The Siberian Express Rolls Over Haystack Butte

The coldest winters I ever experienced, were in eastern Montana. One day in particular, back in the early 1980's, when I lived in Havre, Montana, the wind chill factor was 100 degrees F. below zero.

The winds were screaming that day and even inside a heated building you were cold, and a heavy sweater didn't help much. If you faced the wall your front was cold and your back was warm. Cold pressed into the walls like spears of glacial ice were about to stab through the building, and into your body.

The story of 100 F. below zero wind chill factor, was probably an exaggeration, but I suspect it wasn't far off. To obtain a wind chill of -100, the temperature has to be - 45 degrees or colder, with winds over 60 miles per hour. That combination is possible, on the high plains.

The Montanans call the big storms and cold fronts that roar in from Canada, the Siberian Express.

Another memorable freeze-out, was the time I climbed Crow Peak (9,300 feet elevation), in Montana, back in January of 1973. The main summit of Crow Peak is above timber line, with no trees except for a few gnarly patches of krummholz. In German krumm means “crooked, bent, or twisted” and holz means “wood”. The fierce winter gales, and extreme low temperatures of Montana winter, turn high elevation trees into stunted low growing shrubs, that take foothold in the lee side of large rocks, or low spots in the terrain. An arctic environment. The lower elevations are forested with lodgepole pine, aspen, spruce and limber pine.

Four of us snowshoed into Leslie Lake, at 8100 feet, and stayed two nights at an abandoned miners cabin, which was in disrepair but offered 4 walls and a roof and an old wood stove that was functional. I suspect that the cabin is long gone, crushed by deep winter snows or ambushed by avalanches. Or torn down by looters. We took a day trip and ascended Crow Peak, on snowshoes, and once on the summit the wind was screaming, and it was incredibly cold. A retreat was in order. I had taken off my snowshoes and when I attempted to strap them back on I was unable to, because my hands were so cold. Numb and almost useless. One of my friends luckily had nimble enough hands to help me buckle them back on and we were soon traversing our way back to the cabin.

A couple years later two of my friends decided to mount a winter expedition to Leslie Lake. On the return trip out they attempted to cross a steep and icy slope, and they were unable to kick footholds with their skis and snowshoes and every step they slid a few feet closer to the bottom of a gorge. Each slip brought them closer to trouble and calamity. Darkness bore down and they were forced to bivouac in the canyon bottom, in several feet of snow. In the seemingly endless arctic night of Montana they huddled and shivered together, in one sleeping bag. With frost bitten feet, they hiked out the next day to the trail head.

I checked out the statistics on the coldest place in the Rocky Mountains, and there were some surprises. The Western Region Climate Center has the statistics by State, for record values:
Record Lowest Recorded Temperatures (degrees F)
Alaska: -80 at Prospect Creek Camp
Colorado: -61 at Maybell
Idaho: - 60 at Island Park Dam
Montana: -70 at Rogers Pass
Utah: -69 at Peter's Sink
Wyoming: -66 at Riverside R.S.
Alberta, Canada: -78 at Fort Vermillion

There are probably other weather stations out there that are record holders, or near record holders, but never received credit, because the data was lost or never recorded. My friend Steve tells me that the Taylor Park weather station (10,410 feet) in Colorado, has registered two observations at -60 degrees. For many years the Taylor Park was a manual station, and often times in the winter the weather data was never recorded, because it involved someone slogging for many miles through deep snows and frigid temperatures. The Maybell station is the current record holder, in Colorado, for lowest temperature recorded, at -61.

The Taylor Park station holds one weather record for Colorado, for the longest number of days, with a temperature of <= 32 degrees, which was for 310 days. A krummholz kinda summer. Perhaps one day the big chill will occur and Taylor Park will trounce the Maybell record. If not the current second place record will be condemned to haunt the data vaults, in Stygian exile.

The record in Montana, for the longest number of days with a temperature of <=32 degrees, is 251 days, set by West Yellowstone station, at a whopping 6,668 feet elevation. Montana, you can do better.

The wind speed, as well as temperature, needs to be factored in when calculating wind chill (how cold it really feels). In reviewing the State records for average wind speed and and I figured Wyoming or Montana would have the highest average speeds. Wrong. Not even close. Colorado has two stations that top the record for the highest average annual wind speed with Monarch Pass at 19 mph (over 11,000 feet elevation) and La Veta pass at 16 mph at (9,400 feet elevation). Monarch Pass is an extremely cold place, but at least you can drop down into the trees or a canyon to escape the wind.

What does all this data really mean or prove? Its just a bunch of statistics generated by weather stations scattered here and there.

I think the coldest place in the world is near a small cone shaped mountain called Haystack Butte, in the Sweetgrass Hills, north of Chester Montana, out on the treeless Great Plains, which is just a few miles from the Canadian Border. A great norther or Siberian Express can work up quite a head of steam, with nary even a twig to slow it down, between northern Alberta and Montana. The first obstacle this glacial air mass encounters, once it crosses the border, is the Sweetgrass Hills, which it smashes into and breaks with great fury, like a monster wave hitting a huge rock on the Pacific coast.

Try finding a place out of the wind on the open prairie. Other than a local tavern which sometimes functions more like a mountaineers hut, than a watering hole.

So I will cast my lot with eastern Montana, being the coldest place in Rocky Mountains, with the high plains of Wyoming coming in second.

Wolves frolic in the shadow of Denali

My wife Louise and I explored Denali National Park, in Alaska, for 3 days, in early Sept. of 2003. The tourist pamphlets informed us we had less than a 20% chance of viewing the mountain, due to the frequent cloud cover and storms. Denali Peak at 20,320 feet tall, was clearly visible every day, beating the odds and defying the authorities. A few low dark clouds scudded across the hazy blue sky, and in direct contrast to the massive glaciers, snow fields, horns and craigs and the low lying tundra and taiga forest.

The base of the mountain is 2,000 feet elevation which grants the mountain 18,000 feet of vertical rise. The tallest peak in North America. The Athabascan's called Denali the Great One, which seems rather appropriate. It's a land of perpetual ice and snow.

Denali and the surrounding peaks loomed over us, even though we never came closer than 40 miles. It was hard to take my eyes off the great massif, with its massive glaciers, rock walls and a protective warren of smaller peaks. When you first view Denali, the surrounding glacial horns seem insignificant until you realize, many of them are well over 13,000 feet in elevation. The mountain dominates the land, and the sky, in every way. If I had to characterize Denali I would call her haughty, overbearing, arrogant, lordly, superior. But beautiful.

On the day we drove south, back to Anchorage, the wind was blowing up a hurricane on the highest peaks and ice and snow was being ripped off the highest points, migrating south, creating streamers of ice, some of which must have been many miles long. An airborne dune of shifting snow. If an airplane flew through these grainy ribbons of frost, I would imagine the paint being torn off the fuselage, followed by gale force winds ripping the plane to pieces. A mountaineer on those peaks would be hard pressed to survive that storm of howling, furious wind, and would be forced to make a hasty retreat.

The tundra and taiga at the lower elevations is vegetated with willows, birch, alder, currants, rose and dogwood, a colorful blend of red, orange and yellow. Many of the leaves had already blown away, and fall would soon recede to winter. Some of the stream courses were outlined by dark green spruce trees (20-30 feet in height) which stood tall over the shrubs. Scattered spruce trees dotted the tundra, in total disregard of symmetry and order.

I spotted two caribou, and one of them was an enormous bull. The caribou seemed to be wandering aimlessly, half hidden in cooperating willow, but about half and hour later, they formed up and loped to the east. The big horns in the lead. At another stop I heard a wolf howling in the distance, and scanning with my binoculars, located a wolf pack on a far ridge, in varied colors of black, white and gray. The wolves seemed to be quite engaged in meddlesome play and needless howling.

The first expedition to climb Denali Peak was on April 3rd, 1910, by a group of 4 miners. It's better known as the Sourdough Expedition. It is said they spent 3 months climbing the mountain, spending most of that time on rock and ice, with no other living plants or creatures to be seen, other than a wandering raven or two. As for me I will make no attempt to ascend Denali and will stake my claim to the taiga forest, in good company with caribou and willows. My Sourdough Expedition will be limited to cooking over a roaring campfire of dry spruce wood and climbing mountains, by hefting a pair of binoculars.