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The Five Day Climb led by RMI Guides Andy Bond and Ben Luedtke reached 11,200' today and watched the sunrise from Ingraham Flats. High winds with higher gusts kept the teams from ascending any higher. The climbers returned safely to Camp Muir and began their descent to Paradise around 9 am. They will conclude their program this afternoon.
PC: Arianna Drechsler
Same storm, different day. When we started rolling out of the tents at 9 this morning it was obvious that the storm was still hitting the upper mountain hard. We ate breakfast and kept watching the clouds, and when the forecast at 11 AM confirmed that we still had some more storm days to come, we opted to stay another day at base. As predicted, the local weather came and went during the course of the day with periodic thick cloud and light snow and a little wind even at
Base Camp. We rested and sorted supplies and kept our spirits up. We hydrated and snacked and had a hardy dinner and storytelling session until 10:30 in the evening, at which time the sun finally broke free of the clouds stuck on the mountain range. It broke mostly free, but even diffuse sunshine was welcome for making it a little easier and more comfortable to climb into the tents again.
Best Regards
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
On The Map
Hello from the
Khumbu Valley!
We started our day here pretty early, meeting in the hotel lobby at 5am. After checking out of the hotel we had a short ride to the domestic airport where we weighed all of our duffels and backpacks before getting tickets and slipping through a very laid back security check. Normally there’s a little bit of waiting before heading out to the plane, but today things moved along pretty quickly.
The flights to Lukla have a reputation of being a little intimidating and bumpy, but thankfully today’s flight was pretty smooth and uneventful.
It’s about a 30-minute flight in a small 16-passenger twin otter with stunning views of the Himalayas. We landed on the small runway in
Lukla that’s only about a quarter mile in length and has a slight uphill angle.
After we touched down, the plane was unloaded and our local Sherpa guides hired a few porters that will be carrying our duffels throughout the trek. We made a brief stop at a local tea house to have breakfast and get situated before hitting the trail.
We hiked for about 4 hours today with few stops to rest and to take in the beautiful scenery. We arrived at our camp for the night in a village called Phakding just in time for a well earned lunch. The team got settled, had naps, or explored a little before walking a short way to one of the many Monastery’s here in the Valley. Luckily for us the Monks were having a prayer session and allowed us to sit in while they chanted and blew their horns. It was very surreal and a wonderful way to start this adventure.
All is well!
RMI Guide Casey Grom and crew
On The Map
Good morning from the
Pika Glacier. The weather and visibility yesterday were not exactly what we hoped for. But we made the most out of our day with more valuable training near camp; crevasse and rock rescue systems took the bigger part of the day, finishing with a few laps of vertical ice climbing out of a big crack, Alaska size. Dinner didn't disappoint and made up for the lack of the climb we hoped to do, and a veggie-cheese omelette and steak fajitas were on the menu.
This morning we're in a holding pattern as well, as a super dense fog is reducing our visibility to 30ft.
Stay tuned for more,
RMI Guide Elias de Andres Martos and team.
Good evening from the entire team at Camp 1!
We woke up to a dust of new snow and clouds this morning at
Depot Camp (ABC). Soon after breakfast, we could tell the cloud layer was thin, the winds non existent, and the precipitation receding. Executing our plan of moving upwards was unquestionable. Covering known ground now to Camp 1 posed less of a challenge than the first time last week, and the team moved efficiently uphill. We reached our now well established camp shortly after 2 pm, followed by our Sherpa team, who was coming directly from Base Camp. We're all now in our tents, with full bellies, tired legs and great spirits. Tomorrow we'll start setting eyes towards Camp 2, we'll keep you posted, as we'll be dependent on the evolution of the snow that is starting to come down, as the sun set over the ridge.
Good night everyone!
RMI Guides Elias de Andres Martos, Adam Knoff & Robby Young
Sunday, June 7, 2015 7:42 pm PT
Yesterday we stormed the
Kahiltna Glacier, officially ending our occupation of Talkeetna. We were able to catch an early afternoon flight, skirting the clouds and safely getting ourselves and all our groceries into the mountains!
We expected a huge backlog of climbers at basecamp, and there were more than a few parties waiting to get off the mountain. However a buried tent city resembling a parking lot of white Fiats, was nowhere to be found. We landed to spectacular views and decided to hit the ground running. Making it to 7,800 Camp in the evening was a great start to the climb.
Today we got a reasonable start to the day, leaving camp at mid morning and carrying to 9,700 feet. It was a pleasant day for walking, with enough cloud cover to keep us from getting too scorched. The team made it and we are now resting before dinner. Hopefully we can use that fuel to move to 11K Camp. Keep those fingers crossed for good weather!
RMI Guide Jake Beren
Hello from
Kilimanjaro! Today was just one of those nice and pleasant days in the mountains. We started out with our normal morning routine of breakfast and packing. But instead of getting right on the trail we hung back and watched the whole camp get packed up. Our big objective of the day was to climb the
Barranco Wall and if we set right out for it, we would be in a big traffic jam on the steep rocky wall. By letting literally everyone get out of camp before us we were able to climb the route by ourselves. It was great.
After topping out on the 900-foot wall we had another two hours on the trail before camp. We arrived here at 1:30 and have had a nice relaxing afternoon. Soon it will be time for dinner and off to bed. Tomorrow we are headed to high camp!
RMI Guide Seth Waterfall
On The Map
The Guiding Life!! It's not so glamorous. Steve, and I are sitting at high camp 19,600' feet on
Aconcagua with the team. They are all doing great. The guides however are pulling their hair out (ok, ok, I'm not)! But Steve is because our stoves are being very temperamental. We are working hard to make water, hot drinks and dinner. All is well and we are excited for a great summit day tomorrow. Stay tuned!!
RMI Guide JJ Justman
On The Map
June 23, 2014 - 5:21 pm PT
After a long, tough day yesterday putting in our cache at 17,000',
High Camp on Mt. McKinley, we decided last night that today would be another rest day. The team is spending the day relaxing in the tents, and catching up on nutrition and hydration after returning to camp at 14,000' last night depleted. Yesterday's exercise combined with today's rest should make us acclimatize well and make us exceptionally strong on our summit push. It's also good mentally to know what a long day is like and to know that we are strong enough to push through.
With our cache up at high camp in and the gang well rested after today we're in a good spot to make our move up and take a crack at the summit. Fingers crossed for a good spell of weather in the near future...
RMI Guide Billy Nugent, from 14,000'.
On The Map
Good morning everyone!
It's a beautiful day here on the lower
Kahiltna Glacier. Our team did an excellent job of moving to 7,800' at the base of Ski Hill yesterday. We got an early flight to base camp and spent a few hours getting organized and reviewing glacier travel techniques.
After a solid 8 hours in the sleeping bags we are again packing and looking uphill in the direction of 9,500'.
We'll be sure to check in after our move today!
RMI Guide Mike Walter
On The Map
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Congrats on your adventure. Can’t wait to hear the stories.
Posted by: Patrick VDH on 6/11/2024 at 2:53 pm
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