Fresh off Denali.

Since the last time you heard from me I haven’t been to sleep yet.  We decided to travel through the night because the crevasse danger was so significant. People were falling through everywhere and so we were all roped up and everything. We were on skis so that was better than the people that were on snowshoes. They were falling in up to their knees and waist and people were getting rescued last night. It was pretty crazy so it was scary going across that glacier but even when it got dark at 2:30 AM it was still totally light out so we were cruising without lights or anything.

So we went all night and made it all the way to the airfield.  We set up a tent and boiled some water.  By that time though, I just decided to stay up and hung out until we got the air taxi off the glacier and now we are back in Talkeetna. We are just getting our stuff now but then we are gonna head to breakfast and then a SHOWER.

We started today [Friday] at the 17,200 ft High Camp. We were ready to be done with that camp, beautiful views and everything else but pretty inhospitable environment with the cold. So it’s really good to get down to lower altitude.

We are picking up our skis and some of the caches that we left along the way. We gave away a lot of our food at Advanced Base Camp and now we are picking up one more cache here at the 11,200 ft camp. We will probably head down to the 7,800 ft camp after we boil some water.

I am looking for pizza… and I am not talking about a slice or two, I am talking about a full pizza and a pitcher of beer… and looking for a proper bed.. and a shower has never sounded so good in my life. I smell to high-hell and my hair hasn’t been washed in two weeks. We are ready to have some modern conveniences for sure.

Ended up spending probably an hour on the summit. Jonathan ended up about a half hour behind us so we were all up there for a while and then the Polish guys took off. The clouds cleared a little bit and we got some pictures.

I will be in touch tomorrow, hopefully (cross our fingers) via cell phone rather than satellite phone because we will be in Talkeetna if everything goes right. That’s the goal is to be back down in Talkeetna tomorrow afternoon/evening. Half the battle is getting there and the other half is the weather being good enough that we can get a flight off of the glacier.

We made it!

I am up here standing on the summit with the Polish guys. Jon is still on his way, he should be up here in about an hour but he is a little bit back… but I am on the summit right now!!

Pretty crazy. Amazing climb!

We were planning on it taking about 8 hours to get up here but it took me just a little over 6 hours.

But we made it! Absolutely incredible walking some of these ridges. Now we are on a pretty flat plateau here at the top so we can kinda hang out… and the Poles say hello!

We are actually pretty much in a cloud right now so we can’t see a whole lot but hopefully that will blow out shortly here. Amazing views up here though and we will hang out here for however long it takes Jon, hopefully about an hour, and then head back down. We still got a lot of work to do but pretty rewarding after basically running a marathon everyday for the last two weeks. So psyched, so psyched!

Just had some special summit tea with the boys here and we’re hanging out, hopefully the weather will get a little better although it is not necessarily bad. It was a haul up here today. One of the hardest days I have ever had in my life and we’ve still got a long ways to go. I’ve still got energy though so we are good. We’ll be blowing Molly Tucker up here soon.

…

Johnny made it up a little while ago here. We took some pictures and we’re gonna be heading down. At the top of Denali, really excited and a bit emotional and just soaking it in.

Now the descent begins. We will be in touch tomorrow and let you know our plans for heading out.

Today Jonathan and I took a rest day/acclimatization/weather day. We woke up looking at the summit ridge looking very windy so we decided to take it easy today. Temperatures were very cold as well.

We did go down and get some of our stuff from the cache that we had left at 16,800 feet or so. The weather I believe is supposed to be looking good for tomorrow and right now the plan is to probably head for the summit in the morning but we will wake up and see what the conditions are like.

Just a little nuance of camp life, up here at High Camp we get a lot of frost inside the tent from breathing. All the condensation builds up and creates frost in the tent, then we wake up to it snowing inside the tent from the frost coming down because the wind or us knock it loose.

That’s about it from here, hope the weather cooperates for a summit day tomorrow!

It’s 8:30 PM here [Tuesday] and we are at the High Camp at 17,200 feet. We had a long, long day as we got stuck behind a lot of people on the fixed ropes on the main head wall. Then we proceeded up the West Buttress Ridge. We had a cache there from two days ago. We picked most of that up so for the last part of the day we had very heavy loads. I was climbing most of the day today with my Polish buddy Tomek. The two of us were kind of leading the charge today with heavy packs. Today was walking on a ridge with 75 lb bags with sheer drop-offs on both sides, so it was pretty crazy but we did make it up to High Camp.

Weather was supposed to be good today and tomorrow but it is lightly snowing right now so tomorrow is a little bit uncertain. We are also a little bit worn out so we may take a rest day tomorrow depending upon how we feel and the weather. I am feeling pretty good physically considering I’m hiking at 17,000 feet with a 75 pound pack going up a ridge.

We are just boiling water now, all I’ve had to eat today is some granola this morning and a Cliff bar until I got up here. We left camp at about 11:15 AM and I got up here at about 6:30 PM or so. So we have been working out real hard on little energy but my body feels good and strong. I think my body is adjusting to the altitude pretty well.

I’ve been sleeping well lately probably because we’ve been working out harder. I probably carried a pretty large share of the load today, definitely more than half. Picking up the slack so I’m pretty beat right now.

Tonight the sun will probably go behind the ridge at about 2 or 3 AM, it won’t get dark at all up here. It will probably peak back out and hit our tent at about 10 AM if we are still here.

We are right at the base of the last 3000 feet. It doesn’t look like much, looks like you could reach out and grab it from here. Then you start looking at the traverse to go up there. I’m looking at some people coming down right now and it makes him look pretty small.

When we go for the summit I would anticipate that we will leave High Camp at about 10 AM and it will take about eight hours to the summit and probably about six hours back. Denali is different from most mountains where you leave really early in the morning for the summit because it is so cold here. So we would be summiting in the late afternoon at the earliest but most likely in the early evening. It stays light so late that summiting late in the day is not a problem other than it is a bit colder.

The view up here is unreal! Words can’t describe it. It’s unbelievable with the ridge and the clouds below and then you can see all the way down to the Alaskan basin, probably about 15,000 feet below. So it’s pretty spectacular!

Today [Monday] was a rest day here at Advanced Base Camp (14,200 feet). We had another beautiful day even though we were supposed to get some clouds and even some snow. Basically took it easy today and really did nothing except just tried to relax, get hydrated and heal some beat up lips and tongues and whatnot. The environment we’re in beats up your body pretty good so we are just trying to take care of ourselves.

We had a shower which consists of a handful of Wet Ones that we can wipe ourselves down with. It’s kind of nice to get clean and feel like I’m at least a little bit clean. That’s really about it for today, we just sat around and read books and relaxed.

The plan for tomorrow [Tuesday] is to move up to the High Camp (17,200 feet). The weather is supposed to be good for the next couple of days, especially midweek, so we will try to get up there tomorrow. At some point we need to get the cache that we left up there. We may get that on the way up or we may go back for it. We will probably be moving up with the Polish team again.

Then we will be up there at High Camp and whenever we feel good and the weather is good we will make an attempt at the summit. It’s looking like it may be Wednesday or Thursday at this point. That’s way earlier than we thought we would be doing it but we feel good and the big thing is that the weather has been good. Normally we would be socked in for a couple days at some point but we’ve had near-perfect weather. That being said, to put that in relative terms, at night it’s about 20 below.

So it’s still cold and the sun never really goes down. It goes down behind the mountain because we are right up against the cliff at about 10 PM. But it doesn’t really get at all dark until 1 AM. Then it is kind of dark from 1 AM to 3 AM, but even at four in the morning it is pretty much totally light out. We have to wait until about 9:30 AM for the sun to hit our tent. When the sun is not hitting us it is really cold.

I will try to be in contact again tomorrow or Wednesday from High Camp.

We had an absolutely amazing day [Sunday], it has to be the most spectacular day we have had so far. We did a carry with a bunch of gear and food for our summit push. We took it from here at advanced base camp (14,200 feet) up to about 16,800 feet… really starting to feel the elevation. The first 2,000 feet were pretty much straight up on some fixed line and then all of a sudden the views opened up. It was something that I’ve never experienced before so is a pretty amazing day.

We left our stuff there and we’re back at base camp today [Sunday night]. We’ll wait to see what tomorrow [Monday] holds, probably do a rest day and then go to Camp Four which is at 17,200 feet. It’s all new to me but the technical stuff is feeling good.

[Mom stop reading here.]

Today was much more exposed and stuff that I’ve never done before. We were on some 50-55 degree ice with the crampons and fixed lines going up with 2,000 feet below you and on just sheer blue ice… so it was pretty amazing.

Then we got up to the ridge and we were walking on a razorback ridge with 3,000 feet dropping off to each side of us. So it was absolutely spectacular, scared the hell out of me, and had a great time doing it!

Like I said we will probably take a rest day and then head on up higher.  Better weather is supposed to move in mid-week so that should work to our advantage.

This place is unbelievable, it’s like nothing I’ve ever done before and it’s absolutely amazing! We are looking down across the entire Alaska Range.  We are looking down on all but one or two mountains now, those being Mount Hunter and Mount Foraker (both of which I mentioned a few days ago). You can see for 100 miles and see all the peaks that we were looking down on before and now they just look like these tiny little peaks.

So we are having a good time and looking forward to another rest day after a very very difficult day today. We are certainly dreaming of the food back home and some brew-ski’s.  Eating freeze-dried food every night and I think tonight we are having an ice cream sandwich with dinner (dehydrated, astronaut style) so that’s kind of funny but we are starting to dream of real food.

Jonathan and I are still at Advanced Base Camp and got a much-needed and deserved rest day. Woke up to a little bit of wind and thought it was going to be kind of a dismal day in the tent but it turned out to be a pretty okay day. So we have just been hanging out here and hydrating and resting a little bit.

We also went over to the “Edge of the World” overlook again which is about a fifteen minute walk from our tent. You basically look down about 7,000-8,000 feet to the glacier floor and you can see all the way across the Alaska Range as well. So, very cool, took some pretty neat pictures there… and that’s about it. Hoping for some good weather tomorrow. Hoping to carry some stuff up towards the high camp to about 16,500 feet and then come back and sleep another night here. After that, just hoping for some good weather.

We’re doing well. Finally feeling the effects of the high altitude as well. Bodies a little hammered and lips are cracked and all that kind of stuff but other than that the engines are running strong and feeling good.

I’ll check in hopefully tomorrow and hopefully we’ll have moved some stuff up from here and we’ll still be working our way up.

Today we made it up to Advanced Base Camp with all of our gear at 14,200 feet after digging up our gear cache that was at 13,500 feet.  The weather is still extremely good but we will go from frying hot to really cold in a matter of minutes.  Most of the time we are trying to stay out of the sun though when possible. Spending a lot of time on foot maintenance to make sure that our feet stay in good condition.

Looking up the mountain right now, our next hurdle is a 2,000 ft “wall” that is easily more challenging than anything we have faced so far.  That will take us to the saddle of the West Buttress.

Planning on a rest day on Saturday.  We are still travelling with the Polish team and hopefully the English team will catch up to us again tomorrow.

There is only one camp between us and the summit now so we hope to get up there soon and then we will be able to take a stab at the summit.

Here at the 14,200 ft camp there is an overlook called “Edge of the World” which lives up to its name.  I can see the whole Alaska Range and great views of Mount Foraker and Mount Hunter.

Also of note, Molly Tucker is easily the most popular climber on the mountain!

[note from Bill Lea: Rob can't get us any pics at the moment but here is a picture from "Edge of the World"]

We are at 11,200 feet camp. We stayed here Wednesday and Thursday nights but we carried half of our stuff up to 13,500 feet which is right below advanced base camp. We are going to try to move up there today.

Weather has been perfect. Actually extremely hot most of the time. The two things we are dealing with are temperature and not getting burned. I think our watch said it was over 80 degrees today on the glacier, same thing yesterday. An hour later we had down jackets on and it started snowing. Pretty crazy with the temperature changes but we’ll be moving up today hopefully pending weather.

The other thing we are dealing with other than temperature is foot care because it feels like I have had my feet in a hot tub for about two days here, sweating so much that basically just trying to take care of the feet and just stay out of the sun.

We are dug into a little ice cave here at Camp 3. We are also now unofficially travelling with 2 guys from Poland (the Polish team) and 2 English guys. So kinda moving up the mountain those guys along with others, but mainly those guys. We have a little tent city with the three teams.

I think that is about it. We are doing well. Moving up. Weather is supposed to be good so I’ll touch base again soon.