El Capitan, Dawn Direct. In September I embarked on another solo mission to climb new terrain on El Capitan. I had scoped this line on the southeast face since I climbed Mescalito in 2004, enabling me a good up-close look at the features. The rout...
Kangde Hiunchuli, Patrasi Himal. A three-man expedition of the Tokai University Alpine Club, led by Kazutoshi Nagasawa, established Base Camp at the foot of Kangde Hiunchuli (about 23,000 feet) on September 7. With only two advance camps, Norio Ho...
Peak 29 Attempt. A badly equipped and badly funded British Army expedition led by James Green failed on Peak 29. They reached 19,400 feet on October 23 on the southeast ridge.Michael J. Cheney, Himalayan Club, and Elizabeth Hawley
South Troll, Pure Retro. In June Brian Teale, Kirsten Kremer, and I completed a new route (Pure Retro, V 5.10+) on the obvious west pillar of the South Troll. It is immediately right of a twin crack I soloed in 1988. The approach is easy and obvio...
Thunder Mountain, Tangled Up in Blue; and other new routes. Alaska veterans Jay Smith and Jack Tackle climbed four new routes in May, culminating in the prized first ascent of the 4,000' north face of Thunder Mountain, climbed in lightweight alpin...
Mont Forel Attempt, East Greenland. Our objective was to make a lightweight ski approach, using previously established, air-dropped depots of food and fuel, to Mont Forel. Then we planned to attempt an ascent from the unclimbed north side before c...
M 8 and Attempt on Noshaq. Our expedition was composed of seven Italians, Dr. Silvano Castelnuovo, Luciano Gilardoni, Riccardo Soresini, Bruno De Angeli, Elio Scarabelli, Marco Zappa and me as leader, Captain Mohammad Niwaz of the Pakistani Army, ...
Colombia. Two Swiss climbers, G. Cuenet and Auguste Gans- ser, made the ascent of the Nevado de Huila.
Box Peak, New Route. In July, Misha Michailava, Andrei Molatov, Dmitry Jumakov, Valerie Fedem and Alexandar Chernov ascended a new route (5B) on the west face of Box Peak in the Ak Sai region. At 11 rope lengths, it is not the longest route in the...
Macón, Rumibola and Llanaleria, Ancient and Modern Ascents. The three peaks named belong to the high desert of Salta province. Cerro Macón or Icomân (5490 meters, 18,012 feet) located along the way of the Antofagasta-Salta railroad, was ascended b...
Westfall Group, Southern Battle Range. On August 19 eight members of the Harvard Mountaineering Club, six of them undergraduates, hoisted enormous packs and staggered out of the old mining ghost town of Cambourne, seven miles north of Upper Arrow ...
Sir Hubert Wilkins, by Lowell Thomas. New York: McGraw Hill, 1961. 296 pages, 28 photographs. Price $5.95.This is the story of an extraordinary man, truly sans peur et sans reproche. Our former honorary member was one of the great explorers of mod...
Annapurna IV. A nine-man Czech expedition, led by Wladimir Prochaska, attacked Annapurna IV (24,688 feet). The first attempt failed, but on October 7 Albrecht Milos and the Sherpa Angbabu reached the summit for the fifth ascent.Günter Oskar Dyrenf...
Yalungkang. Our Basque expedition entirely from Azpeitia was composed of Pako Uriarte, José Urbieta, Benantxio Irureta, Pello Aranburu, Francisco Javier Maiz, Iosu Arrieta, Rosa María Segués and me as leader. We climbed Yalung Kang by the normal r...
Northern Apolobamba. In July 2000 over four-weeks, Paul Bielen, Peter Boerstoel, Michael van Geemen, and Peter Valkenburg climbed 17 peaks above 5000m in the northern Apolobamba region, including one probable first ascent and six possible new rout...
Ango. On September 16 the Italian priest Gianni Ventura Libardini claimed with the Austrian nurse Erminia Zopf to have made the first ascent of a snow peak of 5500+ meters (18,045 feet) at the head of the Quebrada Pajush, which rises east of San M...
The Harvard, Mountaineering Club has initiated a careful selection plan for rope leaders in two categories: first-class leaders and second-class leaders. First-class leaders are qualified, in the eyes of the Club officers, to lead and to take full...
Abraham, Three Patriarchs, Southwest Buttress, Zion National Park. Walt Shipley and I met in Springdale, Utah in May for a major big-wall climb in Zion. We chose unclimbed Abraham by a natural overhanging crack system up the center of its southeas...
Various climbs, Cordón de la Jaula. A group has been active in this area of Argentina, west of the Cordón del Plata, near Aconcagua but much more isolated. Access has been by the El Plata-Vallecitos col and Quebrada del Peine, after the Quebrada d...
FALL ON ROCK, INADEQUATE PROTECTION,INEXPERIENCE WITH ASCENDING DEVICE California, Yosemite ValleyOn September 21, 1987, Wolfgang Schrattner (21) fell 50 meters while seconding on mechanical ascenders. Schrattner was on the traverse of the Great R...