On the morning of July 17, Joshua Lavigne, Ines Papert, and I got off the plane in Pangnirtung. Three hours later we were cruising past icebergs in the fjord, propelled by our outfitter’s fishing boat. After three days of rugged trekking, frigi...
A couple of moves, no more than one or two meters. That’s not far. Not nearly as far as the 10,000km we have covered to get here and finally decode the moves needed to make it a full free climb. Ten-thousand kilometers for a couple of meters—i...
Big-wall climbing on Baffin Island was a personal dream for many, many years—a dream that was always in my mind but simultaneously far from becoming reality. In June 2012, Riky Felderer, Ben Lepesant, Matteo Mocellin, William Peterson...
Europe The following climbs appeared on the “Super Big List” of 2012 ascents prepared for the 2013 Piolets d’Or jury. This list was compiled by Claude Gardien (Vertical magazine), Manu Rivaud (Montagnes magazine), and Lindsay Griffin (Ame...
In early June 2012, Sam Thompson (U.K.), Sara Arbos Torrent (Catalan), Arnaud Sors (France), and I traveled to a remote and relatively unexplored part of the St. Elias Mountains. We spent 31 days on the Jefferies and Fraser glaciers, which are ...
In April, Matt Barela, Mike Pond, and I climbed Kuriositeten (800m, AI5 M3+) on the east face of Peak 747, between Mt. Bradley and Mt. Dickey, which we believe is the third ascent [AAJ 2009]. On our descent we found a striking blue ice line that...
The French Federation of Alpine Clubs (FFCAM) initiated this expedition as part of a dedicated training program to help young climbers in their 20s reach a high level of excellence in alpinism. This expedition to Alaska was the conclusion ...
During late March and early April, Ben Trocki and I established two climbs at the head of the Revelation Glacier—the first ascent of Golgotha and a new route on the Angel, making the second ascent to that peak’s summit. From base camp, Gol...
In April our team of Bor Sumrada, Bostjan Virc, Dusan Huc, Grega Azman, Janez Rutar, Matej Pobezin, Urban Iglic, Valentina Mravlje, Ziga Fujan, and myself had an active vacation in a little-visited part of the Revelation Mountains, where—...
On April 22, Jason Buttrick, Jay Claus, Paul Claus, Ruedi Homberger, and I climbed and skied Mt. Steller (10,515’). This was the peak’s second ascent after first being climbed over a 10-day period in 1992 [Jacobs-Anderson-Bowling-Wesson, AAJ ...
In late May, I made the first solo ascent to the top of the Mount Hunter’s north buttress in 15 hours from the bergschrund, but failed to reach the summit. I began climbing on the bottom right margin of the north buttress, climbing diagonally l...
Sometime during the spring of 2012, Jess Roskelley tracked me down through mutual friends and asked what resources I used for spotting weather windows for climbing in Alaska. Considering Jess had just spent weeks on the Kahiltna earlier that spr...
Choi Suk-mun, Moon Sung-wook,and I reached the top of Mt. Hunter on May 21 by a variation of Deprivation, the Sympathy Variant (VI AI6 R A2+). Our original plan was to climb a completely independent route just left of Deprivation, but we wer...
For me, the story of Mt. Dickey started in 2009, when Doug Shepherd took a chance and agreed to a Ruth Gorge trip with a complete stranger: me. I first met Doug in the Seattle Airport, en route to Anchorage; he was easy to spot standing in line ...
Silas Rossi and I established two new climbs on Mt. Bradley (9,104’). The first, completed on April 17, was a 49-hour camp-to-camp effort that resulted in the Sum of Its Parts (4,000’, Alaska Grade V AI6 M7 A2). The route climbs Bradley’s so...
In October, during a rare high-pressure system, Gabe Hayden and I managed an interesting new line in the Mendenhall Towers, outside Juneau. In an attempt to further promote the “hike in, hike out” approach ethic, we opted to hike from Montan...
It started on a sun-soaked crag near home, when Twid Turner asked, “Dave, do you fancy getting strapped onto a new route in Alaska in a few weeks? My partner has just dropped out. I have some funding, loads of kit already there, and the new ...
In January 2012, the Spanish team of Marco Jubes, Edu Marin, and Toti Vales established two long, difficult free climbs in Ethiopia’s mountains. The first, Arenas Movedizas (350m, 7b+/c), ascends a wall above the village of Hawzen in the Tigray...
Inspired by previous trips to Ethiopia by climbers such as Pat Littlejohn and Majka Burhardt, Dan Rothberg and I spent two weeks in the country’s northern Tigray region in search of serious rock adventures. We first visited the Gheralta ...
The Equipe Nationale d’Alpinisme Masculine is a group of young climbers selected by the FFME to learn the skills of high-level alpinism over a three-year period, culminating in an expediton project. Our team of Philippe Batoux, Thomas Vialletet,...