Four Day Climb July 6 - 9 led by RMI Guide Brent Okita reached the summit of Mt. Rainier with their entire team this morning. Brent reported a beautiful day on the mountain and a great route.
Congratulations to today's climbers!
The June 10 - 13 Four Day Climb teams led by RMI Guides Andy Bond and Steve Gately reached the summit of Mt. Rainier this morning. Andy reported light winds, sunshine and clear skies. The teams began their descent from the crater rim around 7:30 AM. Once back at Camp Muir they will repack and continue down to Paradise. Their program concludes at Rainier BaseCamp this afternoon.
Congratulations to today's climbers!
Saw the groups departing the other day. Excited they were successful! Hoping I’ll be one of those folks making the trek next year. Congrats on an amazing achievement!!
Posted by: Michelle on 6/14/2019 at 7:22 am
Andrew & Kyle. You made it!!! Hope you had a beautiful view!
Congrats!!!
Posted by: Barbara Nahmias on 6/13/2019 at 11:52 am
Wednesday, June 5, 2019 - 9:30 PM PT
We had it all today. Sunshine, snow, raging snow, more sun, and even some thunderstorms...aka thunder snow. Regardless, our team snuck in our carry to Windy Corner at 13,000’. Progress! It was really nice to make some progress after a couple days of rest here at 11,000' Camp. The forecast is calling for more of the same for remainder of the week, so we’ll do what we’ve been doing everyday, we’ll wake up and stick our heads out of the tent early, and see if the mountain will allow us to make our move to 14,000’ Camp tomorrow. Fingers crossed!
RMI Guides Robby, Nick, Joe and Team Mountain Zen
Thursday, June 7, 2018 - 11:27 PM PT
Well, we left our cozy home at 14,000 ft on Denali this morning. When we woke, we had clear views of the route, and could see that winds were calm. As we packed up and started moving, visibility decreased and snow started to fall. We slowly poked our noses a little further, halfway expecting the weather to turn us around, but it never did. It snowed most of the day, but it was relatively warm, and winds were very light. It was almost perfect, we just missed out on the views. Regardless, we have settled in to our new neighborhood, and are enjoying the warm 10 PM sun. We just finished dinner, and are tucking into our sleeping bags to stay nice and toasty. If the weather allows, we'll go for the summit tomorrow morning. Wish us luck!
RMI Guide Walter Hailes
Go get em! Enjoy the views from the summit ridge on top of North America. Check out Mt Huntington and then read “Mountain of my fear” in the plane ride home.
Posted by: Tom Romary on 6/9/2018 at 7:37 am
Tyler and team, we hope you reached all of your goals today. We are looking forward to having you home soon to share all of your stories and pictures! Love and miss you! Praying for all of you, mom and dad
Friday, June 1, 2018 - 6:21 PM PT
The sun warmed our tents before a majority of the team was up and about this morning. We decided to sleep late and take advantage of some well deserved rest after our climb of Pequeno Alpamayo the day before. Cups of tea and coffee, bread with honey and scrambled eggs with ham rounded out breakfast.
Today was a move day. After breakfast, we slowly packed up our camp and walked back out of the Condoriri Valley to the awaiting Land Cruisers. With our duffles loaded tightly in the trucks and above on metal racks, we quickly drove the 20 miles back out to the highway and headed south toward Zongo Pass, the basecamp for Huayna Potosi.
The refugio here is a nice change from the tents that we have spent the last few nights sleeping in. Heated rooms, ample storage and electrical outlets seem like a real luxury.
The plan tomorrow is to move up to a hut higher on the mountain to get in position for our climb. The trail uphill is steep, but we will have porters helping with our load and expediting our progress.
RMI Guide Eric Frank
And just like that... everything started moving again. The storm ended exactly on schedule. By 6:30 AM High Camp was calm and sunny and we started brewing up. We packed and dug our gear out of the snow. We shook pounds of ice and frost out of the tents before stuffing them in their sacks. With crampons on one last time, we departed at 10 AM. After seeing virtually nothing for days, the scenery today was welcome and spectacular. We made good time down the fixed ropes in the morning shadow. Lindsay led the charge, pulling the lines free of the wind slabbed snow for a good chunk of the route. At Low Camp, we re-tooled and set up for hauling sleds. No more crampons and ice axes, it was time to switch back to ski poles. By this point we’d been made aware that there were seats on an airplane out of Vinson Base just for us... provided that we got our tails down there in time. We had the lower mountain pretty much to ourselves for the next few hours of trudging through the frozen beauty of the Branscomb Glacier. There was just time enough on reaching base to hastily organize gear before the Twin Otter floated in to a perfect landing. We said our goodbyes to the mountain and the ALE staff at Vinson Base Camp and climbed aboard. Back at Union Glacier, we got out in early evening to a far easier environment... hard packed level snow, mild temps and walk-in tents with tables and chairs. We caught up to the gang of Vinson climbers we’d originally gone to the mountain with. It was a pleasant reunion with guests and staff and everybody trading notes on weather at the top of Antarctica, out at the penguins, back in the Alps or off in the Himalaya. Word is that an Ilyushin flight may be inbound for us the day after tomorrow... on the 15th. Better late than never. In any case, my team is looking forward to a low altitude night without a storm tearing at the tents. Union is certainly good enough for now.
Best Regards
RMI Guide Dave Hahn
Papa (Steve) I miss, miss, miss you, really bad papa! Glad you got to the top, hurry back - Sierra. I miss you and love you - Kira. The Grandkids helped me make fudge tonight. They are very anxious to have you back. We love you and can’t wait to see you, soon. Vickie
Posted by: Vickie Butterfield on 12/14/2017 at 8:34 pm
Thank goodness I can stop feeling guilty every time I put another chunk in the wood stove or fry a real egg or go to the kitchen to top off my coffee cup. You are probably all walking around Union Glacier in your flip flops and tank tops by now. Linz, my birthday present will be you getting safely underway back to Indiana. Congrats to all from 630’ altitude, 22 degrees F. and gentle breeze. There are still colors besides blue and white.
Dave, thanks for looking after our girl. When I tried to teach our kids that taking a little risk adds spice to life, Lindsay took me seriously.
Hey, this is Eric and Avery calling from the lower bivy and Boston Basin Camp here in the North Cascades. We started a West Ridge of Forbidden climbing program today. Things are going really well. The team did a great job climbing up to the lower bivy. It's beautiful up here. Just the right amount of snow and flowers that are about to bloom. We're hoping to climb Sharkfin Tower tomorrow and then our main objective, Forbidden Peak, the following day. Thanks for following along. I'll give you a call tomorrow let you know how things are going.
RMI Guides Eric Frank and Avery Parrinello
RMI Guide Eric Frank and the Forbidden Peak - West Ridge team check in from Boston Basin in the North Cascades.
Hey, it's Billy. I'm checking in with Hannah and Rollo my two assistant guides here. We are on top of South America, 6962 meters, we are also up here with eight climbers and not a single puff of wind. We are the first crew on top today, and it's all smiles from our climbers. We got some happy but tired folks. So that's all I have to report for now. We'll check in when we're back at camp safe and sound.
RMI Guide Billy Nugent
RMI Guide Billy Nugent calls in from the Aconcagua summit!
Felicitaciones!!!! un abrazo enorme a ROLO, y a todo el equipo, buen regreso para todos!!!. Esperamos noticias..
Posted by: deby on 1/30/2017 at 6:40 am
Congratulations to Billy, Hannah, Rollo and the rest of the team. I bet that is a great experience to be on top with no wind. Enjoy the rest, when you get the chance.
Pawel had previously been a part of the Emmons and Kautz Seminars on Mt. Rainier. Finishing up the ice challenges of the Kautz, Pawel set his eyes on the prize, investigated ambitious alpine objectives and developed a plan. That plan included the North Ridge of Mt. Baker and the North Face of Mt. Shuksan. Last winter he trained for six days in Ouray, CO honing his ice skills to get ready for the task. And, as alpine climbing demands creativity, since then he's trained hard in gym and combined it with a rigorous running schedule, sometimes with a pack, at home in Chapel Hill, NC.
We met up for the planned 3-day climb of the North Ridge of Mt. Baker on a Monday in the face of a grim forecast—rain coming in Tuesday morning. The plan was to establish base camp on Monday and launch Tuesday morning. So, not good. But you can't win if you don't play and a large part of success in alpine climbing is putting yourself in position for it and then letting the cards unfold as they do. We set off toward base camp, hiking along the Heliotrope Ridge Trail, popping with alpine flowers. On the hike in it was clear Pawel's creative North Carolina training had paid off. He crushed it in two hours and—just as the thought entered my own mind—he suggested, “What do you think about going for it today?” Even with the crushing time to base camp, it was still 1p.m.—a rather untraditional start to the North Ridge. While we set up camp, I considered the timeline: We'd be pushing the weather forecast, but we felt comfortable descending the Coleman-Deming route (the standard descent) in poorer weather.
Once on the ice pitches of the route (approx. 9,600') you're pretty committed to the North Ridge, but we left camp with the caveat that should the weather change or the travel become more complex than planned, we'd turn back for another try later. Later never came. We made it to the ice cap in just over 3 hours, which is just over half the typical time. With a puffy cloud front still way off over the Puget Sound and a few small cells sweeping up over Colfax Peak, we committed. All the moments of consideration up to the moment of commitment in a climb like this is a struggle on par with Ali-Frasier—but once the decision is made, clarity begins—just climb.
And climb we did. Up through the ice cap, onto the upper flanks of the mountain, navigating through the upper bergschrunds, to the top. Descending the Coleman-Deming route to camp we were treated with blazing red sunset reflections on Puget Sound, rolling into camp just eight short hours after leaving camp.
We reconvened a day later for the North Face of Shuksan, a seldom climbed route. Seldom done for many reasons, among them being the formidable approach. After 5 hours of Amazonian bushwhacking and at least a Red Cross pint donation of blood from both Pawel and I, we arrived at the base of the actual climb. Not surprisingly, after that “warm up” the climb was like cake. Pawel's commitment to fitness and technical prep paid off and we stacked pitch after pitch after pitch of climbing until arriving at our lovely bivy atop the ridge.
The next day was an open road with a full tank of gas. We connected smoothly from the Crystal Glacier to the Sulphide Glacier, crisply circumambulated the mountain, ascended the SE Ridge, and then moved out smartly toward Winnie's Slide to camp. Arriving at camp at slighly past the stroke of noon, it occurred to the both of us that a trip out to the trailhead was easily doable, and since Pawel had some good friends in Seattle he wished to visit, we decided to go for it.
Four short hours later, we were at the trailhead. Packs were off, sandals on, sitting down. Life was good. And getting better. We met up for a culmination of the climb at the Chair 9 Bar and Grill. It was a pure pleasure to wrap up this stage of Pawel's alpine journey. In the face of a formidable forecast, we'd pulled off two major North Cascades objectives—a tribute to the power of positive preparation in the face of pure challenge. Well done Pawel!
RMI Guide Kel Rossiter
The Expedition Skills Seminar - Muir is enjoying wonderful weather on Mt. Rainier today. The team is spending the day training at Ingraham Flats at 11,200'. Ingraham Flats is a relatively flat section (hence the name) of the Ingraham Glacier that climbing parties often use for a camp when climbing Mt. Rainier. The team will head back to Camp Muir for their second night on the mountain.
Thank you guides and team.
What a great experience!
Posted by: Helen COUNTRYMAN on 7/10/2019 at 1:36 pm
CONGRATULATIONS & thanks for taking care of my son
Karen
Posted by: KAREN MULLEN on 7/9/2019 at 6:22 pm
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