Torre Egger. Our expedition consisted of Jim Donini, Jay Wilson and me, supported by Jane Hunter, Jane and Sherm Wilson and Maureen Donahue. We arrived in the area on December 1 and after much load carrying started the climb on December 10. Beautiful alpine free climbing on perfect granite under a brilliant sun let Jay and me fix ropes up the first 500 feet. One stormy month later, we were only 100 feet higher. When the weather finally started to improve on January 20 we found our snow cave and our equipment at the top of the glacier buried under 30 feet of fresh snow. After two hard, frustrating days, we were in our new quarters. After two more days of storm we started again. Two days of climbing took us to the top of the large snowfield almost halfway to the “Col of Conquest” between Cerros Torre and Egger. A brief storm slowed things, but after four more days we reached the col at sunset on February 4. A cold bivouac preceded descending the ropes the next day in wind and rain. February 16 saw us back at the cave and the next day we chopped a platform and pitched our box tent 2000 feet higher up the ropes. We continued fixing ropes in unsettled weather until finally, after a bad icing storm on the 21st, we three pushed the last three pitches in high winds and heavy cloud to the top on February 22, 1976. We descended to the box that night, cleaned the route the next day and were back at Base Camp on the 24th. Up to the col we were on the northeast face of Cerro Torre, following a line close to that of Maestri and Egger in 1958. From the col we were on the south face of Torre Egger. NCCS VI, F9, A4; 4500 feet of technical climbing; 4000 feet of fixed rope; ice up to 75°; 37 pitches of which 13 were on ice and 18 with substantial aid; 11 bolts, all but one for anchors.

John Bragg