Trip Reports

West Rib Signing Out

This years West Rib/Riblet trip was thoroughly enjoyable, we had great weather, great, conditions, and a great group. We were lucky enough to enjoy splendid views on the upper mountain from a perch at 16,300 almost entirely to our self. Our summit day was technical in nature, long in elevation, and highly satisfying. Our decent…

Rumors of a Summit!?!?!

Well, this is a bit embarrassing… We received a garbled post from someone who sounded a lot like Zach Johnson, but were unable to understand any of it.  We have “heard it through the grapevine” that the team reached the summit yesterday.  One of our other teams is at high camp and we have asked…

Traverse Team- Backcarry Day

The crew had a nice and restful day- they had a mellow morning, sleeping in and enjoying a quick round trip from 14 camp  to pick up some gear cached at 13,500′. This involved dropping down out of camp for about 30 minutes, digging up their cache that they left on the uphill side of…

Move to high camp!

The entire team made it to high camp today, and they are happily tucked into their tents with hand warmers and hot water bottles.  They earned their rest tonight- the move from 14 to 17.2 camp is a hard one, but everyone performed marvelously. They first climbed up about 1,400′ of snow slopes to reach…

A summit and a descent from high camp

Markus, along with guides Karen Kingsley and Nick Shepherd, left high camp early this morning to attempt the summit, and I just received word that the rope team has made it safely back to high camp, having successfully summitted Denali!  They are all well and plan on descending the mountain to basecamp over the next…

Qobin’s Team- Signing Off!

Peter called in with the final podcast for Qobin’s Denali expedition.  The team is back in Anchorage, and Qobin is actually on a plane heading back to Malaysia.  We wish him safe travels and thank him for joining us on Denali.  This was his second attempt at the peak, but his first with Mountain Trip. …

Back in town

Four separate expeditions are now out of the mountains and living it up in town.  Burmeister and his West Buttress team are spending the night in Talkeetna, while the West Rib team, Qobin’s expedition and the Northwest Buttress crew are sleeping soundly in Anchorage.  Good work and congratulations to all the expeditions, and welcome back!

At 14,200′ camp

Chris and company pulled into 14,200′ camp this evening, and are happily in their sleeping bags after eating another delicious meal.  Tomorrow they will travel down glacier for about 30 minutes to pick up their cache of gear, and spend the afternoon reviewing skills needed to proceed higher on the mountain.

A summit bid, bad weather

Joe and the team made a bid for the Denali summit, but were turned down by increasingly bad weather conditions.  They descended safely to camp and are now gathering their strength for one more shot tomorrow.  Tomorrow is their “up or down” day, the last day an expedition can attempt the summit due to limitations…