Sugar Damavand

It is nice to be on skis again. A doctor we met in Gusfan Sarah-the 3000m hut on Mt. Damavand in Iran-told me that I had torn a ligament in my ankle. Damn. Seeing my disappointment at his diagnosis he told me my ski boot would act like a cast. He said if I taped the ankle well, I could probably make it up. “But what do I know?” he smiled, “I’m only a veterinarian.”

The blizzard broke on our third morning at the 4100m Bhargaheh III hut. Having been horizontal too long-good books taking us only so far-we decide to bust a move and get the blood flowing. The cloud ceiling is not far above our heads. Is the storm over or what? Or is this just a break in between storms? Might as well be using a Magic-8-Ball. “Ohh, Magic-8-Ball, shall we climb today? -Reply Hazy Try Again.”

The skinning is nice and I’m happy that my ankle feels decent locked into my boot. The six of us skin-zag up the wide snowfield and I’m trying to get a rhythm. Falling behind the others, I feel my lack of acclimatization. In my gimpy state I missed a few of the ever-important accli-days. An hour up, Nico, Nicholas and Laurent-two Swiss and a Frenchman-veer right up another snowfield skinning Euro-style. That is, very quickly. But, where are they going? A ski touring truism: we all have our idea of an optimum skin line, usually different from the others. Up higher, the skinning is more difficult and I start to slip. I decide I must get some of those edge-to-edge skins. Stephen, Victoria, and I go into crampon mode. Lock and load, pied ‡ plat up what is now wind-board that is very nice to crampon up. The clouds obscure the summit but a quick check finds us all feeling well. Victoria has a slight headache but she is smiling; I’m getting my usual high-altitude second wind; and we are feeling optimistic.

Several hours later the six of us regroup, all doing well. The weather, however, is slowly deteriorating. A west wind has kicked up and it is lightly snowing. Our route follows a huge boomerang shaped snowline with a long exposed ridge of volcanic tuff on its inside. It is this ridge that we aim for, as it is a well-needed reference in what is quickly becoming a whiteout. Steadily we move up snowfields, ramps and couloirs. It is getting colder and snowing harder.

We duck behind a rock an hour later at 5300m. The poop has hit the ceiling fan, my hands are cold and my prescription glasses are fogged underneath my goggles. It has gone from whiteout to full-blown blizzard in Warhols’ 15 minutes. Didn’t one of the Persian guys down below say that Messner got thwarted here several years back? I fish out my glacier glasses and try them-frozen solid. “Ohh, Magic-8-Ball, shall we continue? -My Sources Say No.”

It is less then 400m vert to the top. We cache the skis behind the rock and continue slowly up into the tempest, the boys in front appearing and disappearing with every pulse of the thickening wind and snow. I can hardly see and I notice that Nico is having similar eyewear problems. I lose a crampon and by the time I sit down and replace it, my hands are like wood. I cannot get my hands back into my gloves quick enough, the brutality of having to deal with straps, almost too much. Another hundred meters up and the futility of continuing become apparent in the face of this storm. Stephen notices that the tip of my nose has turned white and with that we beat a hasty Pythonesque “run away!” retreat down to the skis. Nicholas helps me get my second ski on-my wooden claw hands not functioning well. I fall in behind Nico, who can hardly see, while Stephen skis towards the volcanic tuff. I’m barefaced now-my glasses done in-and squinting while the ice pellets are stinging my eyeballs. Ten long minutes later, I ski to an awkward stop and with a, “wah, wa, wait a minute,” I realize I can’t open my eyes-they are frozen completely shut.

A translated Jack London novel was the reason my dad---in 1958 at the age of 22---left his home in Shiraz, Iran, to come to America. Mom followed two years later. It’s strange to contemplate: how a chance reading of a book could forever change our family destiny. But it did, and my bro and I ended up being born in Los Angeles as opposed to Shiraz. My brother and I didn’t really feel at all Persian growing up in the suburbs of LA-our family as Norman Rockwell as the rest of them on Melba Ave. (Ok, that is an exaggeration-more like Ali Rockwell than Norman.) Although they spoke to us often in Farsi (the Persian language), to which we would answer back in English, they didn’t push the culture upon us. And when my dad would occasionally tell stories of the homeland it was like, “dad, who cares? I’m going to the beach. Got 20 bucks I can have?” It’s shameful to think about now, but in those days, my brother and I hardly thought about Iran. And at the time no one in America gave much thought to Iran either.

That, of course, all changed in 1979. Iran was very much in the news and soon every American had an opinion about it. The US backed Shah was in exile and the Imam Khomeini had returned. The Shah was a puppet of the West, the Ayatollah proclaimed; and America, the Great Satan. I was with my friend Mike on our first out of state ski trip, to Colorado, when we watched the events unfold on live TV.

“Who is the bearded guy? Pass me a Coors.”

“Guy named Khomeini, he’s an Aya-tollah. Did you throw the burritos in the microwave?”

“Yeah, dude. Nice having a 7-11 across the street. 24-hour burritos. Throw another Coors, this ones warm.”

“Bob, you’re a camel-jockey. What’s up with all those Eye-rainians?”

“Don’t know, but they sure are tripping. They must really like this Khomeini. Should call him Sugar Khomeini.”

And so it went, skiing powder at Monarch during the day, Coors and burritos at night. To me, Salida and Reynolds’s apartment were as far away from the drama being played out in Iran as man was from landing on Mars. At least we had cherubic Alfred E. Neumann look-alike Ted Koppel to lend humor to the situation. Turkey and Iraq border Iran to the west; Afghanistan and Pakistan to the east; several former Russian republics and the Caspian Sea to the north; and the Persian Gulf to the south. Geographically speaking, the common conception of Iran is one of vast deserts. (I’ve never jockeyed a camel, but my Swiss wife has). While this is certainly true, about half the country is mountainous. The two main ranges being the Zagros-situated west of the Old Persian capital of Esfahan-3000 to 4000m peaks with awesome touring potential (some Frenchmen heli-skied here last season). And the dominating Alborz range, to the north and sandwiched between the huge capital of Tehran (pop. 12 million) and the Caspian Sea.

 I had first heard about Iran’s highest mountain-the permanently snowcapped dormant volcano of 5671m, Damavand-from Sohrab, a friend of my dads. He told me about a handful of medium-sized ski areas nestled in the Alborz. Then he spoke with special reverence about Damavand, proclaiming with nationalistic certainty that, “it is one of the ten highest mountains in the world!” I was like, “dude, you’ve been smoking too much tariyak.” (I have recently looked up some stats and there is something like 3000 peaks and sub peaks over 6000m. worldwide) Still, Damavand is at a respectable elevation of around 18,600 feet.

I was suitably intrigued, but my dad quashed all thoughts with a they’ll-throw-you-in-the-army-if-you-ever-go-there warning.

Fortunately, the situation has changed of late. In the past few years the government has pensively begun to promoting tourism again. President Khatami (who was recently reelected by a landslide) seems to be leaning in the direction of eventual normalized relations with the West. And me, well, I finally saw a picture of Damavand and was stunned by how awesome it looked to ski. I figured it was time to visit the homeland, so to speak.

Flying in from Europe via Frankfurt, our crew of six arrived in Tehran at two in the morning. Word was that Iran had a bountiful winter-more snow then they have seen in several years. High-altitude corn snow was what we were after and we were confident that our April 2nd arrival date would be spot on. Except for the dubious look passport control gave me-the American with the Persian name-we cruised through customs and were on a minibus rolling out of a seemingly deserted Tehran.

The drive to the small hamlet of Puloor was in spooky darkness, the only lights penetrating from our vehicle. We crashed hard in front of the fire, Mohsen-our local mountain guide-stoked up in the hearth of the small but comfortable home that was arranged for us.

Stephen is one of a few Americans who is a Swiss UIAGM mountain guide. I have been getting my ski fix for the last ten years over here in Verbier, Switzerland. The five of us have done a lot of great trips together. Rounding out the team was Swiss raconteur Nicholas. He is a talented ski mountaineer from a land where ski touring is almost a national sport.

We awoke in the early afternoon to sunshine. Everyone but me stepped outside to get a lay of the land. In a bad case of timing, I had somehow hurt my left ankle in the days prior to departure. The next day it was as swollen as an overcooked frankfurter and painful when weighted. All I could do was to stay calm, ice the ankle, and think positive thoughts-not easy as I watched my mates leave for an acclimatization ski.

I spent the day getting to know the support team and practicing my Farsi.

I understand the language well and speak it decently. (The language came back to me, much to my surprise, pretty quickly over the course of the month we were there.) Mohsen’s calm demeanor masked his mountaineering experience-his first and foremost love being the mountains and guiding people amongst them. We tended to listen to his every word as he arched an eyebrow and gave us his best Omar Sharif look. He had traveled extensively in Europe, Asia, and Africa in his previous job with an Iranian telecommunications company. For him, a definite perk of his old job was being able to climb mountains in the countries he visited. I had a preconceived notion of the Persians not having much of a clue about climbing and skiing. In fact, there is an Iranian Mountaineering Federation that had, for example, sent a team to Cho-Oyu several years back. Ski touring, mountaineering and even sport-climbing are becoming more and more popular. Ehson-his eldest son and a carpenter by trade (carpenter-mountaineer; even here)-dreams of traveling and climbing as his father had.

This was a recurring theme with the young Persians we met throughout our stay: the difficulty of obtaining visas to (and affordability of) travel. That, and the question we got asked most often: how much we westerners earned. I’ll give you an example. Behrooz, our interpreter, is a geologist studying at Tehran University. The difficulty of even getting into T.U. is astonishing. (And will be getting worse-46% of Iran’s population is under the age of 15, a result of the devastating 8-year Iran-Iraq war.) He told us of mandatory 12 hours a day studying to even have a hope of getting accepted. (I thought back, ruefully, to all the days I cut school with Big Tim to go skiing or surfing. Jeez.) He now studies and works full time as a geologist. He earns $100 per month. He can think of no better thing in life than to travel and study volcanoes, his specialty and passion. The problem is that between finishing university and his as of yet uncompleted mandatory two-year stretch in the army, he is looking at a minimum six years before he can even think of getting a passport.

Upon the teams return, it became apparent that we needed to get up to altitude. The team found the snow down low to be rotten-not only hard to ski but dangerous as well. As for me, it looked more and more as if I wasn’t going anywhere. My mood-like an out of whack metronome-was alternating between depression and being pissed off.

But two days later we found ourselves packed into a jeep and a beater Paykan, (Iran’s version of the venerable Dodge Dart) rolling through Puloor, past the tiny storefronts selling huge wax-paper backed wheels of fruit leather, handmade brooms, and children’s rubber balls, and up the surprisingly well maintained road high above the Havaz River. I had been popping anti-inflammatories like they were Good N’ Plenty’s for the past two days. They seemed to be working. Unfortunately, plenty was what we didn’t have. I had my first views of the massive volcano and it looked a long way up. Abruptly, we turned up a rutted dirt road, our weathered driver rocking the steering wheel like the veteran Paykan jockey he was. Like a snake on the moon, the road wound up the volcanic, lunar landscape.

Some time later we came upon an unlikely sight: a small, domed mosque set in a small courtyard at 3000 meters. Mohsen announced that we had arrived at Gusfan Sarah and that we would be spending the night here. Now here was a novelty: how often do you use a mosque as a base to go ski mountaineering? I asked Mohsen if he has ever seen any Ayatollahs skinning from here. He looked at me and said, “skin che hast?” (What are skins?) We were surprised to find two other teams-French and Swiss-at Gusfan Sarah. Thierry, head of the Swiss team, told us of the big melt-off that happened in the last week.

Seems it was possible to skin from just above the mosque. And now the snow line was almost a thousand meters higher. The view from the courtyard was tremendous. Across the deep gorge of the Havaz River was a high ridgeline called the “doh boradar” the “two brothers.” There were enough chutes off of this ridge that every member of the US, Swiss and Liechtenstein ski racing teams, along with every member of the World Free Ski Tour, would be able to get their own perfect shred gully. How nice. Huge limestone intrusions rose like armor from the deep gorge, full of possibilities. Stone shepherd’s huts, in use for centuries, dotted the dark volcanic tuff near the mosque.

All three teams headed up to Bhargaheh III-the second hut-in the morning. Nico and Stephen decided it wisest to walk up to the hut and back down again to help acclimatize. I was forced to spend the day reading and listening to Buckshot LaFonque (Bb-b-b-buckshot!). By the time they returned it had turned hazy and windy, a big chapeau shaped cloud obscuring the summit.

We moved up to Bhargaheh III the next morning, a light snow joining the wind. I walked the 1100 meters vert in my telemark boots to protect my ankle from the rough trail. I met my doctor friend making his way down. He told me that everyone had left early in the morning for the climb and all were thwarted by the massive winds up high. Some had come close, all were now leaving. That night Mohsen cooked up my favorite Persian meal-khoreshe qeymeh (split pea stew on rice)-for dinner. (If I only had some limejuice to splash on the qeymeh, I would have been in heaven.) And with that we settled into our bags in the comfortable hut. The storm moved in, full of white fury, and stayed put for two days. A howling west wind buffeted us every time we stepped outside, the snow stinging exposed skin. I wondered nervously, how it would be when we finally started to climb.

My eyes are glued shut, locked as sure as a maiden in a Tollyboy. The ice is frozen to my eyelids and I can’t just yank, unless I want to lose skin. I yell over the blizzard to Nico-whom I know is having his own issues-to see if he can get my goggles out of my pack. Bless his heart-he gets them out and I throw them on. The relief is tremendous and after a few minutes, my eyes are thawed. I still can’t see but at least my eyes are open. We continue down in tight formation winding slowly through the rocks, a lot of side slipping in between mini hop turns, everything tense for 45 minutes. I’m glad we are on skis. I would hate to have to slowly plunge step down.

Finally it lets up a little with the loss of altitude. The wind isn’t as bad, my hands are warming, and I can see. The snow is good, too. Check out Laurent tele-ing by-very nice.

Later, back in the now well-populated Bhargaheh III, our crew is worked. It was a valiant effort all around considering the horrendous conditions we encountered up high. Dead tired, I fall asleep to the sound of some local guides singing lilting Persian love songs.

We bailed off of the mountain the next morning. It was sunny but very windy. Gale-force up high, we reasoned. Two non-skiing teams had left hours earlier but were moving very slowly. We gave them no chance of getting up the volcano. Halfway down to Gusfan Sarah, however, the winds diminished and it was positively warm out. Now we were second-guessing ourselves. The lower I walked, the more that nagging feeling of lost opportunity gnawed at my stomach. It was a tangible thing that I could see was affecting some of the others as well. By the time we reached Gusfan Sarah, I was thinking this was unfinished business indeed. And yes, a couple of the climbers made it up. “Ohh, Magic-8-Ball, will we be returning?-Signs Point To Yes.”

Stephen, Victoria, and Nicholas had only one more week, so we journeyed to the beautiful city of Esfahan to get our minds off of the mountain and into some culture. After all, we were in a country with thousands of years of history, mostly brilliant and some disastrous, yet always fascinating. Perhaps the best part is that the cultural legacy is entirely unspoilt by tourism. The days that we spent there were a richness of sights and sounds. We wandered endlessly through the huge bazaar, were mesmerized by the Islamic buildings and blue tiled mosques. We chilled on a comfortable balcony overlooking the huge Imam Khomeini Square, smoking fruit-flavored molasses tobacco out of ghalyans (a Persian water pipe), getting seriously into the Persian state of mind.

We went chaykhunè (teahouse) hopping for hours on end finding all the best ones, especially the ones under Esfahan’s majestic bridges. I quickly fell into a routine of smoking ghalyans, rapping Farsi with the friendly locals, and drinking the marvelous tea in large quantities. And the food had our taste buds reeling from exotic flavor overload…it was all too much.

We got back to Tehran and bid adieu to Stephen, Victoria, and Nicholas. Victoria was ready to leave. Persian (as well as visiting) women, by Islamic law, must cover their hair and not show any skin except for the hands and face, out in public. She was tired of this restriction--of always having to cover up even when it was very warm out. Many Persian women --and men-- are tired of this, too. Hopefully these restrictions will ease in the future.

The rest of us, well, we had unfinished business. The next day we were back up at Bhargaheh III. Well acclimatized, we had walked straight up. Sunshine greeted us the following day and even though we encountered heavy winds and difficult climbing, we would not be denied this time. We stood on the summit some seven hours later, said Inshallah, salaamati and merci beaucoup to the clear sky, tried not to breathe the sulfur fumes, and proceeded to have a wonderful telemark run down the changeable snow. And that gnawing depth in the stomach, that feeling of lost opportunity, well, it floated away on a magic carpet, up past that great 8-Ball in the sky.

A note from the author-
This piece was written before President Bush’s infamous “Axis of Evil” speech. I wrote that: “President Khatami seems to be leaning in the direction of eventual normalized relations with the West.” This was certainly true before said speech… Obviously, things are in a flux at the moment in the Middle East, as well as the rest of the globe.

Let us hope that all the leaders of the world will start doing the right thing and let us hope, and work fervently for, a lasting peace throughout the world---a peace that will allow exploration and discovery for all peace-loving people.

Traveling is a wonder, at times so pure in its wide-eyed simplicity. I am always in awe and childlike when I journey. Traveling opens up minds, as well as hearts. And when you can combine it with some telemark action, well, there is nothing better.

For more photos, go here.

Please feel free to check out the links below and hook up some skiing magic of your own to Iran and beyond…

bob@verbier.ch (that’s me, Bob Mazarei)

And the telemark friends/guides I work with…

www.johnfalkiner.com UIAGM Mountain Guide, John Falkiner

www.alpine-guiding.com UIAGM Mountain Guide, Stephen Hadik

www.swissguides.com UIAGM Mountain Guide, Hans Solmssen

www.horizonsnouveaux.com Travel Guru, Nicolas Jaques

Click here to view more Iran images (surf the site as well, all kinds of tele action…)

Click the lefthand catalog cover, then “Ski et ExpÈditions.”