To quote the famous Robert Service poem, “There are strange things done under the midnight sun…”

Our Rapid Ascent Team called in from a very, very snowy 14,200 foot camp, where they are ruminating about the niceties of life not inside a ping pong ball. Today’s update let us all know that they carried a load of supplies up about 1200 feet to the base of the steepest section of the route, where they made a cache, but also – we now know which desserts that they miss most. Well, we know what Kaylee, Andreas, and Josh are hankering for, but WWAE (What Would Anton Eat)?

The satellite connection was too garbled for me to decipher what tasty treat torments the thoughts of Anton, so we’ll leave it to his friends and family to post suggestions in the comments below.

Three feet of snow fell at the 14 Camp in the last 24 hours. The crew broke trail through the powder and climbed up to the base of the “fixed lines,” a steep section of snow and ice that climbs roughly 600 feet up a feature also known as The Headwall. This stretch of route is affixed with ropes that are anchored to the ice are semi-regular intervals. When climbing up, the climbers will attach themselves to those fixed lines with ascenders, which are mechanical devices that clamp onto the ropes when weighted, but will slide upwards. Tethered to a climbers harness, an ascender will prevent a slip on steep terrain from becoming a fall.

As soon as the weather permits, they will re-climb up to their cache of supplies, load them into packs, and ascend the fixed lines to gain a spectacular ridge. A thousand feet of ridge climbing will take them to the 17,200 foot High Camp of the West Buttress route.

It looks like the weather might abate somewhat later today, so stay tuned and please let us know what you think Anton is mossing most for dessert!

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