Entries from Mt. McKinley
July 6, 2014 - 11:00 am PT
Adam Knoff called the office with great news: The team reached the summit of
Mount McKinley at 7:00pm last night! Everyone is doing great and very happy. They are packing up high camp and plan to head down to 14K camp to visit with
Dave Hahn and team, then may continue on to 11,000’. Their plan is to be at Basecamp tomorrow.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff
On The Map
July 5, 2014 - 10:18 pm PT
We gladly used another perfect day to move up from 11,000 to 14,000 ft. We managed to get as far as
Windy Corner enjoying cool, morning conditions, but there is no way to sugarcoat the walking weather for the final ninety minutes into camp, the sun was intense, the air was still and the climbers were plain old hot. That said, it was tough for anybody to complain too much at the combination of great weather and sweet route conditions. We've kept our streak alive, nine days and half a mountain without having to step over an open crevasse. All were interested and a touch apprehensive to see a raven hopping around our 13,500 ft cache as we approached. He or she hadn't had any luck in getting to this one though, and we took a moment to pack down the five foot deep snow covering the buried treasure -one more time. We'll retrieve that food and gear tomorrow if all goes well.
It was fun "catching up" to the other climbing teams at 14K, although we haven't really as they are a day or two ahead of us now and are closer to moving up than we are. Also great to follow the progress of the only other RMI team on the mountain via radio today as
Adam Knoff and crew hit the jackpot for stable weather for a summit bid.
Best Regards,
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
On The Map
July 5, 2014 - 5:05 pm PT
Adam called and reported that they were on their way up to the summit, just below the
Football Field with all climbers doing well. Yesterday was a great move day for them, and they continue to enjoy good weather, with blue skies and 20mph winds.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff
On The Map
July 4, 2014 - 11:34 pm PT
In observance of Independence Day, we rested at 11,000 feet. Having put in a pretty full seven days of work and in the hopes of maximizing our acclimatization before making the big jump to 14,000', it seemed smart to take it easy in this beautiful place on a magnificent day. So breakfast was at a leisurely pace once the sun made it around the
West Buttress at 9:15. We put a bunch of meat into fry pans over camp stoves for a-mid afternoon simulated barbecue. For fireworks, we watched the sun blaze brilliantly in the Alaskan summer sky. The team is excited for the move to 14K tomorrow.
Best Regards,
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
On The Map
July 4, 2014 - 9:44 pm PT
The move to
Mt. McKinley's high camp is like stepping into the ring with a heavy weight larger than King Kong. Thing is, he really likes to throw things at you in one long grueling round. That round our team won. It could not have been a more perfect day to come to high camp. Now the question becomes how much strength does the team have for round two which comes in the form of Godzilla. Tomorrow we will attempt to climb to the summit, weather permitting. Wish us well.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff and team signing off from high camp.
On The Map
July 3, 2014 - 11:19 p.m. PT
The forecasts had us optimistic that today would work out well for a
carry to 13,500 ft. At seven AM though, it didn't seem that Denali's clouds had read the forecast. It was socked in above, below and to the West of us. Even so, there was a mass exodus from 11,000' camp underway. The five other guided groups that we've been playing leap-frog with for the past week were all busting down their camps and getting early starts at moving up. By the time we'd finished breakfast, we had the place pretty much to ourselves (to our knowledge, no other climbers have come onto the mountain behind us). The weather, although a little murky and more threatening than we'd expected, seemed stable enough for our mission. We put crampons on our boots today instead of snowshoes, an ice axe in our hands instead of two ski poles, and we elected to give our sleds the day off, loading all food and gear for the carry onto our backs. At just after 9 AM we started up the steep "Motorcycle Hill" above camp. We made steady progress onto "Squirrel Hill" and then into the "Polo Field" laid out below the end of the West Buttress. By the time we reached Windy Corner at 13,300 we were thankful for the cloudcover which was keeping things just cool enough for comfortable climbing. And significantly, Windy Corner wasn't windy. We cruised up and around it to our intended cache site at 13,500 ft. Digging a raven-proof cache occupied us for long enough that the clouds began to clear while we were at it. This meant we were treated to some spectacular views during our descent. With lightened packs, we got down without difficulty. The route was in fabulous condition due to so much recent snow. We haven't crossed an open crevasse since leaving basecamp whereas in other years we might well have stepped over a hundred at this stage of the climb. The forecasted fair weather arrived and made our afternoon and evening resting back at 11,000 camp sunny and easy.
Best Regards
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
On The Map
Thursday, July 2, 2014 – 4:43 PM PT
Yesterday our team experienced the unparalleled vistas of a clear sky at 16,200’ on Denali as we were finally handed a nearly perfect day. We loaded up three days of lunch and snack food plus a few personal items for our carry to the top of the fixed lines which crest Washburn’s Ridge—the most stimulating section of Denali’s West Buttress Route. The team did great learning how to jumar. All members of the St. Angelo family and Jay and Mary Lampas hit personal altitude records. Fatima did a great job breaking trail down the lines, literally paving the way for thirty other climbers on the same program as us.
The population of
14k camp has increased dramatically. What once was a camp that resembled a wide cow pasture with wandering wildlife now resembles a city with distinct neighborhoods on main thoroughfares. Just like a city, this can create traffic jams when multiple teams, all roped together, try to move around at the same time. This sudden influx of guided teams means we will need to wake up at 4 am, while the temperature here sits around 5 below, just to beat the crowds and avoid a bottleneck.
This afternoon we had a lengthy breakfast which leaned more along the lines of a leisurely brunch. We then took a beautiful stroll to an incredible precipice called the Edge of the World. Great weather allowed us more breathtaking views and inspired us for the hard days to come. Hopefully our next contact will be from high camp.
RMI Guide Adam Knoff
On The Map
Hello everyone!
Today has been a day of a little work and a lot of rest. We woke up to a delightful breakfast of bagels with cream cheese and bacon and after some casual conversation it was time to go retrieve our 10,000' cache. All was well except for a minor raven attack......thankfully the only casualty was a bag of ramen noodles. It was a 3 hour round trip and before long folks were back to relaxing and drinking glacier fresh water. Our plan for the rest of the day is to keep hydrating and get ready to carry a load to
13,500 ft tomorrow. Stay tuned as we continue our slow but steady climb up this giant pile of rock and ice.
RMI Guide Ben Liken
On The Map
July 2, 2014 - 12:09 am PT
Thank you for all of the blog comments. It is great to hear from everyone back home and it is always reinvigorating.
Today we got to sleep in and then scurried down to our cache above
Windy Corner. It was nice to be reunited with our food, clean underwear and base layers that we left buried in the snow for a few days. We then spent the afternoon doing some kitchen redesign, fixed line training and more sorting of food.
Tomorrow is an exciting day! We will get to see some more challenging and exciting terrain-- carrying to the top of the fixed lines!
RMI Guide Adam Knoff and Team
On The Map
July 1, 2014 - 11:13 pm PT
Today was a relatively easy move for the team. We were walking out of our 9,000' camp at 7 AM when things were crisp and cold. The track was in pretty good condition due to the number of teams that had been over it in the preceding 24 hours and our loads were light. We began in clear conditions but by the time we reached the big right hand turn at
Kahiltna Pass, we were in cloud. Passing our cached gear at 10,000', we began the more serious hills leading to 11 camp. The team rolled into camp at around 11:30 AM and set to smoothing out tent platforms. Right about then it began to snow, just as had been predicted. There are at least a half dozen other guided teams in camp, a few more than we expected to see, but most are staffed by friends and acquaintances. The team took a well-earned rest for the afternoon.
Best Regards
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
On The Map
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Awesome job team. Congrats Jay and mart and all. You will make it down soon!
Posted by: Susanlampas on 7/7/2014 at 3:53 pm
Awesome achievement Mark Skinner and team! Congratulations!
Posted by: Will Kerner on 7/7/2014 at 10:22 am
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