June 29, 2014 - 8:23 am PT
We finally got off Mt. McKinley as the snow stopped and the clouds parted. We wrapped up a great adventure with a great meal that did not have to be rehydrated.
I want to thank Bruce and Josh for being great partners in our adventure. Bruce is one of my heroes. Even though he is blind, he climbs with a natural ability and has a great mountain sense. He truly understands what mountaineering is all about. I look forward to our future adventures together!
RMI Guide MIke Haugen and Team "The Ocho"
I agree with all. Bruce and Josh are Mountaineers and heros in my book. Glad to know you are safe and now have memories of Denali that will keep with you.
Posted by: James on 6/30/2014 at 6:52 am
I’ve been watching you—but also NOAH’s weather reports—and I’m really, glad you made the decision that you did, even with all of that forward momentum that I KNOW you had. I’m sorry you-all didn’t summit but “he who climbs and then goes down, survives to claim Denali’s crown!”.
June 29, 2014 - 12:16 am PT
I believe the saying goes "when the sun shines, make some hay!" Well metaphors are going to have to do because Toto, we ain't in Kansas anymore and nothing grows up here except foot fungus and beards. So, with the sun finally shining brightly and the snow settled to what seems a safe consistency, the team is ready to make some hay and move to 14,000 camp tomorrow! This morning we didn't crawl out of tents until the sun warmed them up at 9 am. After that, massive coffee presses, eggs, bacon and hash browns followed. Yup, we do it right up here. It was Andy's birthday today so he got to be served all morning and surprised after breakfast to a tent full of balloons thanks to Lindsay's pre-trip preparations. After breakfast the team read, sun bathed, still sunk waist deep in snow when not on the trail and prepared gear to bring up the mountain. We are all excited to move our rested legs and make our way up hill. It will indeed be a doozy of a day, breaking trail, dealing with the sun and carrying heavy loads. I know we are all up to the task.
Wish us luck.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff signing off
June 28, 2014 - 10:07 pm PT
So good to be on Denali. So good to be on the move again. With our late flight onto the mountain yesterday evening, there wasn't so much time to be ready for the late season tradition of walking out of basecamp at 4 AM this morning. We built our camp and put priority on getting good rest instead. Our thinking was that with so much snow (30 inches from the last storm) that we might get by just fine without the early start. We'd plainly seen the lower Kahiltna Glacier during our flight and it certainly didn't look like crevasse bridges were going to be a problem. So we got up at a civilized 7:30 AM and did our organizational work and set out for a daytime Denali departure. As we'd allowed ourselves to hope, crevasses were no problem. In fact the glacier was in better condition than it had been for late season in decades. We made three hour-long pulls with some fifteen-minute restbreaks in between. But in the end we decided not to push on to our normal first day camp goal of 8,000 feet. Despite our snowshoes, the walk was getting strenuous due to the great amount of unconsolidated new snow softening with the heat of the day. We camped at 7,000 ft where the East Fork meets the main glacier and we'll happily begin earlier tomorrow to get ideal surface conditions. Nice to see a few of the other late season guides on the move today as well, a bit of a reunion. Especially nice to hear from Adam Knoff at 11K on the radio and Billy Nugent on top.
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
June 29, 2014 - 4:07 am PT
Hey it's Billy here with a late-night check in. I just finished up making dinner and filling water bottles for folks after a successful summit bid today. Everybody's pretty much racked out and exhausted, laying in their tents right now. But their spirits are definitely high. Everyone made it to the summit. We enjoyed an awesome day. Clear blue skies. It was very, very cold, but there was no wind and we were able to make it happen. So, that's all for now. We'll check in again on our way out. Ciao.
RMI Guide Billy Nugent
RMI Guide Billy Nugent calls in after successful summit.
Congratulations to Bruce and Michael. We are soooo happy for you! Rest, relax, and celebrate when you are ready! Cheers, Katherine and Reid
Posted by: Katherine Mitchell on 7/1/2014 at 7:55 pm
Congrats to Bruce and Michael Freedman and all the rest of the team. Great to see that you made it through all the weather. Cant wait to hear the stories.
June 27, 2014 - 11:11 pm PT
At 8 PM this evening we were blessed with the first glimmer of sun in two and a half days. This isn't completely out of the ordinary for this neck of the woods but more surprising, even to me with eight Denali expeditions, was the amount of snow that fell during that sunless stretch. Four feet would about do this storm justice but when you are living in a nylon house that can collapse under a moderate burial of drifting snow it felt more like ten feet. This morning at breakfast while in the posh house, a one pole pyramid cook tent set up to fit the entire team, shook and sagged under the constant loading of falling flakes, Jay Lampas asked if this snow storm qualified as "epic" yet? I didn't want to sound too fragile and make him believe this was the "storm of the century" but I did have to concede that four feet in two days was a touch "epic". Of course the main worry of the team is how this massive blanketing will effect our upward progress. I didn't have an exact answer but I do know we will be sitting still on Saturday no matter how brilliant the weather because of the avalanche hazard that awaits above us. Safety is always the number one priority so we will move to 14,000 feet only when we know it is safe to do so. Hopefully our dwindling lunch food and Cosmo magazines can hold us out until we can get to the cache of food we left at Windy Corner. We are all looking forward to a night with no 2 am wake up calls for shoveling duty. Maybe full dreams will be of the upper mountain. All the best from McKinley Team Knoff.
Yup! We are now swimming in Torch Lake after a “forever” winter in Northern Michigan! As we follow you up Denali we can see that the snows have not left all places to date! We hope you get a break in the weather and your journey will be able to move forward. Ken
Posted by: Ken and Kathy Masck on 6/29/2014 at 4:45 am
Happy birthday Wheeler! I hope the weather cooperates!
June 27, 2014 - 5:17 pm
Hey this is Billy. I'm calling in from 17,000 feet again. We're still here. And we're still pin down by the weather. But things are starting to look like they maybe improving so keep your fingers crossed for us. We will check in again tomorrow. Nothing new to report.
RMI Guide Billy Nugent
Bruce Michael and Team - we’re all crossing fingers and toes that your perseverance and weather join forces to push you to that summit soon! Tapi wants you back safe & sound too - she’s going through steak withdrawal!
Posted by: Jen on 6/29/2014 at 6:30 am
What an adventure! Hang in there and be safe - Mother Nature owes you a break soon!
June 27, 2014 - 12:00 am PT
We were up and hustling to get ready this morning, anxious for the chance to get on Mount McKinley. But it turned out, after breakfast and a walk in the rain to the airstrip, that there wasn't too great a chance for flying today. The word was that several feet of new snow had fallen overnight at Basecamp. The snow, cloud and wind were predicted to continue up there for the day, but we were put on standby just in case things broke. We made good use of the day in the K2 Aviation hangar, reviewing rope techniques for glacier travel. The rain and low cloud persisted, but we stayed dry enough. We had one more "last" dinner in town and turned in to be ready for another day and another try.
Best Regards,
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
June 26, 2014 - 9:40 pm PT
We set out Tuesday morning to move up to 17k when circumstances both unfortunate and out of our control forced us back down to 14k camp. We made the wise mountaineering decision to forgo the summit for another time and begin the arduous trek back to Denali's Basecamp. We made it back to Basecamp around ten yesterday morning and were disheartened to hear that although clear here, the planes were not flying because of weather between here and Talkeetna. We set up camp and made the best of being stuck in the Alaska range.
Although we thought our adventure was winding down, we woke up last night to over a foot and a half of snow threatening our tent. We shoveled around camp for over two hours helping other teams that had tents collapse. When the snow finally slowed down this morning, we had collected well over three feet! Although it was fun to see that much snow, it also meant we needed to put on our snowshoes to stomp down an entire runway filled with nearly waste deep, wet snow. The weather never really cleared today, but we are hoping that we will not receive as much snow tonight and the weather will be clear for flight activity to resume tomorrow.
RMI Guide Mike Haugen and Team "The Ocho"
Mike and Josh,
Thank both for leading Bruce on such a great trip!
Posted by: Mom and Dad on 6/29/2014 at 6:35 pm
I’m so sorry, you guys—but I know you made the correct decision based on what you were facing—I was watching the local weather for Denali via the NOAA feeds and I’m very glad to hear that you’re down & safe! That’s all that matters in the end!
Posted by: Susan Matthews on 6/27/2014 at 10:26 pm
June 26, 2014 - 9:33 pm PT
Hey this is Billy checking in from 17K on Denali, again, where we are still pinned down by the weather. Today is our second storm day. We actually had some sort of blue skies and clearing and some hope on the horizon but things closed back in here. They are calling for high pressure to build over the mountain this weekend. If we get up tomorrow and it looks promising, we might take a crack at it or we might be sitting tight until Saturday. Last night was definitely one of the most ferocious storms I have had to battle up here in Alaska. We were definitely up all night digging out tents with feet and feet of snow and very, very strong winds- 70 miles an hour. For our chance for it, we have tons of food and fuel, and we just need the weather to cooperate. And that's all for now.
RMI Guide Billy Nugent
June 26, 2014 - 6:37 pm PT
The entire team woke up at 2 am to a winter wonderland. With wind blowing and snow stacking the team had to wake up, strap on their boots and grab our shovels. What was a nice camp with all tents visible to each other some 30 feet distance, is now a maze of deep trenches leading blindly to six-foot deep pits, each holding a team member's house. Approximately 40 inches of snow fell by morning in camp, completely covering our posh tent.
Currently the snow continues to fall. A call on the satellite phone to the rangers at advanced base camp at 14,000 ft told us that five feet of snow had fallen there. Some loose snow avalanches were observed on south facing slopes around camp-- a reminder that winter is still upon us on Denali. We have had mixed results with the accuracy of the weather forecast, however in the extended outlook a high pressure system may be headed our way later this weekend and early next week. It is times like these that test the will and patience of any Denali climber. Thank God for Lindsay's Cosmopolitan magazine.
RMI Guides Adam Knoff, Lindsay Mann and Andy Hildebrand
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I agree with all. Bruce and Josh are Mountaineers and heros in my book. Glad to know you are safe and now have memories of Denali that will keep with you.
Posted by: James on 6/30/2014 at 6:52 am
I’ve been watching you—but also NOAH’s weather reports—and I’m really, glad you made the decision that you did, even with all of that forward momentum that I KNOW you had. I’m sorry you-all didn’t summit but “he who climbs and then goes down, survives to claim Denali’s crown!”.
Posted by: Susan on 6/29/2014 at 7:22 pm
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