In July 2022, Marcelo Delvaux (Brazil) made an unsupported, nine-day counterclockwise traverse in the central Cordillera Vilcanota, possibly making the first ascent of a 5,780m summit (13°44'5"S, 71°4'3"W), southeast of Chumpe (6,106m; 13°43'32"S,...
In late June, Tim Sonnenberg, Trey Worley, and I climbed a possible new variation to the northwest ridge of Campa I (5,500m, 13°46'27"S, 71°10'55"W), which is sometimes called Vía Engañada (“Route of Deception”) for the many false summits it cro...
On July 26, Luke Bird and Pete Takeda completed the first ascent of the west face and ridge of Nevado Tinki (a.k.a. Tinke, 5,450m, 13°45'7"S, 71°11'14"W) to its summit. We arrived in the area on July 13, first acclimatizing by bolting some new sp...
Lasunayoc (5,936m, 13°16'6"S, 72°47'45"W) anchors the southeastern end of the Pumasillo group in the Cordillera Vilcabamba. Its normal route on the eastern glacial ramp and upper east face (including minor variations) has been repeated a handful o...
The southwest face of Pumahuacanca (5,563m, 9°35’9”S, 77°19’51”W) is a mostly rocky wall on the east side of Quebrada Rurec, about 4km southeast of Cashan. It likely has seen a handful of ascents on its most accessible slope and first ascent route...
The Cashan massif is located in the Rajucolta Valley, which hosts several peaks over 5,600m. On previous trips to climb the north face of Cashan Oeste (AAJ 2020) and the south face of Huamashraju Este (AAJ 2022), we noticed the elegant north face ...
Approaching the south face of Ango Raju. The Ice Maiden (400m, 6a R), climbed in 2022, is marked. In 1981, Rob Blatherwick and Dr. Johan Reinhard climbed much of the south face, following a route up the cleft to the right. At the time, a small g...
Two of the closest valleys to Huaraz for rock climbing in the Cordillera Blanca are the Quebrada Llaca and Quebrada Cojup, both about one hour northeast of the city. At the entrance to the Quebrada Llaca is the Portada. This massive granite wall ...
(A) Urus Oeste III, a 5,270m satellite spire due west of Urus Oeste. The 2022 route Emmoa (640m climbing distance, M6 75°) followed the obvious snowy weakness. (B) Urus Oeste (5,450m); the 2022 route Hanan Pacha (425m climbing distance, 90°) asc...
In early July 2022, Juan Benevides and Ignacio Vasquez Palominos climbed the first recorded route up the north face of Shaqsha (5,703m) in the southern Cordillera Blanca. Shaqsha is typically climbed via the broken glacier on the southwest side, l...
Sacred Mountains of the World (Cambridge University Press), by Ed Bernbaum, is thoroughly updated from the first edition (1991), expanding the original and freshly considering the impacts of climate change and cultural preservation. Everest 2022: ...
THE ART OF SHRALPINISM: LESSONS FROM THE MOUNTAINS. By Jeremy Jones (Mountaineers Books, 2022). Paperback, 288 pages, $29.95. The Art of Shralpinism is about doing what you love in the mountains, doing it as safely as possible, and how to continu...
A LINE ABOVE THE SKY: A STORY OF MOUNTAINS AND MOTHERHOOD. By Helen Mort (Ebury Press, 2022). Hardcover, 278 pages, $20.74. Beyond the crisp lines of streets and rivers, beyond the typed names and elevation points of cities and mountains, beyond ...
HIGH RISK: CLIMBING TO EXTINCTION. By Brian Hall (Sandstone Press, 2022). Hardcover, 432 pages, £24.99. From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s, mountaineering in the Greater Ranges changed dramatically. Large, cumbersome, and expensive expeditions w...
NATIVE AIR. By Jonathan Howland (Green Writers Press, 2022). Hardcover, 380 pages, $24.95. Historically, climbing fiction has been an under-developed genre. At least compared with our nonfiction canon. Aside from a few luminaries—James Salter, Da...
UNRAVELED: A CLIMBER’S JOURNEY THROUGH DARKNESS AND BACK. By Katie Brown (Mountaineers Books, 2022). Paperback, 256 pages, $19.95. Once named by Climbing magazine as the “Best Female Climber of the Millennium,” Katie Brown began climbing at the a...
ALL AND NOTHING: INSIDE FREE SOLOING. By Jeff Smoot (Mountaineers Books, 2022). Paperback, 320 pages, $22.95. One of the curiosities of climbing is that for such a literary sport, there hasn’t been a close study of the practice of free soloing. T...
VALLEY OF GIANTS: STORIES FROM WOMEN AT THE HEART OF YOSEMITE CLIMBING. By Lauren DeLaunay Miller (Mountaineers, 2022). Paperback, 240 pages, $21.95. It’s the Center of the Universe, the granite nucleus, the measuring stick by which generations o...
HIDDEN MOUNTAINS: SURVIVAL AND RECKONING AFTER A CLIMB GONE WRONG. By Michael Wejchert (HarperCollins, 2023). Hardcover, 243 pages, $28.99. When we climb mountains, at a certain point we quiet the monsters in our minds and go forth. This basic ye...
At 8:02 a.m. on August 9, NPS climbing rangers received a call from a climber whose partner had fallen off the north side of the ridge just west of Peak 11,840’. This peak sits between Teewinot and Mt. Owen along the Cathedral Traverse. The report...