Light in the mountains provokes various thoughts and considerations. Natural lights, stars and the moon promise a settled night, ideal for an unplanned bivi halfway up a route, while the lights of a mountain refuge can give you assurance after several long days on a route. Sometimes the lights from bedrooms, street lamps and porches give me entirely different thoughts:
We sit on a bivi ledge 1500 metres above the valley floor, exposed and committed for the night. The sky is clear and crisp in a calming way, but we are still on the North face of the Eiger, effectively trapped with only hard climbing above us to get us off the mountain. I’ve been in the situation before and it always makes my mind wander. With our backs against the wall, we sit in our sleeping bags, in a bucket seat made of snow. Looking down a thousand metres to the town below I imagine a family in a chalet, unable to comprehend the position we have put ourselves in. They tuck into a warm meal and share wine around the table. In contrast we are on an icy ledge with a sachet of soup to share.
We are masochistic. We seek these experiences again and again, even though, in this moment, although I love this environment, there is a small part of me that would prefer to be in that chalet, wood burner roaring and whisky in hand.
But light also gives a sense of comfort, a 
direction to go, and indications of safety. Planned day trips can easily turn into night; headtorches should be packed no-matter how long you plan to be out. Darkness falls quickly and you soon become reliant on a light to get you down safely:
Back in Italy we are abseiling off our route after climbing 300 metres up a limestone tower. Avoiding the midday heat we started late and the blanket of darkness quickly fell. Fatigue, thirst and hunger have started to set in. Our headtorches set to full beam scanning the rock, we are looking for the reflective shine of a bolt. Dave is hanging in space at the end of 60 metres of rope. We need the next anchor to thread the rope and repeat the process 3 more times until we are back on solid ground. Dave shouts up, he’s found the anchor 10 metres to his right. I look down and can only see a light from his headtorch. Swinging from side to side until he’s gained enough momentum to run across the wall to reach the next anchor. Sometimes climbing at night is unplanned but necessary, while others its planned but unnecessary:
Climbing in the night focus my concentration, the light creates a sphere of fixation, only what you see matters. The floor sits 200 metres below but I can’t see it. I can’t see the next anchors, the next crux or the next pitch, only the next few holds in front of me. The light keeps you in the present, the spotlight on the wall only gives away your next few holds and nothing more. Shadows dancing around the holds revealing the location of the smallest crimps.
Back down in Chamonix valley it’s the last day of my trip and a friend has kindly offered me his couch for the night. I can’t sleep, I sit upright and look through the balcony doors up to the Midi, the light of the summit station clearly visible. It’s 2am and I want to be up there on some uncomfortable ledge, I wonder if someone is shivering in their bivi looking down, wishing to exchange positions.
