What to Expect
*** Thanks to MT guide Dave Ahrens for the detail in our itinerary!
DAY 1: We’ll check in with the Rangers in Talkeetna before driving to the Park headquarters and to catch the bus to Wonder Lake through the amazing Alaskan backcountry. This is a great opportunity to see the wildlife and get a sense of the scale of the Alaska Range. You typically will see caribou, grizzlies, arctic wolves, owls, beavers, moose and a wide variety of birds. The bus is often filled with photographers and frequent stops are taken for photo opportunities.
DAY 2: We’ll leave our camp at Wonder Lake and walk two miles downhill to the McKinley River Bar, a mile-wide, braided maze of silt filled, bitter cold water. After crossing several braids you can thaw your feet out before heading towards Turtle Hill on a horse-worn single track made by the first expedition that is often shared with caribou. After cresting Turtle Hill it’s all downhill and around the many lakes perched atop the ancient, now green, moraines of the Muldrow Glacier. Our camp at Cache Creek is often a nice riverside camp with crystal clear running water.
DAY 3: We’ll cross Cache Creek and head towards McGonagall Pass. (It was here that my last trip encountered a grizzly that mounted up on his back legs to better inspect us, while we made as much noise as possible. He sniffed and growled a bit before heading off in the opposite direction. I guess he wasn’t totally bored with us, as he then shadowed us for most of the day from across the valley. As we slowly transitioned to the alpine realm, we eventually left the grizzly to his lush tundra.) We climb into the narrowing high valley of McGonagall Pass and encounter a typically snow choked gully with a dog leg corner which leads you to your first view of the mighty Muldrow Glacier and Mount Brooks towering in the distance. It’s here that you may feel the brisk katabatic winds so commonly moving down from these large Alaskan glaciers. After exiting the Pass, we’ll work our way up the lateral moraine to the cache of supplies laid by our dog musher friends and our first night on the Muldrow.
DAY 4: This is our first “cache day” or “carry day,” as well our initial interaction with our new friend, “sled.” After sorting through the cache over coffee we will head up the massive Muldrow glacier. The goal is to reach a nice camp spot below the Lower Icefall. We need to transport roughly half of our supplies to this spot and then dig a deep cache hole in the snow to guard against the ubiquitous ravens that are notorious for digging into and tearing apart less protected caches. It’s then a nice light hike back to camp. There are few crevasses to deal with on this day, as we are below the firn line and therefore some raw blue-ice glacier may be encountered.
DAY 5: Move day! We’ll follow yesterday’s trail, which we marked with bamboo wands and hopefully have a nicely beaten-in track to our camp at the base of the Lower Icefall.
DAY 6: This is an exciting day as we head into our first icefall and it provides a great introduction to glacier travel. There is often a less threatening passage along the right side of the glacier which follows a short broken route along the lateral moraine in order to avoid the more broken upper part of the ice fall. Once back on the glacier a weaving path avoiding cracks takes us to a flat area below the Hill of Cracks.
DAY 7: Move day…
DAY 8: Today we will establish a route to our last camp on the Muldrow. This day will test all the glacier travel skills you have honed over the past week. Our first challenge is to make our way through the, “Hill of Cracks”. This is a dynamic and ever-changing section of the Muldrow where the glacier flows over a large convex role, creating a maze of crisscrossing crevasses. Locating the path of least resistance that is completely dependent on snow conditions can make for an arduous passage through this tedious section.
Once through the Hill of Cracks, the Great Icefall towers above you. There is often a fairly direct route up via an obvious trough that weaves in and out of crevasses while huge seracs obscure much of your view. After a good amount of route finding, end running and some wide steps or jumps, we will arrive above the main mass of the icefall. Above this point we will travel up a gentle slope that works its way through some of the largest crevasses in the world and eventually leads to some compression zones below the Flat Iron, a large rock face coming of the prominent Pioneer Ridge. From this area, we will have our first view of the Harper Icefall which often is active. The large debris field stretching down glacier from its base is reason enough to stay away from this powerful formation. It is amongst these compression zones where we will establish our last camp on the Muldrow before heading up and onto Karstens Ridge.
DAY 9: Move camp through the slots and ice towers…
DAY 10: This day and the ones that follow offer some of the most amazing views of the expedition. Our first objective is to find a route onto Karsens Ridge. This can be a formidable challenge depending on glacier and avalanche conditions, and some steep snow climbing may be involved to reach the ridge proper. Once on the ridge you get your first glance of the Traleika Glacier some 2500ft below on the opposite side of the crest. We will work our way up the corniced ridge to a small camp. This ridge has changed more than any other part of this route in the past 10 years. There once was a shelf called the “Corral Camp” that offered ample camping, yet it has dwindled to a narrow exposed spot and no longer offers the once spatial and protected feel it once had. We will make a cache at the most protected compression offered that season and head back down to the Muldrow for one more night.
DAY 11: Move camp…
DAY 12: The amazing views continue as we work our way up the ridge with some running belays, leading to the bottom of the “Coxcomb,” a steep and avalanche prone section that leads to the top of Karstens Ridge. We often need to employ the use of fixed lines to get through this stretch. After reaching the top of Karstens Ridge we find ourselves at the 14,000ft Browne’s Tower camp overlooking the great Harper ice fall. This icefall is a stunning work of nature which at one point was nonexistent. Centuries ago, the Muldrow once continuously flowed all the way down from the 18,000′ Denali Pass. A glacial surge occurred, that separated the Muldrow from its upper reaches, which in turn became the Harper Glacier and separated the two by the aforementioned Harper Icefall. Here we will make a small cache and then head back down the Coxcomb with Mt Carpe and Mt Koven in the distance.
DAY 13: Move camp up and along the Coxcomb…
DAY 14: Today our goal will be to single carry onto the Harper glacier via a traverse across a steep and exposed slope. Once on the Harper we will continue to the climbers’ right side to avoid the large seracs of the first of two ice falls on the Harper. Once we make our way through the first ice fall we will establish camp below the second.
DAY 15: Move to High Camp! We will pass the second ice fall on right and head towards the 18,000′ Denali Pass separating the north and south summits of Denali. This is the camp from which we will make our summit attempt. It is a cold, exposed place and at 17,400ft putting in camp can be exhausting. With wind hammered firm snow it is often necessary to chisel platforms as opposed to digging them.
DAY 16: Rest and acclimatize before summit day.
DAY 17: Summit Day! Weather pending we will work our way towards Denali Pass where we will join the West Buttress route to the summit. While we have had numerous serious days before this point, this one is especially so. We need to have a good, clear day with low wind in order to mount a summit bid.
DAYS 18-19: Descend the West Buttress Route and fly out to Talkeetna!
***We have the possibility of descending the Muldrow Glacier route, which will add another 2-3 days to our descent.
Days 20-28: Contingency days
