It’s a great piece. In it, Loomis covers why all-women ascents are significant, how the perception and expectation of what women can accomplish has changed over the decades, and the significance of role models — particularly in mountaineering, rather than just rock climbing. It’s interesting, but I think absolutely correct, why women in mountaineering don’t stand out in the media and public eye except in close circles of climbing aficionados.
It’s worth checking out and you might be surprised. Though from my experience, we shouldn’t be.
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My family and I will be flying to Upstate New York soon for my 10-year college reunion. I have positive feelings about it — or else I probably wouldn’t be going. However, I’m not entirely sure why I’m going. A little reflecting on this time seems appropriate since this is a milestone that might be more significant than turning… say 30. But I think the reconnecting might be the best part. In that way it’s not just about the past.
I chose my school for a lot of reasons, but mountains had nothing to do with them. During college, I treated hiking and climbing activities in an almost secretive way. I certainly didn’t blog about my passion then. I shared my interest with very few people. I think I liked it that way. It set me apart, even if only in my own self image; while I went about a “normal” college life I was doing something else entirely on the weekends and breaks.
I dreamed about working a job as a professional most of the year and then putting on the crampons and carrying my axe to scale some Alaskan peak on long weekends and paid vacations. The Smash and Grab short film resonates here. But guys like John Frieh, Mike Burdick, Zac West and even the likes of Ed Viesturs, when they were young, were in a better position to play in and get experience in the mountains than me. Still, I thought I could climb peaks in the wilderness — whether they were firsts or not — in an organic fashion. I would climb by sheer willpower and persistence; luck and bullheadedness rather than experience and skill. I thought I could be like the Sourdoughs on Denali.
Great climbers these days get started at an early age, climb with climbers better than them, earn their requisite ten thousand hours on the rope, and push their comfort zone. But that wasn’t always the case. The first ascents in the Alps were done through stubborn determination and grit. They didn’t have experience or mentors to glean anything. Neither did the Sourdoughs for the most part.
The story begins with Frederick Cook. Jonathan Waterman gives a great description in High Alaska, but I’ll paraphrase. Cook alleged to have bagged the first ascent of Denali in 1907. His story was a bit outrageous yet many to this day insist the mountain was first climbed by Cook.
Flip forward to the fall of 1909 in a bar in Fairbanks. There, Tom Lloyd bet Bill McPhee two cents that he was neither too old (49) nor too heavy to climb Denali. Then, McPhee offered $500 to help prove Frederick Cook never set foot on top. Two more Alaskans contributed funds and the whole venture seemed possible.
The expedition team was made of tough Alaskan miners — sourdoughs — whom had absolutely no experience climbing mountains. In addition to Lloyd, Peter Anderson (47), Billy Taylor (27), and Charles McGonagall (40) rounded up the older team. They left Fairbanks in the dark of an Alaskan winter in December with four horses and a sled dog team and didn’t make their first camp until late February. Then they spent the next month establishing camp at 11,000 ft.
On April 3rd, they packed thermoses and doughnuts, wore creepers and carried alpine poles as well as a fourteen-foot long spruce pole. Planted the pole at 19,000 ft. to prove they were there and continued to the North Summit at 19,470 ft.
The true summit however is the South Summit, which wasn’t visible from Fairbanks, so they seemed to ignore it. They probably saw that it was higher. But if conditions weren’t right, perhaps they couldn’t see it two-miles away.
Regardless, their ascent was remarkable. As Waterman writes, “These men unknowingly matched the fast-and-light standards which only highly trained alpinists would apply more than a half century later. Their nonchalance, and lack of ropes or climbing experience, made their climb all the more remarkable.”
It wasn’t this story that actually created my notion of the bullheaded, organic alpinist sprouting up, but it bolstered it. But as ten years have gone by, I don’t know anyone that climbs at that level that hasn’t been living the life of a professional climber, either through guiding or grants and that weren’t climbing at a young age.
The Sourdoughs weren’t young. It’s just a different era. I know and I am enjoying waiting for whatever comes next…
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This Memorial Day weekend tested my New Year’s resolution to not complain so much about the heat and humidity in Peaklessburg. This was tough since it was consistently about 90(F)/32(C) and very humid. If you were in the cooler mountain air — even if the conditions were cloudy or rainy — remember, I think you had it made!
If you are a weekend warrior, you know these three-day weekends are great. You can get out there in between work and have an extra day to go farther or perhaps add a recovery day before returning to the 9:00-to-5:00 grind. Still, escaping responsibilities of family and friends, let alone work, can be difficult. I keep thinking of what alpinist David Burdick said in the Smash and Grab video: “Our life windows are shorter than our weather windows.”
This particularly rings true for a weekend alpinist, where high, steep, snow and ice routes mixed with blue skies are sought but often do not coincide with the free times when we don’t have to be there for plumbing repairs, graduations, and family quality time — the things that often can’t be rearranged on the schedule. This also makes me admire John Frieh all the more. Let me explain…
Burdick, Frieh and partner Zac West made a weekend dash from Seattle to southeast Alaska on the Stikine Ice Cap to attempt of Burkett Needle near Devil’s Thumb. It was a first ascent to boot that they named Repeat Offender (IV 5.9 AI3 M5).
You’d expect that on an ascent like this, two days before they topped out, that they would be climbing, waiting out weather in a camp somewhere or at least hanging around a tarmac for the weather to clear so their plane could taxi them to base camp. Nope, they were home, in Seattle able to sleep in their own beds, and in the case of Frieh, with his family. They went from home to summit and back in three days!
Compare Frieh to Ed Viesturs. While a lot of aspiring climbers with family have admired Viesturs for his balance (better word might be arrangement, really, since balance doesn’t always necessitate a 50/50 split) with his family over the place climbing plays in his life, I think John Frieh could be the new contemporary role model here. Frieh has a family and works a full-time job in the Pacific Northwest. He’s consistently a part of establishing challenging first ascents in some great locations in Alaska and he works a “real” full-time job as an engineer and he is a husband and father.
While Viesturs worked as a veterinarian and then a carpenter when he wasn’t climbing, he was essentially a full-time professional climber by the time his children arrived, where work was guiding, giving slide shows and planning the logistics for the next ascent. I don’t know what kind of support or agreement Frieh has from his family, but he’s fortunate to have his family and be able to explore some of the most amazing mountaineering challenges today.
On a related note, one of my good friends Chris McGurn — a solid guy all around — got out this weekend with panache. On Saturday, he took a plane as a passenger to several thousand feet above the Virginia countryside, looked out the window and took the express way down with some friends. I’m really glad he got to jump and for the support he got from his wonderful wife! (And by the way, there is no jealousy here; I would have preferred the long way down and a wait on the tarmac before getting to the terminal, like usual.)
I’m also really glad the chute opened and that he didn’t bust an ankle on contact with earth. He’s my climbing partner for a rare day at the gym next month!
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Sadly, 10 climbers are now dead from the events over the past weekend on Everest. It was reported earlier as 11 dead, but fortunately, one climber, Italian Luigi Rampini was found alive and rescued!
If you’re looking for the latest news on what happened or some insight into what is happening on the mountain now, I only wish I had something to share especially if you know one of the hundreds of climbers on or around the mountain. I am trying to understand what is happening like everyone else.
I keep thinking of Freddie Wilkinson’s book, One Mountain, Thousand Summits. He delves into the 2008 K2 disaster from a journalist’s perspective, as well as a climber, and attempted to reconstruct the frenzy of what friends and family around the planet where doing to find out if their loved-climbers were okay. Satellite phones, email, Twitter, Facebook have all changed the way we see what was happening. It’s a powerful story of loss, what people thought was happening on the mountain, why the public thinks climbers climb, and an introduction to some of the unheralded heroes. I’m sure family and friends were searching for news through phone calls throughout the day and tracking social media. In that, truth and misinformation are intermingled.
As for the events on Everest, no doubt truth and misinformation have been trickling out or even flowing out liberally. For instance, author and producer Jennifer Jordan — who is well connected with leaders in climbing — posted an amazing and worrisome photo on social media of easily well over 100 people walking up in what resembles a conga line or reminiscent of gold prospectors heading over the pass in the Yukon. I don’t know when it was taken or who actually took it. I don’t know conclusively what it means. Regardless, I had the same thought everyone else made: Wow, that’s unreal! As one put it, that was crowded even on a good day on Mont Blanc.
I want to judge those climbers. I don’t like the look of their climbing style. I don’t like conga lines. You don’t have conga lines in the wilderness. In the wilderness you have small teams and alpine ascents without fixed ropes.
I shouldn’t judge them because I do know this: Some climbers just want the top. They want to get up there. Whether it requires pain, thin air, altitude sickness, maybe even frostbite, and perhaps a conga line. Everest is the biggest. Maybe it’s not the baddest, but it’s a universally recognized icon. I suspect if you’re on the rope line heading up you’ll go to the top even if it means sharing the top and the struggle with the entire neighborhood from that crowded basecamp. For them, it’s an acceptable price of admission to the Everest club.
There are plenty of other climbs around the world, offering their own challenge. But when you think you can do Everest, isn’t that a notch in your belt you want to have? Why not me? Why not you?
For those who were lost, injured or failed in their attempt, they did what they needed to do to feel complete. In that, I’m positive they felt alive.
Thanks for dropping by again, as always. If you enjoyed this post, please consider following the Suburban Mountaineer on Facebook or Twitter. Happy reading and carpe climb ‘em!
The other night I got an email from, Erika Chisarik, a climber and a regular reader of this blog. It was good to chat with her; I genuinely enjoy talking climbing with readers anytime. It’s especially enjoyable when they have a question that gets me thinking or a story to tell. This reader had both.
Erika has climbed a couple of trekking peaks in Nepal, including Imje Tse (a.k.a. Island Peak) ( ft./6,189 m.) and Gokyo Ri (17,575 ft./5,357 m.) It was all her husband’s idea, this climbing thing. After watching a few YouTube videos, the feeling was more along the lines of terror rather than excitement. But that’s the way of the uninitiated in some ways; always seeing the risks and dangers and unable to see the opportunities and rewards. The wall blocking the view of the positive outlook was knocked down somewhere around Island Peak base camp. There, the notions of possibilities and the idea of accomplishment had set in. Mountain madness was taking hold.
Unfortunately, her husband couldn’t get to the top. This whole trek was his idea, but altitude sickness respects no one. They descended to base camp and he recovered, but he would not try again on this trip. After some prolonged, intense discussion, they decided Erika should seize the moment and go climb to the top. Somewhere along the ascent, or perhaps during her half hour alone, with only her Sherpa companion, at the top of Imje Tse, she knew she hadn’t satisfied this new desire, but rather an ember was stoked. I think Erika had as close to a religious experience as you can have in making the spiritual conversion to being a mountaineer. Here is a short video of her climb:
Since returning, she has taken to admire Ed Viesturs and one of my favorite books, Viesturs’ autobiography No Shortcuts to the Top (which he wrote with David Roberts). He is an, “inspiration,” to use Felicity’s word, and I couldn’t agree more. He’s climbed all 14 of the 8,000-meter peaks without the help of supplement oxygen, climbs with the care of a guide, husband and father. His mantra of ‘making it to the top is optional, making it back down is mandatory’ speaks volumes about his approach.
However, as a woman, Erika wondered whether there were any women mountaineers that deserve admiration like Viesturs.
As a new father of a very young lady, this question dealt with an important topic for me too. While I promised Wunderkind’s mother that I won’t push climbing on her, I think that there are several, strong, independent women mountaineers that deserve admiration and respect and that could serve as positive role models. Here are three that leap immediately to my mind:
Arlene Blum — Blum is an American scientist that faced a great deal of discrimination because of her gender in the 1970s, especially when she wanted to participate on the leading Himalayan expeditions — made up of exclusively men with rare exceptions. She responded in dramatic fashion by leading the first all-women team, and the first American ascent of Annapurna in 1978. Her book, Annapurna: A Woman’s Place, has been a key book in the history of woman mountaineers within the English language. She later became a women-expedition specialists and lead a group to Everest.
Wanda Rutkiewicz —Rutkiewicz was a Polish mountaineer and is best known becoming the first woman to climb K2, though the rest of here climbing career is interesting too. She’s been featured in Jennifer Jordan’s book Savage Summit and Bernadette McDonald’s book Freedom Climbers. Her Himalayan summit list (not to mention the Alps and Pamirs) is as impressive as the struggles she and all Polish climbers faced in being Poles and climbers during Soviet occupation.
Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner — This woman stands out possibly the most in terms of persistence, strength, and accomplishment. Kaltenbrunner, an Austrian alpinist, became the first woman to follow Reinhold Messner’s path of climbing the world’s 14 highest peaks without relying on supplemental oxygen. She finished “closing the loop” on all 14 in August 2011. She began her quest in 1998 when she topped out on Cho Oyo. As a side note, had Oh Eun-Sun, a South Korean climber, hadn’t had disputed record for one of her 14 peaks, Kaltenbrunner wouldn’t have been celebrated the same way and we might not have cared as much. But she is a strong, independent, unpretentious, gentle woman, from all reports. What better character for a hero.
Chisarik with Makalu from Imja Tse (2011)
Several other women climbers deserve special attention, in my book. There are only seven — at my last count — American women to have earned the International Federation of Mountain Guides Association certification. It is the highest standard for being a mountain guide. Not all of them are still climbing. In fact some have dedicated them to a life with family. One has started a family and has recently returned to climbing and her daughter is the ultimate, “Crag Baby,” I’ve heard. I won’t say who’s baby… In any case, these are some of the other stars that deserve mention on this short list of great women mountaineers:
Kathy Cosley
Heidi Kloos
Olivia Cussen
Zoe Hart
Julia Niles
Angela Hause
Caroline George
I’m also certain that I have omitted some other notable women climbers. I can also say I enjoy following guide Melissa Arnot, who is currently attempting Everest. She has some good videos through Rainier Mountaineering Inc’s website.
Thanks for dropping by once again, and thanks to Erika for the email! If you enjoyed this post, please consider following the Suburban Mountaineer on Facebook or Twitter, if you haven’t already. Happy reading and carpe climb ‘em!
I would like to know what Conrad Kain would think about the Baer Gryles deodorant commercial. If you haven’t seen the ad, Grylls (a.k.a. the boy that climbed Everest and Born Survivor in the United Kingdom but branded as Man vs. Wild in North America) runs cross country to an American desert rock wall and proceeds to climb it. The style, cinematography and monologue have been reminiscent of the Vertical Limit don’t-forget-the-explosives days. Kain died in 1934, but I know he would have told Grylls and the director, this commercial does represent climbing.
Kain would certainly point us to something less pretentious and more pure. I think he might have directed us here, where a false, or just inaccurate, image is difficult to carry: The image above is of what is possibly the most memorable peak in the Purcell Mountains — which are in Eastern British Colombia, parallel to, but not part of, the Canadian Rockies. This edition of Mountain Drool is about Bugaboo Spire.
The climb is classic alpine in the European sense, complete with nearby huts. It was first climbed by Kain in 1916 shortly after he was invited by the Alpine Club of Canada to come from Austria and climb in their backyard as a guide. He lead many parties up several peaks, but the Kain FA route up Bugaboo Spire’s south ridge is one of his most memorable. The region was called the Bugaboos because miners seeking useful metals only found a dead end. The ACC and Kain’s exploration instead found a new set of climbing opportunities.
While the northeast ridge, shown more prominently in the image, appears to be more popular today, the Kain route (seen partially on the left side of the picture) still offers several quality pitches with a long scrambling section and lots of exposure. All that through only about 1,400 ft./400 m. of ascent. The approach from the Conrad Kain hut has glacial hazards often necessitating roping up and wearing crampons.
Various sources list differing elevations for Bugaboo Spire. The heights listed by climbers on SummitPost.org and Peakbagger.com are conflicting and confusing. Toby Harper of the ACC helped clear it up somewhat. While not everyone’s figures matched up with all the details, some appear to take for granted that Bugaboo Spire does in fact have two peaks. According to The Bugaboo Spires, the definitive guidbook by Chris Atkinson and Marc Piché (2003), the higher south summit is 10,512 ft./3,204 m. SummitPost.org and Wikipedia apparently did their research.
Kain’s work wasn’t limited to Bugaboo Spire, of course. He lead many other routes in Canada and New Zealand. You can check more into his leadership in alpine climbing through this webpage by the Conrad Kain Centennial Society.
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