IT HAD ALL gone wrong. I sat drinking beer in the Edinburgh evening sun, grumpy and frustrated about my flight to Canada the next day. I’d planned a dream trip to see my best friend and old climbing partner in Vancouver, and then, three weeks befo...
The Cordillera de la Viuda is a subrange of the Cordillera Central (see Alpine Journal 2000 for more details about the area). With many 5,000m peaks and moderate climbing, it is an interesting place for exploration and climbing. The highest summit...
From February 8–26, 2018, Rodrigo Lobo Villarroel (Bolivia) and I completed a trip to the Avellano Towers. We approached from Chile Chico up the Avellano Valley—this is the southeast approach, which is the more expensive but “inspiring” option. St...
In August, Argentines Griselda Moreno (leader), Ramiro García, Paula Miranda, and Lelo Saldaña made the first traverse of all the summits of Nevados de Famatina. This traverse was attempted unsuccessfully five times in the 1990s, and it was partic...
In January 2018, our three-woman team from the U.K., comprised of Michelle O’Loughlin, Freja Shannon, and me set off to explore the long and wild Avellano Valley, where the snaking Rio Avellano eventually meets its source: the striking Avellano To...
In October 2018, Chilean mountaineers Harry Brito, Camilo Hornauer, and I made the first ascents of Cerro Dalla Vedova (2,271m) and Cerro Stoppani (2,275m) in the eastern section of the Cordillera de Darwin. Cerro Dalla Vedova is located at the he...
THIS WAS THE THIRD season in a row with fairly poor weather and conditions. After having anomalously dry seasons in 2012, 2015, and 2016, it has come as a bit of a shock to go back to average Patagonia weather. The only extended windows of good we...
In February, Itai Cohen, Elaine Kennedy, and I made an ascent of the west ridge of Cerro Aguda (2,641m; 46°48'51.74"S, 73°09'36.18"W; also called Cerro Agudo or Aguja Aguda) on the eastern margin of the North Patagonian Icefield. The peak had been...
From September 25 to October 13, the French national women’s mountaineering team (ENAF), comprised of Florence Igier, Johanna Marcoz, Marion Pravin, and Maud Vanpoulle, along with two coaches, Gaël Bouquet des Chaux and Antoine Pêcher, completed a...
In December 2017, Australian climbers Colin Barton, Callum Hawkins, Paul Plank, Geoff Robb, Annette Skirka, Raymond Alfred Smith, Neil Thomas, and mountain guides Sören Kruse, Carlos Vasquez, and Steffen Welsch made the second known ascent of Cerr...
In the winter of 2006, during a plane flight to San Rafael Lagoon to begin the first north-south winter crossing of the Northern Patagonian Icefield, I saw through the window a huge mass of ice surrounded by impenetrable forests and a glacier that...
After four years of working in the Exploradores Valley, west of Puerto Río Tranquilo (toward the west end of Lago General Carerra), and always looking at these incredible and barely explored mountains, it seemed time to invest some effort to climb...
Paolo Marazzi and I set off from Italy on December 24, 2018. Once at Puerto Bertrand, we waited in vain for a gaucho to help transport our gear up the Rio Soler valley. In order not to waste the first window of good weather, we crossed Lake Bertra...
On October 13, Diego Saez Beros, Adam Fabrikant, and I made a ski descent of the south face of Cerro Punta Yamakawa (4,967m). This was the first leg of our annual, autumn pilgrimage to the Central AndesWe began our trip on October 10, leaving Sant...
In July, Colombian climbers Rafa Avila, Diego Cortés, Jhoany Poveda, Luis Ossa, Victor Ortega, and Alex Torres organized an expedition to the Cordillera Huayhaush. They started their trip on July 21. After installing a base camp under Puscanturpa ...
In January 2019, on his fifth expedition to Queen Maud Land, veteran polar guide Christoph Höbenreich from Austria led Michael Guggolz (Germany) and Kjetil Kristensen (Norway) to the Holtedahl Peaks. They circumnavigated the range on skis and clim...
An Australian team—Dave Goldie, Andrew Lock, Liam Silk, and Pat Spiers—visited Anvers Island in February 2019 and made what was probably the first traverse of Mt. Français (2,822m), ascending the Zeus (northwest) Ridge to the summit before descend...
MARCH 2018 Our skis etch crisp lines in a crystalline mat of snow, broken only where we’d stopped to gawk at the deep icy couloirs and jagged buttresses of A Peak’s north face, towering 4,000 feet above. From our camp on the north shore of Gran...
El Capitan continued to produce firsts and speed records in 2018, and a handful of significant new aid and free lines went up throughout the Valley.In addition to the sub-two-hour run up the Nose by Tommy Caldwell and Alex Honnold in June, several...
ON JUNE 6, ALEX HONNOLD AND I managed to climb the Nose in 1:58:07 after 11 previous attempts. We had toyed with the idea of attempting a speed record the previous fall, but we only climbed the route together once, which was enough to whet our app...