Most Popular Entries

RMI Guides Mike Walter & Abby Westling led the Four Day Climb August 26 - 29 to the summit of Mt. Rainier this morning with all climbers in both groups.  Mike reported a beautiful day on the mountain as the teams were approaching the crater rim around 7:10 am.  Climbers will spend time in the summit crater before starting their descent, dropping 4,500' back to Camp Muir.  After a quick stop they will continue the remaining 4,500' to Paradise.  Once back at Rainier BaseCamp later this afternoon the program will conclude with a small celebration for the teams.

Nice work today everyone!

Hello everybody this is Casey checking in from Cho Oyu. A lot has happened in the last few days. First off, we left our Interim Camp and have safely arrived at Advanced Base Camp where we will be based out of for the remainder of the climb. It was a beautiful hike across the moraine to reach a moderately flat spot which sits at 18,500' and makes it one of the highest Base Camps in the world. The team pulled into camp and immediately began working hard to get camp set up. After most of our yaks arrived, we collected our things and got settled in for the night. It snowed most of the night and we woke up to warm, sunshine this morning which was welcomed by all. Today we had our Puja ceremony which is a Buddhist ceremony where we ask for safe passage and for a safe climb. A Buddhist holy man, called a lama, presided over our ceremony. It was very surreal to hear the lama chanting while we sat looking up at the mountain we hope to climb. We made some small offerings to the mountain mostly food and drink which the local birds happily cleaned up. It snowed during the ceremony which the lama said was a good sign. It continued to snow for the rest of the day and we spent time resting and acclimatizing to this new altitude. Everyone is doing great and we are having fun too.

Namaste from Kathmandu.  

Day 1 of our Everest Base Camp and Lobuche Expedition is in the books.  I would say yesterday was the official first day but I don’t want to start confusing people this early into things.  

Despite where we sit on the official green light of our multi week adventure, one thing isn’t confusing, this team is not afraid to drink a beer!  Yesterday, whatever day of the week that was for those of you reading this now, we all met for our first team lunch and within minutes were making a toast to all of our bags showing up, all of us showing up and to offsetting jet lag with alcohol.   I liked everyone from the get go.   The rest of the day brought some shopping, resting and a nice dinner.  

Today we started with a wonderful breakfast at our Hotel Yak and Yeti, quickly followed by a fun city tour.   We saw ancient Buddhist temples, a Hindu cremation ceremony and monkeys cute enough to want to bring home but would likely eat all your food and kill your cat.   

These are all beautiful sights with lots of history and meaning but to me the most intense part of this city is the traffic!  If anyone reading this has a family member on said trip, don’t expect them to come home and be the same person, especially crossing the street.   We all have a much different “margins of safety” when dealing with moving vehicles now.  Don’t attempt to stop us, just close your eyes and count to ten.  

After surviving our last walk to and from the restaurant zone, we are now packing for our anticipated 6am flight to Lukla, one of the most challenging runways in the world and gateway to Everest.   

We will report on the flight and first stretch of the walk tomorrow.   

RMI Guide,

Adam Knoff 

This is from KING 5 News special coverage about United Way's Climb for the Community up Mount Rainier, which took place July 5-8, 2009. The climb team, which was lead by mountaineering legend Ed Viesturs, included NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Seattle Seahawks coach Jim Mora and United Way CEO Jon Fine.

Today was the day, the team successfully reached the summit of the eighth tallest mountains in North America, Ixtaccihuatl. We woke up dark and early at 1230 AM for our alpine start, scarfed our oatmeal, chugged our coffee and we were off.

The route from high camp starts off with most of the elevation gain and a steep scree field to boot. Taking two steps up and one step back, the team trudged up “the knees” of Ixta to gain one of its magnificent ridges. Though the skies were clear, the wind was out with a vengeance. A cutting, constant 30 mph wind greeted us at the top of the ridge and decided to join us for the rest of the climb. With most of our layers on our person and buffs covering all but our eyes, we leaned into the wind and traversed until we dropped down into the ever-receding Ayaloco Glacier. Down and up the half pipe of a glacier, we gained the final ridge and pushed on to the summit. The team moved so well that we beat the sun to the top, but we were able to find a wind break and watch a gorgeous sunrise at the summit. Congrats to the team!

Now we’re off to well-deserved showers and beds in Puebla.

RMI Guide Dominic Cifelli & Team

On a personal fitness level, time sometimes seems elastic to me: if I have plenty of time to train, I'll sit around and lolly-gag; tell me I only have a couple of months to get prepared and I'll be up at 5 a.m. training like a prizefighter.    The question of, "Will I be ready?" will ultimately be answered only on the climb. However, we can stack the odds in our favor by creating a tracking system that gives us a snapshot of where we are in the preparation process.   A simple method is to make a graph depicting where we are today and where we need to be for the climb. For this example, I used a January Expedition to 22,841' Aconcagua in Argentina if I started training in October:   This allows me to see: 1. What I'm capable of today (see my post "Setting A Baseline" if you need help with this). 2. What I need to accomplish on my target date.  3. Where I should be during the process.  My experience is that progress is rarely a straight line on a graph and you may be ahead or behind at any given point; but you can see generally what you've achieved and identify what work remains to be done throughout the training period.    So, what if you're running short on time to prepare? This happens often. If the goal is ambitious, we may need to intensify our focus and really adopt the mindset of an athlete.    Some training recommendations if you are short on time to prepare: • Try to establish a sensible progression and use the entire time you have rather than "front load" your training (which could create setbacks or injury).  • If you do have an aggressive training plan, be sure to focus on rest and recovery as well as quality nutrition.  • Make your training as specific as possible: Mountain climbing and hiking are perfect. Cross country skiing, running, Stairmaster, and cycling are all also good. Focus in on these activities to benefit the most from your training.  • Embrace the adventure and focus on the process more than just the result; it's easy to expend a lot of energy thinking only of the summit. By focusing on enjoying my training and doing the best I can each day, I find I enhance my training experience and my overall experience on the climb. Take some time this week to sit down, pull out a pencil and paper, and graph out the training progression you need for your climb. It will give you a clear picture of not only where you need to be for your climb, but also where you need to be in three months, in one month, and even next week. Keep this graph in a convenient place and pull it out every once in a while to check in on yourself. It can be helpful to establish specific, repeatable benchmarks to revisit during your training to measure your progress. Check out RMI Guide Pete Van Deventer's ideas on using benchmarks.   - John Colver    _________                      John Colver is a longtime climber, former mountain guide, and certified personal trainer with the American Council of Exercise. Colver introduced outdoor fitness classes to athletic clubs throughout the greater Puget Sound region before creating his adventX  brand. Currently, adventX leads training programs in Seattle and Colver presents clinics on outdoor fitness at companies such as Microsoft, Boeing, the American Lung Association, and REI. Colver lives in Seattle. Questions? Comments? Share your thoughts here on the RMI Blog!

RMI Guide Hannah Smith checked from the Summit of Mt. Baker at 12:04 pm PDT today. The team successfully reached the summit via the Easton Glacier Route. Hannah let us know, that the team is stoked and had a beautiful day of climbing. The team will descend to the trailhead tomorrow. 

Congratulations Team!

Our hope was to make the summit bid short and sweet. Not so much because going for the top of Mount Everest is an awful and onerous chore, but more because dragging it out can be. Besides, we believed we were shooting for a discreet patch of calm weather and forecasts for such a patch are generally only reliable a few days in advance. It was to our advantage to cover big chunks of the mountain in a relative hurry. Leaving Everest Base Camp and relocating to ABC in one push was our first real test in this effort and that went quite well. Even so, we'd planned a full rest day at ABC in order to get recovered, re-hydrated and ready for the real test... -all of the Lhotse Face in one shot... about a vertical mile which would take us to 26,000 ft. The rest time was dull and frustrating though, to be honest. Most of our friends were already up poised for the summit and in fact, a fair number had already made the top and were coming back down. Hanging a day at ABC required patience and patience two months into an expedition required discipline. I drank absolutely as much water as I could and fretted over whether I'd be strong enough to keep up with my partners. Tshherring, Dawa and Kaji would each be carrying a bit more than me and Linden would be venturing into new terrain, so perhaps I'd eke out advantages here and there. And if all of those advantages failed, I'd rely on an old guide trick... specifying that my pace was the only one that would get us to our goal with strength intact... only fools would go slower or faster. The five of us got out of ABC at 2 AM and as usual, walking on a glacier in the dark cleansed my brain of concerns about competing with my partners. It was a perfect night with the peaks all lit by a giant moon. We all seemed to be climbing strong, making it to the base of the Lhotse Face in about an hour. Then we were across the bergschrund and moving steadily up the ropes with our headlights picking out steps worn into the ice. A few hours labor as the world got lighter and we cruised on into our Camp III site at close to 24,000 ft. We each added a ten-pound oxygen bottle to our load at this point, but the big advantage was that we got to turn those bottles on and start breathing right. Linden and I joked during the next hour on steep ice, heading up toward the Yellow Band, that it was the easiest climbing of the entire trip due to the introduction of the O's. Sunrise on the face helped a little as well, pushing back the cold. We'd begun the Face with only a few other Sherpa teams out and about, but by the time we passed Camp III we were in full traffic as plenty of Western teams were getting out of their camps and heading up. Sure enough, we also began to see folks coming down from the South Col -the day before had been a big one for Everest summiting and this same day (the 20th of May) was going to be even bigger. Eventually, as we climbed through the Yellow Band, we ended up in less-busy space and we were able to stop for a little water, food and photography. It was plain that we were enjoying perfect conditions and this made us pretty optimistic for the climb ahead. The Geneva Spur was to be our final obstacle of the day, guarding access to the South Col, but easy snow conditions and reliable fixed ropes on the Spur made it a cake walk. We were excited to link up with friends and fellow guides at the South Col and to hear their stories. And then we were excited to dive in our tents and get eating and drinking and resting for the evening. Winds actually increased during our afternoon at the Col and clouds and snow moved in, but we were pretty sure things would ease by the time we were ready for climbing. Linden and I shared a tent and kept reminding one another of things we needed to pack or prepare for the climb. We touched base regularly with Mark Tucker down at 17,500 ft and tried to find out if he had any updates about the weather and the whereabouts of other climbers. As it got dark, we pulled sleeping bags over our down suits and tried to shut our eyes, but it was pretty miserable rest. There were plenty of climbers around us on different schedules, coughing, moaning, yelling to one another, and testing their radios... there was our own anxiety and desire to get moving, and there was the cold and the noise of the wind. When Tshherring gave me a yell at about 9:40 PM, I was happy to get out of the tent and look at the weather. There was already a great string of about forty headlights moving up the Triangular Face below Everest's Balcony and I was pleased to see we were the only team shooting for a midnight start. The clouds had blown away and the wind was in the process of quitting. It was another beautiful night and it was time to get after some strong cups of coffee. Just before midnight, we wrestled ourselves into harnesses and crampons out in the cold and wedged Oxygen bottles into our packs. Kaji, Tchherring, Linden and I said goodbye to Dawa, who'd remain at the Col in case of problems, and we checked each other over pretty good before turning toward Everest and the Triangular Face. Kaji took the lead and set an easy but steady pace. In other years, I'd climbed over broken and loose rock on this steep and continuously difficult section of the climb, but this time we found good steps kicked in snow. Eventually we came upon other teams, but passed these without too much trouble since we were only four climbers and we were very capable of unclipping from the fixed ropes and putting things into "four wheel drive" with our crampons and ice axes. We were at the Balcony (27,500 ft) in just about three hours and were by then ahead of all but about a dozen climbers. Now on the SouthEast Ridge, we negotiated a narrow track on a crest of snow bordering the immense Kangshung Face. Winds came up, but not steady or greatly worrying winds... just irritating gusts that blew powder snow all over us for thirty seconds at a time. These quit a little after sunrise when we were coming to grips with the steep and rocky flanks of the South Summit. In the process, we passed a few more climbers and then got onto the South Summit by ourselves. This point allowed clear radio communication with Mark Tucker down in BC and we took advantage, letting him know just how perfect everything was up top. Then we got going on the thrilling traverse to the Hillary Step. The ropes were fixed perfectly, steps were well-kicked in the snow and the winds were non-existent... so when combined with the lack of traffic, it all had me thinking to more difficult and stressful times in these same places. We each felt lucky and happy to swing up and around the boulders of the Hillary Step. We made the top shortly after, at around 6:55 AM. There were a number of climbers there when we arrived, but most had climbed from Tibet (via the NorthEast Ridge). Temperatures were moderate and easy and so we didn't rush our own summit celebration. Eventually we had the top to ourselves and enjoyed the quiet. After months of life in deep valleys or on steep mountain faces, it was a welcome novelty to experience gigantic and open 360 degree views. But not for long. We needed to climb down to safety. This turned out to be a snap with three strong and experienced partners. In fact, we were back shaking Dawa's hand at the South Col in just a couple of hours. We ate, drank and broke down camp, getting ready to complete the last stage of our blitz... if we could get all the way down to ABC on this day, our bodies would be subjected to far less altitude related stress... we'd recover from the climb a good deal faster. But ironically, we'd have to work much harder in the short term. We hoisted big and heavy packs and climbed down the vertical mile... sweating like crazy in our down suits (but now in cloud and new-falling snow) our arms were getting tired from thousands of feet of rappelling, our toes were getting jammed forward in our boots, and our throats were getting parched from altitude and bottled oxygen... but we were getting lower and safer with every step. We rolled into ABC by mid-afternoon, glad to see Uberaj and glad to see our tents. I was exhausted but confident that I was exhausted in the very place I wanted to be. We were safe and the monkey was going to be off our backs for just a little while. Of course, the last trip down through the Khumbu Icefall would be in the morning... but worrying about that could wait until real sleep and real food had a chance to kick in and work their magic. Best Regards, RMI Guide Dave Hahn

The Four Day Climb August 5 - 8, 2022 led by RMI Guides Alan Davis and Matias Francis reached the summit of Mt. Rainier early this morning.  The teams reported windy conditions.  They left the crater rim around 5:20 am and as of 7 am were at the top of Disappointment Cleaver on their descent.  Once back at Camp Muir the teams will have a quick break before continuing the remaining 4.5 miles to Paradise.  They will then conclude their program this afternoon at Rainier BaseCamp.

Congratulations to today's climbers!

The use of trekking poles during climbs (in appropriate terrain) can dramatically reduce your expended effort, allow you to move more efficiently, and ultimately let you climb longer and further.  Trekking poles help us to balance, taking some of the work away from the small muscles in our feet and ankles responsible for balancing, and involving the core and skeleton instead.  They also help enormously when it comes to managing a large and unwieldy backpack.  There are ways to use and hold trekking poles that improve their efficiency.   A common question is how long should the poles be?  For climbers’ purposes, trekking poles should be significantly shorter than most would think: right around hip height.  By setting our poles at hip height, and holding the pole by placing the palm on the top of the grip and draping fingers over the pole, the skeleton can take much of the load from the pole, reducing fatigue and effort.  The shorter height allows the bones of the arm to stack over each other, taking the load rather than the muscles.  Remember, this is not cross country skiing and having the pole tall and out in front of you only means more, yet less effective, work for your arms.   Another element to think about is how overly active arms can actually create more exertion for your body.   Imagine that you were hiking up a set of stairs.  Now put a tall pair of poles in your hand, and hike the same stairs while you try to push yourself up with the poles at the same time.  Rather than two of your limbs working hard to move your mass uphill (lots of work already!) all four are doing the job; only your arms, working out in front of you, act as levers instead of pistons (like your legs) so they are mechanically much less suited to the task.  But, by moving your arms and trying to push on those levers, your heart rate will rise with the extra exertion; the result is a higher heart rate, earlier fatigue, and less efficient use of your system if your poles are out in front of you (like a cross country skier).  Even with the poles set to hip height, we see this happen often on steep rolls, when climbers don’t lower their grip on the pole to keep their hands at a comfortable height.  Once the hands are above the heart, they have little effect on balance or upward motion, and the heart has to work harder to pump blood uphill to them. Through small steep terrain features it's key to choke up on your poles to avoid this.   These are not absolute principles but suggestions. Play with them during your training to teach yourself to move more comfortably and efficiently with poles.  It will pay big dividends on your next climb, and can help to take some of the training stress of hiking up and downhill with heavy packs, off of your joints, helping to prevent injury! Questions? Comments? Share your thoughts here on the RMI Blog!