Entries By jackson breen

RMI Guides Jackson Breen and Calvin Jiricko, climbing with the Four Day Climb team, reached the summit early this morning under clear skies and calm conditions. After spending some time enjoying the views from the top, they began their descent. A smoke layer remains settled around 12,500 feet. The team is currently making its way back to Camp Muir.

Congratulations Team!

The Expedition Skills Seminar summited Mt Rainier yesterday, July 16th, via the Emmons Glacier. They descend back to Camp Schurman and will continue their descent to the trailhead today. THey will return to Ashford this afternoon. 

Nice work team!

The four-day climb led by RMI guides Joe Hoch and Jackson Breen reached the summit of Mt Rainier this morning around 6:30am. They reported cold temperatures and moderate winds. They are currently on their descent back to Camp Muir and will return to Ashford this afternoon. 

Great work everyone!

Due to a snowstorm, the RMI Guide Jackson Breen and  Team turned around at 8,500 feet yesterday during their summit attempt. The team is descending to the trailhead today.

The Four Day Climb teams led by Seth Burns and Jackson Breen reached a high point of 12,300 feet on Disappointment Cleaver before making the decision to turn around. Despite the clear skies above, recent storm snow, challenging route conditions, and difficult travel all contributed to the call to stop their ascent short of the summit.

Well done to the team for their hard work!

Climbers were greeted with clear skies and calm winds as they made a successful ascent of Mt. Rainier this morning. The teams reached the summit under beautiful conditions, led by RMI Guides Tom Skoog and Felipe Guarderas.

After spending time on the summit, the teams have begun their descent and will return to Camp Muir before continuing down to Paradise later today.

Congratulations to all of today's climbers and guides on a successful summit day!

Friday, June 12 - 8:20PM PST

Welcome to your Denali Wrapped!

Hello all, and welcome to your end of climb playlist, fam. Congratulations to us on making it to the top, on forging lifelong friendships along the way, learning new mountaineering skills and pushing ourselves harder than we thought possible to achieve incredible things in one of the most beautiful places in the world. Here are some songs that we curated to help us remember the grand adventure.

They say the summit is only a small fraction of the joy of climbing , so why don’t we start with the beginning? The journey from the airstrip to our first camp at the base of ski hill was a heavy and hot one; with full sleds that tripped us up so who can’t help thinking of Tubthumping by Chumbawamba? We get knocked down, but we get up again, at least until the heat of the day began to make our sun shirts stick to our backs and warmed us all the way to our toes, and then maybe our thoughts turned to Blister in the Sun by the Violent Femmes. Thank goodness for Leuko tape and Compeed pads. But eventually we got to drop our sleds off at 11k camp, with Can I Kick It? By A Tribe Called Quest summing up our relationship with our bright orange friends.

Ski Hill and 11k were wonderful camps, notable for the amazing weather we had and easy time we had slowly caching gear higher on the mountain. Notes of Hot in Herre by Nelly, Vanilla Ice’s Ice Ice Baby, and Ice Cream and Sunscreen by Martha were punctuated by real bonds being formed over games of backgammon, trivia, conversations about our families, and working together towards our goals.

We didn’t hear much of the music from the guide tent, but what we imagined them playing on repeat were: That Don’t Impress me Much by Shania Twain, I’ll Make a Man Out of You from Disney’s Mulan, and, on hard mornings when we were tired and our guides pushed us to our limits, You Always Hurt the Ones You Love by the Mills Brothers was heard floating softly through some headphones. So thank you for pushing us to our limits, even when we complained or threw up, for creating the space and opportunities for us to realize we were stronger than we ever thought. For doing the hard thing, even when we complained about the lack of time for our pourover coffees or how cold and uncomfortable we were. Thank you for Betting on Us (Francis and the Lights) For you, Jackson, Ray, and Lacie, we listen to Whitney Houston’s Higher Love on repeat. The higher you get, the higher you are. 

When things got rough from Windy Corner onwards, we certainly sang The Kids Aren’t Alright by the Offspring to ourselves, In Too Deep by Sum 41, and perhaps there were one or two members of the team still dreaming of a miracle man to carry their load singing Holding out for A Hero by Bonnie Tyler. Some of those days had the Proclaimers Over and Done With as our camp anthem, and who couldn’t help humming Jame’s Arthur’s Say You Won’t Let Go while we went up the fixed lines or Bon Jovi’s Living on a Prayer while shivering on the Autobahn? 

We tried to add an bassoon song for Lacie, but we don’t know any. For Ray and his rays of sunshine, we will always be listening to the spiciest latin beats. And for Jackson, our favorite JBL, his song isn’t a song, but rather every single inspirational locker room speech in film history. 

Overall, we collectively spent more than 408 hours on the mountain living out the song “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” on repeat! That makes us Marvin Gaye’s top .0001% fully embodied fan! Our second favorite song was Miley Cyrus’s The Climb, and today in Talkeetna, some great recovery tunes have included Hips Don’t Lie by Shakira, My Neck My Back by Khia, and I’m So Tired by Lauv. Enjoy the sun, my fellow climbers, you’ve earned it. 

For the one crazy member of our team spotted running in his very short shorts the day we returned, Lenny Kravitz’ Always on the Run is just for you. For our favorite Brolonzo, obviously our staple is Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins. For the girl who is 5’2 but somehow thinks she’s 6’5, there’s Bad Mutha by Lord Finesse. For the guy who does a cracking impression of Lacie; I’m a Goofy Goober from SpongeBob made the cut. For the climber who looks like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast, we obviously gotta give you the song Gaston. And finally, for the man with a million degrees, I Love College by Asher Roth. 

Not all of us made it to the top, but all of us are gonna make it home, and we are all leaving with lifelong bonds and real love in our hearts for one another.  That seems pretty lucky to me. While the mountain summit may have been the goal, the real gift was the friends we made along the way. As The Wind and the Wave sing, Happiness is Not A Place, it’s the people who make your heart feel fullest. 

So, thanks for the one last dispatch, and until next time. Xoxo

-RMI Climbers

Friday, June 12th @ 4AM PST

Today we undid all of the work we spent the last 14 days doing in just 14 hours. We woke up to a clear cold morning at 17k camp. We descended the West Buttress in chilly conditions but were treated to nice weather and familiar faces when we saw our RMI family at 14k camp! Best of luck to Dan May and his strong team of climbers! Down we continued to 11k camp where we dug up our cache and enjoyed some relatively warm temps and sunshine after having been at over 20,000’ less than 24 hours ago. Still further down the mountain we went to camp one to pick up another cache where we saw Ben Luedtke and another RMI team. Finally we retraced the very first day of our trip and walked our way back to the airstrip on a tranquil Alaska range night. The day was truly unbelievable. We were treated to views of Hunter, Foraker, Denali, and the rest of the central Alaska range. Days like today stir up a great deal of gratitude for the privilege this life is and an overwhelming reminder of how small we are. We arrived at camp under the midnight sun and treated ourselves to refreshments, charcuterie, and friendly conversation before finally turning in for the night. Morning? The sun doesn’t set. Who knows? More importantly, who cares?! We achieved so much more than our goals and with any luck we will be flying back to Talkeetna and returning to the “real” world tomorrow. We can’t wait to see you all and tell you about the wild journey we had together!

Best,
Jackson

Wednesday, June 10, 2026 - 10:58pm PDT

Cumbre!

We got up early this morning and were the first team on the autobahn. A chilly start paid dividends throughout the rest of the day. We enjoyed the best weather you could ask for, incredible views, and a virtually empty route. Despite the perfect conditions the team is still pretty spent and has a long day ahead of us tomorrow. Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible.

Peace, Love, Gratitude.

RMI Guide Ray Holt and Team

Tuesday, June 9, 2026 - 11:04 pm PT

Our team woke up early this morning for the first time in many days. We packed up and moved from 14,000’ camp up to 17,000’ Camp. We walked up through the cold of the morning towards the fixed lines. After ascending the fixed lines we found ourselves on the West Buttress itself. And in all of my years I have never had such a pleasant day on the West Buttress. It was truly a day you dream about. We climbed in base layers in the sunshine weaving through the rocks looking down at 14 Camp where we started the day. It was not all sunshine and rainbows however, and the day had its fair share of struggles and suffering. After a long hard fought day we arrived at 17 Camp where we set up tents, made water, ate dinner, and prepared our gear for a summit attempt in the morning. Thank you for reading along and sorry I am not as entertaining of a writer as our climbers. We will check back in tomorrow with an update on our summit attempt!

Best regards,

RMI Guide Jackson Breen and Team