorn, and Jungfrau, but found the routes crowded and the ethics different from Canada's comparative wilderness. In Peru's Cordillera Blanca in '63 and '78, his party completed several first ascents on glacier-hung spires over 4,500 metres in height, especially on Tochlaraju, 6,000 metres.
In 1972, on Mount Robson's south face "hourglass route" Roger Neave and Ralph Hutchinson climbed the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies, a peak that few alpinists aspire to, putting two unlikely climbers on top.
"We were an old-age pensioner and one with no toes," remembered Roger. "Ralph had lost his toes to frostbite on Mount McKinley in Alaska."
Roger enjoyed his retirement in Nanaimo, canoeing and climbing the Island peaks, well past the age of 80. He had a practical philosophy about climbing.
"You are climbing with people with the same interest, so you make a lot of good friends," he recalled. (I could tell that he was dreaming back to specific climbs.) "I like the feel of the rock under my hands. Any mountain is a challenge, especially if there is the element of exploring the unknown." And for Roger Neave, his mountain trips always contained that element.
In 1991, only a year after the death of his wife, Fran, Roger died an outdoorsman's death, cutting firewood in his backyard. In the words of his mentor, Alex McCoubrey, Roger seems to have lived, "to love the game above the prize."
A Mentor
Roger's place is clean,
he tends his bees,
cuts his own firewood.
This morning he was alone,
canoeing on the river.
He's such a legend;
it's apparent
I'm still trying to impress,
as though anything
could match his
sixty years of summits.
We talk of mountains.
Sometimes I lose him,
he drifts off, halfway
through an expedition,
back in the hills,
doing what's needed to survive.
I mimic his example,
keep my kitchen clean,
my wood cut for winter.
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