Climbing
ArchiveOn July 31, George Dunn, director of International Mountain Guides, became the first person to summit Mt. Rainier 500 times. He's since bumped that number up one, having just completed his 501st Rainier summit. He began…
Boogie 'til You Poop from Cedar Wright on Vimeo. One of the negatives of having a friend with a new digital SLR that captures great video? Having him record your most embarrassing outdoor adventure moment and sharing it on Vimeo. Warning: This video contains explicit…
Any dermatologist will tell you: Wear sunscreen every day, even if you're just hanging around town. But picking the right one is where it gets complicated. According to a 2009 study by the Environmental Working Group, nearly 30 percent of sunscreens don't have strong enough protection from UVA, the sun's most prevalent, carcinogenic rays. Then there
Courtesy of Wikimedia Three amputees from three different wars recently bagged the summit of Kilimanjaro, the tallest mountain in Africa, NPR reports. Between the three men, there was only one human leg; the rest were prosthetic. “The message we're trying…
Below, Trey Cook's friend, David Schipper, relays information from Cook and the late Fredrik Ericsson's skiing expedition on K2. This morning a memorial service was held for Fredrik at the Gilkey Memorial,just below basecamp. Trey made it back to base camp after a dangerous and challenging descent.Though…
Courtesy of Flickr Brandon Baker has no memory of being struck by lightning last Wednesday, the Star Tribune reports. The 31-year old hiker of Princeton, Minn. was on the summit of 14,259 foot Long's Peak just northwest of Boulder,…
This dispatch was received on the afternoon of August 5. Below, Trey Cook's friend, David Schipper, relays information from Cook and Fredrik Ericsson's skiing expedition on K2. Today at about 2PM Moab UT time and 10 PM French time the remaining 9 climbers at camp 4 plan to begin their…
Chogolisa (Courtesy of David Schipper) Early this morning I was woken by a call from Trey's girlfriend. 'Frippe was killed…' The bottom of my world fell out. Facts and information are impossibly inaccurate at this altitude so I got started making my way through the…
Outside's Sam Moulton reviews Black Diamond's Z-Pole. It's a carbon-fiber trekking pole that weighs in at 260 grams and costs $150. –Erin Beresini…
Below, Trey Cook's friend, David Schipper, relays information from Cook and Fredrik Ericsson's skiing expedition on K2. Today's call showed up on my cell phone while I was having coffee before another day at the Outdoor Retailer Show. Trey and I chatted for 7 minutes with excellent clarity and…
From August 3, 2010. Below, Trey Cook's friend, David Schipper, relays information from Cook and Fredrik Ericsson's skiing expedition on K2. As I was standing in line to enter the Outdoor Retailer Show in Salt Lake City UT my phone rang with the familiar 88…. prefix. A few days…
Erik Weihenmayer is best known as the first blind person to reach the summit of Mount Everest in 2001. Since then, the 41-year old has climbed the Seven Summits, carried the Olympic torch, graced the…
By Stephen Regenold It's trade-show time again. This week, you'll find me (and thousandsof other “gear junkies”) in Salt Lake City at the Outdoor RetailerSummer Market, a twice-annual exhibition of the latest gear andequipment made for playtime outside. Here's a peek at some of…
With the summit of K2 rising above us so close we feel like we could have touched it, Frippe locked into his skis and dropped into the massive 45-degree face that stretches from The Shoulder at 8000m to below Camp 3 at 7100m. This big, beautiful face…
By Stephen Regenold It is a foreign concept to most climbers in America. But in Europe, a mountaineering discipline called via ferrata — Italian for “iron way” — is an immensely popular way to get off the ground. Developed during World War I as…
By Stephen Regenold Marketing departments rarely dip into metaphysics when promoting a product. But with its new Tree Hugger 32, an eco-minded backpack design, The North Face touts “good karma” as an attribute alongside pack capacity and compression straps. Karmic repercussions or…
Courtesy of RonAlmog on Flickr. Last Wednesday 17 climbers were caught in a lightning storm above 13,000 feet on the Grand Teton, the Jackson Hole Daily reports. All of the climbers were injured in…
1) How’d you get your start?I got a journalism degree from UC-Boulder in 96 and thenmoved to Italy. Before leaving, I called Climbing Magazine and asked if theyneeded any news from Europe.
“Dead man in Camp 2. Bulgarian.” Lakpa’s news was such a surprise, we had a hard time believing it. For one thing, the last three days of warmth and sun without a breath of wind couldn’t have been more perfect. Base camp had been a virtual ghost town, with all…
What did you do on your summer vacation? Well 12 year old Matt Moniz is trying the extraordinary. He and his father, Mike are tagging the highest points in all U.S. 50 States in 50 days. They just completed number 49, Granite Peak in Montana. Next up they leaving for…
Frippe’s voice over radio static: “I’m leaving Camp 2 now. I’ll leave the radio on. Watch for me.” From the avalanche plain at the bottom of the route I looked through the 20x lens of the video camera, straining to pick up any sort of movement, even…
It's 8:00 a.m., -20 F, and the winds are gusting over 60 kph (37 mph). Despite my 8,000-meter down jacket and neoprene facemask, I’m chilled to the bone and my hands are blocks of ice. I need to get moving. Frippe locks into his skis and edges…
One of life’s simple pleasures is undoubtedly snow falling on a tent while you’re dozing inside, enveloped in a cozy, warm, down cocoon. And, oh, how quickly that pleasure turns to pain when the tent is perched at 6,300 meters (20,669 feet) and the snow is being…
Late June 2010, I teamed up with my regular 14er partners, Patrick and Robert to complete some unfinished business. The 14er combination of Castle, 14265', and Conundrum, 14060', stand outside of Aspen at the end of a long mining dirt road. I had completed both in 2009, (see the…
After the Tour de France, Lance Armstrong is scheduled to compete again in this year's Leadville 100, according to Denver's 9news.com. Past champions Dave Wiens and Lance Armstrong will…
We awoke to the sound of driving wind and blowing snow battering the walls of the tent. It wasn’t the kind of storm that made you start scratching out a will on the side of your water bottle, but unzipping the tent door a crack and getting…
A preliminary report has Alex Honnold breaking at least one speed record after solo climbing the Regular Northwest Face on Half Dome and The Nose, according to alpinist.com. For more on the story, check out Honnold Flies Up The…
I’m just about to fall asleep when I hear a sharp crack from the ice directly beneath me. I’m not a huge fan of crevasses, and something like this would normally send me flying from the tent like I was shot from a cannon, but tonight I’m…
Outside in Aspen: Catching Up With Melissa Arnot from Outside Magazine on Vimeo. Climber Melissa Arnot recently became the first American woman to summit Everest three times. (She's bagged Mount Rainier 73 times.) We caught up with her at…
8:30 a.m. The pit, in and of itself, was inconclusive. When pressured with the kind of force that would represent a skier executing a silky smooth jump turn, a layer did, in fact, release, but it wasn’t the kind of sheer that shrinks your cojones and sends you tiptoeing…
Climbers on the lower slopes of Hvannadalshnúkur (Photo by Stephen Regenold) By Stephen Regenold From the summit ridge on Hvannadalshnúkur, Iceland’s highest peak, the world dropped away to a blanket of clouds. It was late May, and I’d come from far below,…
The courtship has begun. Yesterday we made a reconnaissance mission up the Gondogoro glacier to catch a glimpse of the lovely face of Laila Peak. It was a perfect day–blazing sun, not a breath of wind, not a cloud in the sky. Frippe and I were the…
There are 54 'official' Colorado 14ers mountains rising above 14,000 feet and at least 300' from an adjacent saddle. An estimated 500,000 people climb on 53 of the 14ers each year without fees or permits, today. One, Culbera, is on private property and the owners charge $100 per climber.
Base camp. It seemed as though it took us forever but we’re finally here. Two days ago, we followed a line of 23 porters as they left the terraced fields of Hushe behind and headed into the magnificent Karakorum mountains. Smiling children followed us out of town…
With the controversial summit from the Tibet side by 13 year oldJordan Romero, China seems to feel enough is enough. Starting thisfall, 2010, climbers must be between 18 and 60 to be issued a permit. This was announced by the China Tibet Mountaineering Association (CTMA) who manages mountaineering in…
Pemba Dorje Sherpa, a Nepalese Sherpa who holds the record for the fastest ascent ofEverest (eight hours and ten minutesin 2004) is hoping to take a local child to the summit after 13-year-old American Jordan Romero became the youngest person to climb the mountain last…
A climber who went missing Saturday on Mount Rainier is now presumed dead, according to the Seattle Times. On Saturday, 11 climbers were overtaken by an avalanche, and all were pulled out by fellow climbers but one. The climber is believed to be a 27-year-old man from Olympia,…
In the mountains, flexibility goes a long, long way. We expected to be in Askole about now, but, hey, things change, right? Our original plan was to go from Skardu to the tiny village of Askole via a long and harrowing 4×4 trail. It’s a narrow road–steep…
In the blink of an eye there was a razor to my neck. I had committed the ultimate rookie tourist error, suckered into compliance by a few friendly encounters that lulled me into dropping my guard. I was on the outskirts of a remote village in northern…
By recent standards, Everest 2010 was a safe and successful year.There were nearly 500 summits with 4 reported deaths, all on the north,and several injuries and rescues. The total Everest summits broke thetotal 5,000 (includes multiple summits by Sherpas and guides so perhaps 2500 individual summits) level since the…
Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me. Not sure how much of a fiesta we’re going to be able to drum up in this town, but my birthday wishes are all in place and I’m super stoked to be here. A few days ago we flew…
As-Salamu alaykum, or “peace be upon you” in Arabic. After months of preparation and one long day of traveling, Fredrik Ericsson and I have finally arrived in the capital of Pakistan on the first leg of our adventure. What adventure, you…
Five hundred dollars can buy you a lot of things: an iPad, a mediocre bike, a lawn mower—or three days of glorious summertime freedom (transportation excluded). Here are our picks for the best do-it-yourself budget escapes in North America, plus outfitted adventures you can't afford to miss.
MountainFilm in Telluride, a 32-year-old festival, is a little meeting of big minds in a beautiful place. Granted, I'm not being particularly objective. Outside sponsors the festival and a group of editors from the magazine and producers from our new television channel spoke on a panel Sunday.
Jamie Clarke, Scott Simper, and the five climbing Sherpas–Kami Tsering, Arita, Ang Namgal, Pemba Dorje, and Sonam–of Expedition Hanesbrands, reached the summit of Mount Everest on May 17, the early side of…
Award-winning director Michael Brown—of Serac Adventure Films and the Outside Adventure Film School—keeps sending advice down from the top of the world. If you’re an aspiring adventure filmmaker, you should pay attention. The latest installment, embedded above, offers…
The weekend saw perhaps 300 summits on both sides of Everest. The weather was mixed throughout, with blizzard conditions at times. The climbers had to work hard for their summits. There have been three deaths this season: two on the north side and one on nearby Lhotse. Taking most…
May 22nd, 2010 will be a day recorded in history: the youngestperson to summit Everest and the person with the most summits inhistory on the same same day yet from different sides. Apa Sherpa at age 47 made his 20th summit with the Eco Everest teamand on the other…
A huge wave of climbers on both sides of Everest have moved to theirrespective Advanced Base Camps and are on their summit bids starting Friday night, Nepal time.They are not only dealing with the extreme altitude of Everest but also an impending cyclone that could bring heavy snows and…
Dr. Peter Hackett is back. After a ten-year absence from the Khumbu Valley, a place he’s either lived or visited consistently between 1974 and 2000, Hackett returned to Nepal this spring to work at Everest ER. In his ten-year absence, the Telluride-based doc who…
There were at least 60 summits on Monday morning, May 16th from thesouth side. And at least 6 on the north. Thewinds did pick up late Monday bringing a stop to this brief window. After a false start on Saturday night when the winds did notcooperate, teams huddled at…
Chad Kellogg, the 38-year-old Seattle-based climber attempting to break the speed ascent record on Mount Everest without the use of supplemental oxygen, stopped by Expedition Hanesbrands’ site at Base Camp last evening to check in on the…
We can summarize the week in one word: weather. After the excitementof summits on May 5th and 7th, teams on both sides watched this week asthe jet stream sat parked on the summit of Everest creating a hugeplume of ice crystals that provided second thoughts on going to thesummit.
Combine the total number of Mount Everest summits of all the seasoned mountaineers at Base Camp this season–Dave Hahn, Apa Sherpa, Conrad Anker, David Breashears, Dr. Peter Hackett, Russell…
More teams have made the decision for a summit bid this weekend. Thelatest include the Malta Everest team, half of Peak Freaks and a twoperson team from First Ascent. They are now at camp 2. Why are theseclimbers going to the top in marginal weather? Well maybe the weatherwill not…
With several teams targeting Sunday, May 16th as a summit window,the question of rescues often comes to mind; especially if the weatherlooks marginal as this one does. Followers of Everest know that rescues are difficult and sometimes impossible above base camp or 17,500'. In his book, Into…
Jamie Clarke and Scott Simper, Expedition Hanesbrands’ climbing team, have been planning their Everest expedition for more than two years. The day has finally come for the 42-year-old Calgary mountaineer and adventurer…
Most climbers get a little restless in Base Camp. There’s not a lot to do other than read the latest weather report, eat, sleep, sharpen crampons, take a Sherpa shower, and wait for a decent summit window. Cory Richards, on the other…
This was a busy week on Everest with the first summits for the 2010season along with a risky gamble. And several accidents and, sadly, areported death on nearby Lhotse. A team of nine Sherpas fixed the ropes to the summit on the southside. They included Sherpas from IMG, Alpine…
Leif Whittaker shows you Everest Base Camp in a film shot by Michael Brown of Serac Adventure Films. Want to shoot your own…
Six a.m. at Everest Base Camp and I wake to the sound of a Nepali screaming into a cell phone. A few days ago a new cell tower was installed at Gorak Shep (translation: Dead Bird), the last Khumbu Valley outpost a thousand feet below us, and…
Eric Simonson's IMG Blog is noting the first summits of 2010 onEverest. As expected it came on the south side from the Sherpa teamfixing lines to the top. Sherpas from AAI and Himex were also on the team and I will report their names as soon as I receive…
It’s Day Six of Expedition Hanesbrands’ trek to Everest Base Camp. We’ve passed the14,000-foot mark and are spending a relaxing layover day in Pheriche. The view from the window of the Himalayan Hotel is a maze of stone walls, most of which enclose a very large yak.
Thereare good weeks and bad weeks on Everest, a bad week is when someonedies. On Monday, April 26, Hungarian climber Laszlo Varkonyi was sweptinto a crevasse by an avalanche on the North Col. A desperate searchensued, however, by Thursday, the search was called off. The entire north side was…
Oh Eun-sun of South Korea claimed a summit of Annapurna earlier this week, which would make her the first woman to summit all 14 of the world's tallest mountains–except for the fact that her total check list of achievements is in hot dispute within…
On one of my Everest climbs, I was told outright – “If you can't getto camp 3 in under 5 hours, you are out.” After a discussion with mygrim reaper on people skills, the logic of the statement made sense.Speed is your friend on any mountain, much less the…
You never know who you’re going to run into in the lobby of the Hotel Yak & Yeti. The former royal palace, with its scarlet lobby chairs, baby grand piano, and bar that serves a cold Tuburg beer, is the…
There was a large avalanche near the North Col on Monday, Tibettime. Before going further, remember that breaking news of accidentsfrom Everest, especially from the north side, in almost every case isinaccurate. However, many teams are posting updates on their websitesto inform family members of the status of their…
Prayer flags , worn by the wind, strung between trees just outside of Patagonia, Arizona (© Jay Graham / drr.net)Over the coming months, Outside will be posting interviews with adventurers, environmentalists, filmmakers, and others conducted by Mountainfilm. Many of the icons appearing at this year's…
The weather on both sides is proving difficult even stopping theSherpas from fixing the route above camp 3 on the Lhotse Face. So mostclimbers are resting in their -40F sleeping bags, reading or playingcards in the dining tents. The Sherpas continue to carry oxygen bottlesto camp 2 in anticipation of…
For most Everest climbers this is week three or four away from home.They are making good on their acclimatization efforts with over 100climbers now having spent a night or two as high as camp 2 on the southhowever significantly fewer even touching the North Col on the north. The…
This season, among other dubious firsts, Mount Everest will see a summit bid by the youngest climber, 13-year-old Jordan Romero, and the first attempt by a climber with an artificial hip, 65-year-old Don Healy. One bright spot: Draper, Utah–based Apa Sherpa, who first summited the peak in 1990 with Rob…
In the age of social media, a group of celebrities demonstrate that "raising awareness" isn't always code for self-congratulation.
By Stephen Regenold For three weeks in April, I put my entire life on hold to trek in the Khumbu Region of Nepal. As a part of Expedition Hanesbrands, a major mountaineering initiative led bythe Canadian climber…
Climbers are making great progress with their acclimatizationrotations on both sides of Everest. The Sherpas are now starting to fixthe ropes to camp 3 high on the Lhotse Face – a great sign. On thenorth, Adventure Peaks is looking to move to the North Col For some teams, the…
Love Acadia, the Tetons, and the Grand Canyon? Wait until you meet their crazy little cousins.
Right around the time I started working at Outside, the editor Mark Bryant assigned Jon Krakauer a story that required climbing Mount Everest. The office was always supercharged, but in the weeks leading up to Krakauer’s May 1996 summit, the intensity at…
Another good week on Everest with teams settling into base camp onboth sides of the mountain. Alpine Ascents was the last large team toarrive at south BC on Wednesday. They spent their time adjusting to thehigh altitudes of over 17,000'. Teams conducted their Pujas and evenpracticed some ladder walking…
Right on schedule, the second week of April, camps 1 and 2 arealready in according to this email I revived from Phil Crampton ofAltitude Junkies: My Sherpas have already established camp one and camptwo so we plan to continue to stock camp two in anticipation of theclimbers sleeping there.
RMI and Peak Freaks have arrived in Everest Base Camp in Nepal. The first of many. It is critical to take your time getting to BC. Tim Rippel explainsthat two of his climbers are going lower, not higher, due to the impactof altitude. He does an excellent job of…