Northwest Buttress of Denali

The Northwest Buttress line of ascent in red, with the West Buttress line of descent in green.
Thanks to TAT for the use of this awesome photo!

I remember gazing up the Kahiltna with a cardiologist from Canada over a decade ago. We were camped on an airy perch on Mount Crosson, and I was vicariously tracing the numerous classic routes we could see on the south side of Denali. The Doc pointed off well to the left of the Cassin and The Rib, and directed my attention to the left hand skyline of Denali. Steep snow slopes led up and through rock bands to a long, corniced ridge that curved to meet the north peak of the mountain.

"That," he said in a voice from some other plane of existence, "is a most sublime line."

I knew that Gary Bocarde, my boss at the time and founder of Mountain Trip, had climbed that line, the Northwest Buttress, back in the 1980's to make the second ascent of the route. I mentioned this to my doctor friend and he said he'd like to give it a try some day.

A dozen years later, and after many attempts to sort out a team to attempt the NW Buttress, I am happy to announce that we have a team and will give the route a try.

Mountain Trip has historically had good success on the route, as we made not only the 2nd, but the 3rd and the 5th ascents of the line, adding significant variations each time. I've not yet been able to find out how many times it has been attempted, but I'd guess less than 20, perhaps much less.

Many guide services are content to stick to high probability, low risk routes, and that's fine. We at Mountain Trip have always identified ourselves as climbers, and the climber in me really wants to find out what that most sublime line is like, up close and personal. Numerous questions arise, from the esoteric to the practical. What will it feel like to drop off the north side of Kahiltna Pass, leaving the relative security net of the West Buttress behind? Will we be able to climb around the rock bands or will we need to climb through them? How will my mind reconcile my 5' 11" insignificance when we chop through a cornice to gaze down the 14,000' vertical drop of the Wickersham Wall, one of the biggest alpine faces on the planet? The power of the unknown is one of the driving forces behind why we all climb, and this route embodies a lot of unknown.

We have two climbers committed and are therefore going to launch the trip. We can accept two more fit climbers with solid alpine skills. This is a relatively unique opportunity , so if you are at all interested, please contact us. The trip details are as follows:

The Northwest Buttress
Dates: May 3 - 30, 2011
Team Size: 2 Guides / 2-4 Climbers
Trip Cost: $7000 per climber

Trip fees include: 2 nights lodging in Anchorage before the climb, round-trip scheduled group transportation between Anchorage and Talkeetna, glacier flights, all food while on the climb, all group equipment (tents, ropes, kitchen, etc), and our top-tier guides.

Give us a call or drop us an email if you would like to join the team.
T. +1-970-369-1153
E. info@mountaintrip.com

Limited Spaces Available for Mount Rainier Climb!

Mount Rainier Climb via the Emmons Glacier
July 17 - 21, 2011
4 climbers / 2 guides
$1650 per climber

Mount Rainier, the iconic volcano of the Pacific Northwest, rises 14,411' (4392m) above the very nearby sea. Climbers from around the world travel to Washington State each year to test their mettle on the heavily glaciated flanks of the mountain. Mountain Trip is happy to announce that we are offering a fully guided climb of the peak by its Emmons Glacier route in the summer of 2011.

Traditionally, mountaineers wishing to join a guided ascent have been limited to one, and just recently three, guide services. This year, the National Park Service has opened up a limited number of guided opportunities and selected Mountain Trip to lead one of those ascents.

We are offering a five day climb of the heavily crevassed Emmons Glacier route. We selected the Emmons because it is much more of a wilderness experience than the more heavily traveled Disappointment Cleaver route. Taking more time than the concessioned guide services allows us more of a window for weather and greater opportunities to acclimatize. Our leader for the expedition will be senior Mountain Trip Guide Chris Kerrick, who grew up in sight of the mountain and has over 25 ascents of the peak. We will be a small group of only four climbers and two guides, so this opportunity is quite limited.



If you have climbed with us before, you know that we make every decision based on what will provide you with the best possible experience. We bring that same dedication and personal service to this Rainier climb, and hope that you consider joining us this summer.

Climbers will need to be in Seattle on July 16th for a team meeting and equipment check. Mountain Trip will provide transportation to and from the mountain, all food for the ascent, all group gear, mountaineering and park entrance fees, and, of course, our top-notch guides.

If Mount Rainier has been on your "To Do List" or if you are a mountaineer looking to expand your skill set on a mountain with big, Alaskan style features, please give us a call or send us an email as there are only four spots available for this opportunity.

Adaptive Sports Adventure Gets Published!

Sylvie Fadrhonc, a friend and education and development manager of the Telluride Adaptive Sports Program (TASP) just had an article published about a collaborative trip that we have been helping them run for the past two years. Spokes n Sports Magazine, a publication about wheelchair athletes, has a feature article article about our "Alaska Adventure" program. We've not marketed this trip, as we really want it to act primarily as a benefit to the athletes and the TASP, as we are ardent supporters of their work. With the publication of this article, I suppose it's time to pass along a bit of information about the program and how it has evolved over the years. Click on this link to download a pdf of the article from the Alaska Adventure.

Telluride Adaptive Sports Program has been an institution in the Telluride area offering ski instruction and year-round therapeutic and adventure opportunities to people with disabilities since 1995. In the fall of 2008 we approached TASP about helping them offer a trip into the Alaska Range for some of their disabled athletes as a very partial "thank you" for their helping my son become the ripping little skier that he is today. Their enthusiastic response and effort resulted in a collaborative "Alaska Adventure" that we led in the summer of 2009.

Such an adaptive trip into a glaciated environment as remote as the Alaska Range had never been attempted to our collective knowledge, and we knew that we would all have a lot to learn about how to safely and effectively manage the many levels of logistics. We therefore carefully selected the first year's participants and made certain to manage their expectations so that they knew we were all proceeding with this trip with the best possible intentions and planning, but that we'd have to figure out a lot of the systems while in the field.

The trip was a resounding success!

A team of 12 flew onto the Coffee Glacier and included three spinal-cord injuries and a traumatic brain injury. We set up a very comfortable base camp and, despite rough weather, had a great time exploring the area on skis and sit-skis. In an article in our local paper one participant reflected, "Being in remote Alaska restored my own inner vitality and belief that I could still experience what I thought was untouchable from a wheelchair.”

With one successful trip under our belts, we felt we could develop an even more challenging curriculum for a true mountaineering course and offered two such trips in the summer of 2010. Both teams flew onto the Pika Glacier, south of Denali and home to the stunningly beautiful area known as Little Switzerland. TASP staff and our guides worked together to develop efficient glacier travel systems which enabled wheelchair bound participants to become Alaskan mountaineers. One highlight was when Sylvie intentionally launched into a crevasse on her sit-ski, and the remaining participants with disabilities successfully extracted her! It just doesn't get any better than that!

We plan to continue developing this program and will send a team into the Range next summer with an objective to climb, in the hopes of attempting Denali in the very near future. Our dear friend and guide Heidi Kloos initially took the reigns of this program in 2009, and a scholarship fund has been set up in her memory. Enough donations came in to sponsor a wonderful young lady named Amanda Young, an athlete with spinal bifida. If you'd like to make a donation, information can be found at the Telluride Adaptive Sports Donation page.

Follow our January 10th Aconcagua team

Follow the expedition updates and podcasts as our team attempts to climb to the summit of South America's highest peak. Aconcagua is the highest mountain outside of the Himalaya and one of our favorite destinations.

We have a blog dedicated to posting daily updates and audio files as the team members call in to report their progress and tell us about each day of the trip. We're really happy with our new dispatch blogs, and invite you to check them out.

Click on the link to read about our Aconcagua Expedition.

Denali Fee Increase - Public Comments Needed

Denali National Park is holding two public "open houses" to discuss their desire to increase the mountaineering fee for Denali and Foraker. Currently at $200, rumors abound as to how high they'd like it to be. The first number thrown out by the Park was $500, although Congressional voices have probably made that 150% increase improbable at this point. They call the fee a "Cost Recovery Fee" and feel that they spend more on climbers than they currently recover.

Though we are fundamentally opposed to any fees for using our public lands, we recognize that Denali poses certain specific challenges and accept that some form of fee will forever remain in place. How much that fee needs be is what is up for discussion.

The meetings are to be held as follows:

Seattle, Washington – Monday, January 17, REI Flagship Store, 222 Yale Ave. N, 6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

Golden, Colorado – Tuesday, January 18, American Mountaineering Center, 710 10th St., 6:00 – 8:00 p.m.

Comments can also be emailed to: DENA_mountainfeecomments@nps.gov

Climbing Denali is already an expensive endeavor. We encourage you to contribute your thoughts and personal commentary. Would a $500 fee prevent you from attempting the mountain? What services do you feel are necessary? How much are you willing to pay for those services?

Mountain Trip will be in Golden and we look forward to seeing you, if you can make it on the 18th. I'll buy a round at the Golden Brewing Company post-meeting! (Golden's 2nd largest brewer...)

Thanks for your time and consideration,

Todd Rutledge

Guide/Director
Mountain Trip
www.mountaintrip.com
info@mountaintrip.com

Follow our Mount Vinson Expeditions

Our second Mount Vinson expedition of the season is underway. We have a blog dedicated to their climb, and invite you to follow them through our expedition dispatches as well as podcasts from 78 degrees south latitude. Click on the link below to keep up with the team!

Mount Vinson Expedition dispatches

Our first team of the season was very successful, with all 10 of our climbers and guides reaching the summit. The depth of support we were able to provide allowed us to make three separate summit bids, to best accommodate all of our team members. We invite you to read about the expedition and listen to podcasts from the summit on our:

December 1, Vinson Expedition Dispatch Blog

We've really had a lot of fun developing our Vinson program, and the word from "The Ice" this season is that the quality of our expeditions has been without parallel. We're staying in the best hotel in Punta Arenas, have the nicest Base Camp facilities, are eating like royalty, and, of course, have our top-notch guides helping lead our teams to the top of the bottom of the world.

Please click on the following link for more information on our exceptional Vinson Massif expeditions.

Colorado Ice Climbing!

While snow has been a bit sparse in SW Colorado, the ice has been coming into great condition! Three of us got out on Friday, December 10th and climbed the San Juan Mountain classic ice route, The Ribbon (600' WI4). The ice was in fatter than in the past few years and the route lived up to its classic status!

The Ribbon follows the cleft in the rocks for four pitches of great fun!

Todd Rutledge started us up the route, which climbs a short, thin bit of ice to a long stretch of snow and lower angled ice.

The second pitch was more engaging, and was steep, right off the belay.

MT owner Todd and our buddy and newly credentialed, IFMGA Guide, Eric Larson, having some fun at the second belay.

Eric took over the lead for the last two pitches. The third pitch was pretty cruiser and ended at a nice, sheltered belay before the steep pillar at the top of the photo.

MT "Rookie of the Year" Karen Kingsley, following the steep bit at the start of the last pitch.

Karen didn't have any fun at all!

Eric near the end of the second of four rappels to get off the route.

If you have aspirations of some steep ice classic or would like to learn the basics of how to enjoy this amazing sport, please give us a call at our Colorado office. We're located minutes away from some of the best ice in the state and would love to help you get up on some frozen falls!

Recaps from our 2010 Guides' Mega-Training

We'd like to extend a special thanks to the 23 Mountain Trip guides who made the considerable effort to join us in Ouray, CO from October 25 - 31 to attend our 2010 Mega-Training. Six of us stayed on for another week to complete an AMGA (American Mountain Guides Association) Rock Instructor Course, which wound down this past weekend.

Thanks also to our guide Kevin Koprek for the time and dedication he spent developing the curriculum for the course, arranging for lodging for all our guides and generally making this whole course happen. Instructors and IFMGA Certified Guides Vince Anderson and Angela Hawse spent the better part of two weeks with our guides and we deeply appreciate their help, insights and instruction. Thanks to high altitude medicine specialist Dr. Peter Hackett and Durango Search and Rescue team leader Leo Lloyd for presenting an amazing day of medical and rescue instruction. Dr. Hackett runs the Institute for High Altitude Medicine in Telluride. Click HERE for a link to their website.

We could post an entire blog about the past 14 days of instruction, which kicked off with a big barbecue before covering heaps of technical skills, principle-based decision making, pedagogy for teaching mountain skills, and much, much more. The Mega-Training concluded with a day of guide presentations on a wide variety of mountain topics ranging from avalanche considerations on Denali, women's issues on expeditions, physics for climbers, crevasse rescue, deescalation techniques for use with emotional teammates, and more. We booked a local restaurant for a dinner to celebrate our dear friend and guide, Heidi Kloos, who we lost to an avalanche six months ago and it was really nice to see her Mountain Trip family have the chance to meet some of her local friends.

John Duncan cuts big steaks out of prime rib while his daughter Brooke looks on hungrily. John owns and runs a local fly fishing and adventure guide service called Telluride Outside and is the husband of Laura Duncan, our amazing office helper.

An early snowstorm confined us indoors on our first day, where Vince and Angela discussed an array of technical skills and considerations that would lay the foundation for the rest of the week. Read more about Vince at his website HERE.

A heartfelt thanks to the Ouray County Search and Rescue Team for allowing us to use their "Rescue Barn" as our base for the course.

The weather improved and we took things outside to the beautiful setting of Unaweep Canyon, and it's granitic walls, some of which rise over a thousand feet tall. For more information on Angela, click HERE to see her website.

We interspersed technical instruction with plenty of hands on application. This meant getting to climb some great routes!

Evenings generally saw us congregating at the Rescue Barn for more topics of discussion and slide shows presented by our guides.

We opted to spend more time in Unaweep than planned, as cold temperatures did not let much snow melt around Ouray. This added some travel to our days, but provided a great venue for learning. Thanks to the Western Colorado Climbers Coalition for helping keep access open to these spectacular crags. Check them out at: http://westernslopeclimbers.blogspot.com/

Joe Butler belays a climber up on his bomb-proof anchor.

Chris Kerrick about to trust me to lower him down a route.

We returned to Ouray for a couple of days of short-roping practice and instruction. Here Angela models how to short-pitch and efficiently belay up two climbers at a time.

After the official MT Mega-training ended, six of us remained to complete an AMGA Rock Instructor Course, during which we climbed a lot more, including a day up a super-fun route called Otto's Route on Independence Monument, a 400 foot tower in Colorado National Monument.

Joe Butler battles the tricky overhanging off-width crack on pitch 2 of Otto's Route.

Jacob Schmitz belays Karen Kingsley up the exposed and fun last pitch.

The MT RIC team on top of Independence Monument
From left to right: Chris Kerrick, Karen Kingsley (in front), Joe Butler, Todd Rutledge, Jacob Schmitz and Peter Ingliss.

Jacob, having fun while being lowered to the base of the route.

Mountain Trip Everest Summiters Receive Honors

Orange County Metro recently honored three Everest summiters from Mountain Trip's 2010 Everest Expedition: Cindy Abbott, Denise Fejtek and Paul Fejtek. Congratulations for this recognition and all of your accomplishments. Check out the full article: http://ocmetro.com/t-Cover_Hot25_24Everest_Climbers1110.aspx.

Mount Everest Expedition 2011

The Summit of Mount Everest May 23rd, 2010

We are all excited and preparing for next year's expedition to Mt Everest!

Join us.... on one of the true challenges on our planet!

Namaste,

Bill Allen and Scott Woolums

Check out the Everest Dispatches and lots of photos from our 2010 Expedition at http://mteverest2010.blogspot.com

and find out about 2011 at
http://mountaintrip.com/International/everest.html

Our new Vinson Massif e-Magazine is live!

We just launched our latest expedition planning magazine for our trips to Antarctica. We wanted a publication that reflects the quality of our expeditions, and will be converting all of our expedition booklets to this format in the coming months.

Read and enjoy!

7th SUMMIT FOR BILL ALLEN!

Mountain Trip co-owner Bill Allen just completed the Seven Summits yesterday with an ascent of Elbrus, the highest peak in Europe!

Bill, along with returning climber Ephi Gildor and fellow MT guide Con Sevaris reached the summit at a little after 8am local time. They had acclimatized for several days in the beautiful Cheget Valley before making their summit bid.

Bill is just a couple summits away from having completed the famed highest points on each continent twice, and has climbed most of the seven numerous times. In the past 13 months he has stood on top of Denali, Carstensz Pyramid, Aconcagua, Everest and Elbrus and with upcoming trips to both Vinson Massif and then Everest in 2011, he's not showing much sign of slowing down.

Special thanks to Ephi for choosing Mountain Trip for his go-to guide service for Elbrus as well as other climbs!

12 Year Old Climber Climbs 50 Highpoints in 43 Days!

When the father and son team of Mike and Matt Moniz approached us about climbing Denali we quickly picked up on two things: they had seemingly boundless energy and enthusiasm and 12 year old Matt was the driving force in the decision. As we worked together over a period of months on a plan for the expedition, Mike let me in on a secret, secondary plan that would be contingent on their reaching the top of Denali. I've not mentioned it previously, but would like to offer up a hearty congratulations on the two of them for their recent accomplishment.

The two climbers stood on top of the highest point on each of the 50 states in the US in a record 43 days!

The logistics involved were mind-boggling, but Matt's determination, combined with dad's planning and attention to detail resulted in things pretty much going as planned.

This amazing feat was fueled by Matt's desire to raise both funds and awareness for a dear friend's illness, Pulmonary Hypertension. They raised $25,000 and hopefully a lot of awareness in the process. You can read about their travels, find articles and links as well as some great video on their website HERE. (Yes, that is a Mountain Trip logo on the top left corner of their tricked-out van's window. Thanks for the props, guys!!!)

Denali 2010 Season Wrapped Up

Our last team of the 2010 Denali season just flew off the glacier this afternoon. We had a great year, with lots of happy climbers. Weather was really challenging this season in Alaska and specifically on Denali, but we still managed to have 14 of our 17 Denali teams stand on the summit.

Each expedition had its exceptional moments and probably heartbreaks as well. Most teams spent their share of time camped in stormy weather, although a couple teams did manage to move up in mostly clear, blue sky weather.

Some highlights of the 2010 season:

We led the first ever guided ski descent of Denali to ski off the summit! Our goal was to travel on skis up to the 14,200' camp and perhaps make some turns in the big Genet Basin above camp. The climbers were fit, motivated and the weather cooperated enough for the team to carry skis up to high camp. Our guides did a great job of evaluating the climbers and the snow conditions and assessed that everything looked good for a descent from the summit!

We also ran a Wilderness West Buttress expedition for some adventurous souls in mid-April where they were able to experience Denali without any other teams on the hill one might have seen it 30+ years ago. They had a cold trip, but it was certainly a unique wilderness experience and the response from the climbers and guides was very enthusiastic.

Toward the end of the season, we led two "Alaska Adaptive" trips for disabled athletes. In conjunction with Telluride Adaptive Sports Program, we flew a number of wheelchair bound, traumatic brain injury and visually impaired athletes to the Pika Glacier, south of Denali for almost a week of skiing, climbing and instruction. Highlights included the athletes orchestrating a crevasse rescue scenario to raise a sit-ski "victim" out of a gaping crevasse! Kevin Koprek, lead guide on our first trip this summer said the experience was so rejuvenating and invigorating that it probably added five years to his guiding career.

Thanks to all the climbers who joined us for this, our 37th year of guiding in Alaska. Thanks also to the family and friends who supported these climbers, we realize it isn't only the climbers who sacrifice for these trips. Hopefully, we helped ease some of the stress through our Expedition Dispatches and podcasts.

We are enjoying a two week respite before the next expedition goes out the door. We're heading to Mt Elbrus (Russia), Vinson Massif (Antarctica), Carstensz Pyramid (Indonesia) and Aconcagua (Argentina) all before 2010 is over.

Interested Everest climbers should contact our office, as we are looking to add further services to our 2011 Everest Expedition in the hopes that we can exceed the expectations of our climbers. The feedback from our 2010 expedition was great. Here's a bit of what our climbers have been saying:

"From beginning to end; Mountain Trip was professional yet friendly, organized but open for suggestions, and produced a safe, successful 60-day expedition that resulted in all the climbers, guides, and climbing Sherpas joining the elite ranks of those who have climbed the world's highest mountain. The thousands of details involved with such an endeavor boggles the mind, but almost without exception: it was a perfect trip."
-Cindy Abbott (Click HERE for Cindy's blog)

New Aconcagua Planning Booklet is live!

We just posted our new Aconcagua Expedition Planning and Preparation Book on our website. It was a lot of fun to produce and we're quite proud of it, so please check it out. Click on the booklet below for a larger version!

Open publication - Free publishing - More seven summit

Denali Updates July 1, 2010

Our Denali season has been full-value, with brutal storms interspersed with stretches of stunningly beautiful, clear days. Our last two teams to go high reached the summit and here are some podcasts from the climbers on the summit of North America.

June 7th team:



June 13th team:

Images from our 2010 Everest Expedition

Vivian James Rigney climbing up the Lhotse Face

The team negotiating the Hillary Step on summit day

Looking back across the South Summit of Mount Everest

On the top of the world!!
May 23, 2010

Descending through the Khumbu Ice Fall

The 2010 Mountain Trip Everest Team, back in Base Camp, safe and sound...

EVEREST SUMMIT!!! May 23, 2010

We are thrilled to report that our entire Everest team stood on the top of the world at 9:30 am on May 23rd!

We were on pins and needles, waiting as our team moved up with a decent, but far from perfect weather forecast. Fortunately, the gusty winds predicted failed to materialize and the team enjoyed a beautiful, warm night and a clear dawn as they climbed to the summit. They made good time, even with having to negotiate a large number of other climbers, and returned safely to Camp 4 at 26,000 feet at about 3:30 pm.

Congratulations to our five climbers, two guides and 12 Climbing Sherpas!!!!!!!!!

Here is a podcast from Scott Woolums, our expedition leader, as he checked back in from Camp 4, following their successful summit:

Denali Weather Forecast

This is an interesting widget that provides a nice, concise forecast for Denali weather. It should update daily, so check back and track what's blowing on Denali!

Weather by meteoexploration

Bill Allen featured in Salem, OR newspaper

I can only post this because Bill is over in Nepal, as he would be too self-conscious about it to let me. Bill's hometown paper, the Statesman Journal, covering all the news that's fit to print in Salem, Oregon, recently ran a front page story about Bill's Everest current expedition.

Bill and the other six climbers are currently waiting for the jetstream to shift, lowering wind speeds up high and presenting them with an opportunity to head for the summit of the highest peak in the world. They are roughly 40 days into their expedition and everything is set for their summit bid.

You can read the article from the Statesman Journal by clicking HERE.