Entries from Mt. McKinley
Hi all! The skies are clear, winds calm, and it's a great day to fly to
Kahiltna Base Camp. Our team is heading in first thing this morning to start moving towards our objective! We'll check in this evening from the glacier with more news of the day. All the best, and we'll keep you updated on our progress over the upcoming weeks.
RMI Guides Pete Van Deventer, Robby Young, Josh Maggard and team
Our team is still at the 11k Camp, as winds picked up around midnight last night and continued through this morning. We decided that the winds were too high for our liking, and we took another rest day here at 11k. The winds abated this afternoon and we're optimistic we'll be able to move to the
14k Camp tomorrow. In the mean time, we enjoyed a relaxing day around camp. Extra rest days like these are beneficial for acclimatization and getting strong for the hard work ahead of us.
Everyone is doing well, and we're all looking forward to moving camp up higher. We'll keep you posted as always.
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On The Map
Today we saw the first real clouds of the trip, accompanied by a dusting of snow. The clouds cleared out in the afternoon and it turned into a beautiful, but breezy evening.
We weren't terribly concerned with what the weather did today, as we took a complete rest day in order to have more time to acclimate to the altitude and recover from the past five days of hard work in the mountains.
Everyone is doing well and, if the weather lets us, we'll move up to the
14,200' Camp in Genet Basin tomorrow. The weather forecast for tomorrow is calling for clear skies and moderate winds, so we'll just have to see how things play out.
We'll keep you posted with our progress.
Caio for now,
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On The Map
Greetings from Talkeetna!
So we made it off the glacier just in time! This morning we woke at 3:30 am to start the 5.5-mile walk back to basecamp. The forecasted storm was slowly creeping in from the southwest and as we walked down glacier in the twilight, clouds came spilling over Mt. Foraker, threatening to shut down visibility. At 11:30 we could hear the mosquito hum of K2's Otter as Randy flew in just below the cloud ceiling and set the plane down on the runway. Forty-five minutes later we were in sandals and t-shirts in downtown Talkeetna enjoying the warm air and flowering fauna. It has been an excellent experience for our folks. As we dry our gear on the lawn, everyone is quietly reflecting on the last six days spent in the
Alaska range.
RMI Guide Leon Davis
Today we awoke yet again to a beautiful morning, but tomorrow that changes. With a brief disturbance blowing in from the Bering Sea tomorrow we took advantage of the good weather to make a carry to 13,500ft. There we cached gear and food that we will later retrieve and haul to
14,000ft Camp. Everyone was excited to finally strap the spikes on and go climbing and the team did fantastic navigating the new terrain and altitude. With the sun out and clear skies we enjoyed warm temperatures and fantastic views of the
West Buttress proper and major features such as the Messner and Japanese couloirs. Tomorrow the team will enjoy their first rest day of the trip as we wait out the weather. All the best from Denali!
RMI Guide Steve Gately
On The Map
Hi everyone!
Well today we went for Kahiltna Dome and we got higher than any other
RMI seminar in recent history. Soft snow and punchy crevasse bridges put a halt on our upward progress close to 11,000 feet. Despite the early start, temperatures never allowed the snow to freeze solid enough to prevent us from dropping into the many cracks that guard the ridge. The guides put the question to our
seminar participants about whether it was safe to continue and the entire team made some very rational common sense arguments on the decision to turn back. We do believe these folks are starting to understand their limits while making good decisions, as we hoped this seminar would help impart!
We are safe and happy back at 8700' camp hoping to fly off tomorrow if the forecasted snow does not interfere.
Good night and see you all soon!
RMI Guides
Leon Davis and
Eric Frank
Good evening friends & family,
The team is here at 8,800' camp on the Kahiltna, 5.5 miles from base camp. Today we walked with a few days of food and fuel up glacier under clear skies and later a blazing sun. It seems to be unseasonably warm here for early May, but we can hardly complain about great weather!
Early tomorrow morning we will leave camp and make an attempt on
Kahiltna Dome and we are all excited to see what the mighty Kahiltna looks like from 12,200'!
Until tomorrow, good night from us all.
RMI Guides
Leon Davis and
Eric Frank
Once again the weather has been nothing less than spectacular for us up here on
Denali. After a breakfast of smoked salmon, cream cheese, and bagels to start the day, we headed back downhill to retrieve our cache of gear at 9,500'. We arrived back at the 11k camp a few minutes after 2pm, with plenty of time to rest in the afternoon. As well as resting, eating, and drinking, we had a couple of chores to accomplish, namely building snow walls to fortify our camp and sorting our gear to cache up higher, which we anticipate doing tomorrow. The weather forecast looks good for tomorrow, so if it verifies we'll take advantage and get a cache in up high, likely at Windy Corner, around 13,500'.
All of us on the first
RMI Denali expedition would like to wish a very happy Mother's Day to all of the mothers in our lives.
Thanks for keeping track of our progress. We'll keep you posted with updates as we continue this awesome adventure.
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On The Map
May 10, 10:50 pm PT
Well, the weather continues to treat us well up here on the Kahiltna Glacier. We moved from
Camp 2 to Camp 3 (11,200') in beautiful, sunny weather; a light breeze kept us from over heating as we climbed up towards Kahiltna Pass. Once at camp we spent a few hours digging in and establishing a comfortable living situation. A well-earned dinner of quesadillas with fresh vegetables filled our stomachs before we crawled into our sleeping bags for the evening.
The weather forecast remains good, and tomorrow we will go down to 9500' to make a "back carry" and retrieve the extra equipment we left there in order to make our loads more manageable for the journey to camp 3. We'll be in touch again tomorrow.
Cheers,
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On The Map
May 10, 2014 10:37 pm PT
The good weather persists in the
Alaska Range! We were fortunate to spend a big chunk of time today training under clear skies and bright rays. By the end of the afternoon, everyone was dialed on crevasse rescue and amped to move camp up the glacier tomorrow. Aside from our attempt in Radio Tower most of our time so far has been focused on training and lectures on mountain related topics. Now it is time to put our training into action and see if the mountains let us get a summit.
RMI Guides Leon Davis & Eric Frank
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Go Pete go…Godspeed to you + team…Will be foloing along…Best…Waltero
Posted by: waltero glover on 5/16/2014 at 5:55 am
A special message for the Lowry’s ...wishing you success in your quest for the summit on your first climb as a married couple in Alaska.
Posted by: Nick Spanakis on 5/15/2014 at 1:06 pm
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