The Shamsi Tuyuk area lies approximately five main valleys, and 50km east, of the well-developed Ala Archa Range. Before the visit of a British expedition in July-August there were no recorded climbs. In the course of 14 days the team ascended s...
The Corean Alpine Club sponsored a four-man team to climb the northeast face of Teke-Tor in the Aksai Range. Ahn Chi- young, Kim Kyoung-rae, and Lee Ki-geun completed their new route, Korean Light Way, on July 9. The first seven pitch...
In August the Russian and Latvian team of Mikhail Babich, Vladimir Lavrinenko, Andrei Lebedev (leader), Yuri Maksimovich, Valdis Purins, Oleg Silin, and Ivan Zhdanov completed 36 days of trekking and climbing along the Zaalaisky Range, of wh...
During three weeks in August, Anna Backlund and I visited the Ak-su area. Our main goal was the 800m Perestroika Crack. As a warm-up we climbed an offwidth route on Petit Tour Russe: sevenpitches at 7a. Next we climbed a new line on the lowe...
After a long and eventful hike to base camp in August and a week of recovering from illness, Madaleine Sorkin and I set off for a warm-up on Perestroika Crack that ended in us coming down after the crux due to bad weather. A few days later w...
Ben Mitchell, Cecelia Mortenson, Danny Uhlmann, and I traveled to the Big Pamir in May to explore the potential for ski mountaineering and alpinism, and make first ski descents of unclimbed or rarely climbed peaks. We chose the Koh-e-Wakhan ...
In July our international team of five climbers started from Dushanbe (Tajikistan) on a nine-day approach to unexplored valleys in the eastern end of the Wakhan Corridor, southeast of Lake Chaqmaqtin. The team comprised Sarah Sheridan (A...
Alexandre Darrioulat, Franck Mazas, and Arnaud Pasquer (France) visited the Wakhan in July and August. Their original goal was an ascent of Noshaq, but due to the unrest in Tajikistan, the authorities at Ishkashim would not allow them to e...
In August and September 2012, Tom Codrington, Ian Cooper, and I, from the Oxford University Mountaineering Club, took on the big walls of the Karavshin. After patching our way across the country, mollifying men with guns and sharing vodka with...
In mid-July I traveled to the Karavshin region with Peter Fasoldt. Our goal was the first alpine-style enchainment of the three major peaks dividing the Ak-su and Kara-su river valleys: Peak 4,810m, Peak 1,000 Years of Russian Christia...
On January 23 the highest unclimbed mountain in Antarctica, Mt. Elizabeth (4,480m) in the Queen Alexandra Range, was the scene of a fatal air crash. The Twin Otter, owned by Kenn Borek Air of Canada and carrying three Canadian crew, crashed int...
The experienced British and ALE Guide David Hamilton led Paul Nicholson and Russians Vyacheslav Adrov, Olga Rumyantseva, and Vitaly Simanovich to the summit of Mt. Sidley in January, making the sixth known ascent of Antarctica’s highest volcano.
In the northeastern section of Livingston Island, a Chilean team of Gabriel Becker, Nicolas Danyau, and Gonzalo Lllul, traveling aboard the Ocean Nova, made the first known ascent of Sharp Peak via its east face. The team reached the summit in 1...
Hannah Baker, Derek Buckle, Jamie Goodhart, Mike Pinney, and I (all U.K.), Stefan Jachmich (Germany), and Bjorn Riis-Johannessen (Norway) traveled on the Spirit of Sydney to an unclimbed range north of Beaschochea Bay. Favorable ice conditio...
Three expeditions all targeted the same area of unclimbed mountains on the peninsula this season. Just south of the Waddington Bay–Argentine Islands region, Beascochea Bay is surrounded by peaks on three sides, those on the northern side being ...
If there was one thing that defined and controlled this trip—like a psychotic maestro conducting a death-metal- rock-and-roll orchestra—it was the unrelenting wind: fierce, biting, destroying, hypothermic- hammering, schedule-delaying, kat...
On January 20, 2013, Leo Houlding, Alastair Lee, Jason Pickles, Chris Rabone (all U.K.) and Sean Leary (USA) completed the first ascent of the huge northeast ridge of Ulvetanna, and fifth ascent of the mountain. The nature of the ridge, the ant...
Mt. Vinson (4,892m) continues to attract large numbers. One hundred and seventy individual climbers reached the summit during the 2012-13 season (a total of 184 successful ascents). Fourteen guides made two or more ascents. Only four clients...
Few climbing expeditions visited the Wakhan Corridor during the summer, and all were affected by hostilities. Surprisingly, the hostilities in question were not those in Afghanistan, but in Tajikistan, through which most climbers must enter and...
With Mary-Rose Fowlie (who hadn’t climbed for 20 years) and my brother Bill (who’d never climbed) both coming along as base camp support, two of us planned to visit the upper Qala Panja Glacier and attempt Rohazon Zom (6,535m) from the north...