Over the summer, Jake Whittaker and I put up a new free route approximately 100 yards left of the Widow’s Tears amphitheater. We called the climb the Lurch (7 pitches, 5.12c/d), after one of the last moves on the route—by far the crux.The Lurch fo...
Myles Moser and I began climbing a new route on Bastille Buttress in October. Located on the south side of Lone Pine Peak, the Bastille is a whale of granite soaring about 2,000’ and with only two established routes: the Beckey Route (Beckey-Brown...
As full-time desk jockeys, Daniel Jeffcoach and I did not have an extra day for an approach that gains 4,000’ over seven miles. We did not want to carry much water either. We thought our new route on the Sphinx (9,146’) would go quickly and be no ...
My infatuation with the Juggernaut began years ago. Dave Nettle and I were high on the Incredible Hulk, waiting out a summer thundershower. As the rain eased and the clouds lifted, I noticed the profile of the Juggernaut to the west. I later asked...
On August 10, Greg Horvath and I established a new route on the east pillar of Mt. Barnard (13,680’), which is ca 3 miles north of the Mt. Whitney massif. I first eyed the route a year earlier during an ascent of the east pillar on which Mike Maid...
Over a weekend in mid-June, Caitlin Taylor and I established a new route and first free ascent on the remote Flatiron Butte (ca 11,600’), a seldom-visited wall somewhat lost to history. In recent years the area has come to be known as Shangri La. ...
In local Paiute legend, a young boy named Hai’nanu disrespected Tuvaimawiye’e (what we now call Convict Lake) and challenged its power. The lake swelled up and chased Hai’nanu high into the mountains. After climbing to the top of the highest peaks...
On September 9, Scott Sinner and I hiked 12 miles from Whitney Portal to the base of Mt. Chamberlain. Going from sea level to over 13,000’ with a 60lb pack knocked me down a peg, and I slept for 14 hours. We camped on the eastern shore of the uppe...
Jake Dayley and I made the first ascent of a spire in Mormon Canyon, on the north side of the drainage, directly across from Earth Angel. The route follows a crack system on the west face before traversing to the southwest aspect of the summit blo...
I had always felt a fascination for northwest Yunnan, the region at the eastern end of the Himalaya where three great rivers flow close by and parallel to each other. The American climber Mike Dobie, who lives in China, suggested I check out...
From May 2–7, Alik Berg (Canada) and I established a new route on the east face of the Mooses Tooth (10,335’). Our route starts on the ramps of Arctic Rage (Gilmore-Mahoney, AAJ 2005) and then takes a steep and direct line up the massive upper hea...
At the end of January 2014 we realized our aim of making a new route and the first winter ascent of the north face of Chanchakhi (4,462m). Our team included four Ukrainian climbers: Mikhaylo Mironchak, Volodymyr Roshko, Dmytro Venslavovsky, and me...
"Open up, I’m coming in!” I squeeze under the rain fly of the portaledge next to Nik Berry and Mason Earle. The rain is turning to sleet and the thunder’s getting closer. The three of us are hunkered down, 800 feet up the north face of Mt. Hooker ...
“Right now your grief is this giant gaping hole with sharp edges, but as you move forward in life the edges soften and other beautiful things start to grow around it…flowers and trees of experiences. The hole never goes away, but it becomes gentle...
Ryan: “A Wild Ride to the Summit of Mount Johnson” reads the American Alpine Journal. Beneath the headline, a meaty account of Jack Tackle and Doug Chabot’s first ascent of the Elevator Shaft in 1995.I’m fresh off my first real alpine climb, Halle...
In May, Jonas Haag and I made the first ascent of Lurking Tower over 13 days by the route New Dog, Old Tricks (3,000’, VI 5.11 C3+). This was my sixth trip to Baffin Island and my partner’s first big wall—ever.I first went to Baffin 17 years ago....
Sens Unique (200m, 5.10+, Bérubé-Frick, 1974 ) is a particularly remote route that follows an imposing rock pillar up Acropole des Draveurs. The route is in the Charlevoix region and is well known as an ice-climbing destination because of the mega...
Over three days in August, Jon Simms and I established a new route on the northeast face of Mt. Stephen (10,495’) in Yoho National Park. Our goal was the massive, unclimbed, and eye-catching wall known locally as the “Great Wall of China” or “Apoc...
This past winter a few friends and I did something unusual. Rather than further support the petro-state of Alberta by driving the six-hour round-trip to the Ice Fields Parkway or four hours of off-roading into the Ghost, we approached the mountain...
In mid-November I had some great adventures completing a couple of big, new mixed routes with strong partners on the lower northeast face of Capricorn Peak. This mountain is just north of and behind Mt. Patterson along the Icefields Parkway. The r...