During 2016–’17, Patagonia witnessed one of the driest winters on record. By late November, the conditions were not unlike late February, with little snow in the mountains, ablated glaciers, and dry forests. It was so extreme that there were fears...
In July, Horacio Gratton (Argentina) teamed up with Lucas “Jah” Marques and Gustavo Fontes (Brazil) to climb a new route up Tabuleiro, a 400m wall in the state of Minas Gerais. Tabuleiro can be reached from the town of Conceicao do Mato Dentro; fr...
In August, Argentinean climber Horacio Gratton and Brazilian climbers Wagner Borges, William Lacerda, Valdesir Machado, and Ed Padilha opened a long and difficult new route on Pedra Baiana. (Gabriel Tarso and Edson Vandeira were also present to do...
A large Argentinean expedition was active on the Antofalla massif, a mountainous high desert north of Catamarca, from January 9–20, 2017. The group consisted of Julieta Balza, Gerardo Casaldi, Sergio Cerutti, Javier Echenique, Adrián Gandino, Mart...
Cordón los Clonquis is the official name for a chain of sedimentary mountains outside Mendoza. It contains five principal summits that separate Quebrada de Chorrillos to the south from Quebrada del Potrero Escondido to the north. One of the peaks,...
In late April, Argentine climbers Matías Cruz and Facundo Juárez Zapiola visited Morro Von Rosen (5,450m), a peak of compact granite in the Chañi Group, located in far northern Argentina. They made their base camp at a hut on the slopes of Nevado ...
In the summer of 2014 I had the privilege of joining Blake Herrington and Max Tepfer to establish a new line on the mysterious M&M Wall (a.k.a. Supercave Wall). This impressive, 1,000’ south-facing wall is two miles north of the famous Liberty...
In September, Mark Smiley and I decided to make a foray into the “West Sichuan Highlands,” as Tom Nakamura describes the ranges on the eastern Tibetan frontier. Our plan was to travel overland to Ganzi, survey the area, and act opportunistically w...
Rising to 4,509m above the rainforests of Papua New Guinea, Mt. Wilhelm is the highest in the country. Due to its glaciated past, Mt. Wilhelm comes with scenic lakes and several steep rock faces—the latter not covered in the dense rainforest that ...
The Pic de l’Aurore, in Percé, Québec, is a seaside wall at the tip of the Gaspé Peninsula, known for its long ice climbs. It’s a five-hour drive from my home in Rimouski, but traveling here is always worth it for the awe and respect this wall com...
In a fruitful trip of less than three weeks, our Catalan team of Oriol Baró, Roger Cararach, and I did two climbs above the Dudh Kund Glacier. After flying to Lukla in mid-October, we approached up the Sor Khola and established base camp at Dudh K...
With the help of a friend who had visited the Rolwaling two years earlier, Nik Mirhashemi and I contacted Mingma Gyalje of Dreamers Destination. Mingma grew up in the Rolwaling and has become one of the most accomplished and bold Nepali mountainee...
Following a visit to a little-explored glacier basin in the east-southeast corner of Renland by Michel Raab (AAJ 2013), Geoff Hornby organized an exploratory expedition here that took place from July 18 to August 19. There was only one day of ligh...
It took a while for Nicolas Favresse, Siebe Vanhee, and I to get used to walking on horizontal ground again, after 19 days on the east face of the Central Tower of Paine. It was a powerful experience, with lots of bad weather and harsh climbing co...
In early July, I spent a week in the remote Cordillera Carabaya (see linked report). Our objective was the highest in the range, Nevado Allinccapac (5,780m, sometimes spelled Allincapac), which has had only a handful of ascents. However, after se...
In 2009, Bruce Kay, Jimmy Martinello, and Jay Sinnes put up School of Rock (1,900m, VI 5.11 A2), a 50-pitch route up the complete west buttress of Mt. Bute. In July 2015, after a three-day approach from Homathko Camp, near the north tip of Bute In...
In mid-September, Eric Wehrly and I snagged a new and aesthetic line within a day’s “walk” from the road in the North Cascades. It was my first rock FA in the range and a chance to learn from Eric, who has many first ascents to his name.We parked ...
In late August, Andrew Andraski and I hiked into the Wind River Range on a blind date of sorts. With time off between working courses at Outward Bound, we decided to go on an alpine granite adventure, despite never having tied into a rope together...
From July 19–24, the Siberian team of Oleg Khvostenko, Alexander Parfenov, and Vasiliy Terekhin climbed a new route up the center of the east-southeast wall of Kyzyl Asker (5,842m). In 2010, Khvostenko had planned a visit to Kyzyl Asker with Denis...
From April 29 to May 1, my wife, Teresa Au, and I climbed a new route on the northeast face of Mt. Barrill (7,650’, a.k,a. Barrille or Barrill, see note below). This was our first trip to Alaska, and we flew to the Mountain House airstrip in mid-A...