Our May 18th team awoke yesterday to blue skies, so they suited up and got ready to roll!  unfortunately, just as they were about to clip into their ropes, a big, nasty lenticular cloud formed over the upper mountain, causing them to apuse and put the breaks on their summit hopes.

After a couple of hours, the cloud began to dissipate, so they again clipped into their ropes and started climbing.  The route up from high Camp is a long, traverse up fairly steep slopes, called “The Autobahn,” for a team of German climbers that took the quick way down…  (Alaska climber humor..!)  Above this, it follows a series of rolling hills until it reaches a large flat, compact glacier known as The Football Field.  They took a good break here before climbing the fairly steep, Pig Hill, up to the summit ridge.  The ridge is spectacular, with a modest, 100-1500′ drop off to your left and a more engaging 9000′ drop off to your right!  It is beautiful, exciting and demanding.

Finally, they reached the summit and enjoyed the top of North America!  They made it back to camp at about 1am in the Alaska twilight and everyone is happy, healthy and sleeping soundly.

Congratulations everyone!!!