Entries By Dave Hahn

After so many days of preparation and travel and anticipation, what a thrill it was to finally be walking uphill.  We left our comfortable hotel at 8 AM in a bus headed east.  We’d reached the Kilimanjaro National Park entrance by 10 AM and after a further hour of getting organized and registered with the park, we were off.  It was raining lightly when we left our hotel, but it was merely cloudy and damp when we got walking through the big trees at the start of the Machame route. Moss was thriving and hanging from every branch and tree trunk and the trail was a little greasy under foot.  Before long, we were steadily gaining altitude.  The bus had taken us to 6000 ft and our goal for the day, Machame Camp, sat at 10,000 ft, so it was always going to be a tough workout.  It was certainly tougher for our staff as they raced uphill with far heavier loads than we were carrying.  We took short breaks every 90 minutes or so in order to eat and drink and by a little after 4 PM, the trees were getting smaller, the clouds were thinning and magically, our camp appeared… right where we’d hoped to find it.   The crew had built us a wonderful home and we simply needed to move in.  We sat in our dining tent for an afternoon snack and then, just before dinner, the clouds cleared enough to give our first magical views of Kibo -Kilimanjaro’s central peak- shining in the last rays of the sun nine thousand feet above us.   Dinner was excellent and by 8 PM we were crawling into our tents and heading for bed… pleasantly tired and ready for a night with perhaps a little less jet lag. 

Best Regards

RMI Guide Dave Hahn & Team

Today was an easy day at the Rivertrees Hotel on the outskirts of Arusha.

The team met after breakfast to get into the details of our Kilimanjaro climb. We discussed staffing and itineraries and what gear gets used when. We talked about getting to the mountain and getting away from it and everything in between. We talked about packing and sorting gear and then we broke up the meeting in order to pack and sort.

Gear checks were performed back in the hotel rooms and then the gang had much of the afternoon to relax and work through jet lag.

We gathered for dinner outside on the patio and then drifted off to rest for our big first day of climbing.

Best Regards,

Dave Hahn

Wow.  We did it.  Against all odds, the team made it clear over to East Africa without missed or canceled flights and without losing luggage. 

We’re assembled here in USA River, Tanzania (on the outskirts of Arusha) and ready to begin our Kilimanjaro adventure.  Some of the team used the day to explore the town, some were still en route and some of us just napped… trying to work out the jet lag.  But we came together for a pleasant dinner in the garden-like setting of the Rivertrees Hotel.  Most chose to wear sweaters, finding the cool temps a pleasant change from the various heat waves plaguing the States these days.  The nine team members simply enjoyed each other’s company this evening…  tomorrow morning we’ll begin the business of prepping for a week of climbing Africa’s highest mountain. 

Best Regards, 

Dave Hahn

The Five Day Climb July 23 - 27 reached the summit of Mt. Rainier this morning.  RMI Guides Dave Hahn and Pete Van Deventer and teams reached the summit around 6:30 am under calm winds and warm temperatures.  The teams will return to Camp Muir where they spend the afternoon to relax and recover after their efforts today.  The teams will descend the remaining 4,500' to Paradise tomorrow morning.

Congratulations to today's climbers!

Thursday, July 7, 2022 - 11:52 am PT

We are calling ourselves lucky.  Very lucky.  The clouds moved away long enough for the glacier surface to freeze up for our nighttime ramble down the lower Kahiltna.  We started walking down from 11,000 at 12:30 AM.  The midnight sun was beautiful on the peaks around us as we cruised down in the cool shadows.  The first hours, to the base of Ski Hill, were straightforward… then things got complicated.  Lots and lots of crevasse crossings.  But that is where the freeze helped immensely.  It also didn’t hurt that other teams preceded us, breaking into holes and showing us where not to walk.  In the end we made it through without any collapsed bridges.  It took about seven hours to get to the airstrip.  Half the team flew off in a K2 Otter just before 10 AM but before the plane could make it back for the other half, clouds rolled in.  They didn’t roll away until mid afternoon, at which point the Otter swooped in to get the job done.  We were the last team on Denali for the 2022 season… and then we were just a bunch more tourists in Talkeetna with funny tans.  The team had a celebratory dinner at Mile High Pizza Pie, and then a late night Cornhole tournament in the beer garden of the Fairview Inn.  A little live music and a nightcap (or two) put a finish on an excellent expedition.  Thanks for following. 

Best Regards
RMI Guide Dave Hahn

Photos courtesy of Dave Hahn

Tuesday, July 5, 2022 - 8:25 pm PT

We pulled out of 14,000' at 10:30 this morning.  Winds were still blowing up high, it certainly wouldn’t have been a summit day, but much of the low cloud had cleared out.  The couple of hours down around Windy Corner, across the Polo Field, down Squirrel and Motorcycle Hills were the usual insane sled rodeo.  The sleds don’t like being heavy or on a side hill and so they flip a lot and we all just try to keep smiling and pulling.  We set up camp -possibly our last- in early afternoon and dove in for naps.  We’ve just eaten dinner now and we’re napping once more.  The plan is to get up in three hours (at 10 PM) and to set off around midnight toward the airstrip on the Southeast Fork of the Kahiltna.  We’re hoping the surface of the lower glacier freezes up hard and that our timing is just right for taking advantage of that freeze.

Best Regards

RMI Guide Dave Hahn

Monday, July 4, 2022 - 9:46 pm PT

We woke to a calm but cloudy morning at 17,200'.  There was light snow falling -some of the first snowflakes we’ve had on this trip.  It wasn’t too hard to be out in it for packing though.  We got it all done and got walking at noon.  Many careful steps were taken along the crest of the West Buttress in the clouds.  We got a little surprise when we started down the fixed lines at 16,200. There was an actual squall with snow blowing in our faces as we delicately stepped down and across crevasses.  Things eased as we got to 14,000' at 3 PM and re-established camp.  We then had a quiet afternoon and evening of resting, relaxing and eating, with everybody making mention of how much easier life at 14,000' was compared to 17,000'. 

Tomorrow we’ll hope the clouds go elsewhere as we get down to 11,000' and get set for the big walk out the lower glacier. 

Best Regards

RMI Guide Dave Hahn

Monday, July 4, 2022 - 1:50 a.m. PDT

Briefly…Because it is 12:38 a.m. at 17,200 ft…we did it! Fabulous climb to the top of North America. The day started out a little more windy than predicted, so we pushed our start back to 10:15 a.m., by which time thinks were looking more promising. We went back and forth all day between a little cool and a little hot. Luckily, when we hit the top at 6:30 p.m., it was calm and easy.  In fact we enjoyed it so much we spent 50 minutes on top! There was only one other team today and we will likely be some of the very last for the season. Beautiful views down into all the fascinating glaciers and valleys surrounding Denali. We picked our way carefully down, leaving the summit at 7:20 p.m. and arriving back at high camp at 11:00 p.m. Late night dinner and then crawling into sleeping bags for well earned rest. 

Best Regards,

RMI Guide Dave Hahn and team

Saturday, July 2, 2022 - 8:56 pm PT

It was a rest day, although slightly less restful for taking place at 17,200'.  Everything is a little harder up here.  We were lucky to have a nice sunny day (again) which made it easier to relax.  It was breezy from time to time, which was forecast.  We’re hoping the winds quiet down, in keeping with those forecasts, for our summit day tomorrow.  We ate and drank water and stared out at the amazing views.  We made last minute adjustments to our packs and the gear we’ll rely on tomorrow.  We talked strategy.  We looked up at the “autobahn” -the route from 17,000' to Denali Pass and tried to judge its difficulty.  After weeks of hard work to get in position, we are ready. 

Best Regards

RMI Guide Dave Hahn

Friday July 1, 2022  11:25pm PDT

We were repetitive today.  “What a gorgeous day” was heard over and over.  We were out of our sleeping bags and firing the stoves at 7 AM and … as usual… it was calm and clear and perfect at 14,000 ft.  A little cool in the shadows, but by the time we’d eaten breakfast and done another big gear sort, it was 9:50 and the sun was coming on strong.  We headed up the now-familiar terrain leading to the fixed ropes and the crest of Denali’s West Buttress.  The work was certainly hard, carrying big packs on steep snow, ice, and rock at high altitude, but the scenery was magnificent.  It was even more magnificent once we loaded up the supplies from our cache at 16,600 and pushed on to new ground.  It was a thrill to walk along the ridge crest, balancing between the big drop down to Genet Basin on one side and the Peters Glacier on the other.  We rolled into 17,200 ft at about 4 PM in calm and sunny conditions and began to build our high camp. 

The decision was made, over dinner in our rather compact high camp dining tent, to take a rest day tomorrow (Saturday) and to focus on a summit bid Sunday.  Conditions look good for Saturday, according to the forecast, but even better for Sunday and we’d like everybody to have their best shot at the top after so much hard work. 

Best Regards,

RMI Guide Dave Hahn & Team