Powered by the AAC’s Catalyst grant, Jessica Anaruk and Micah Tedeschi took on to the big walls of the Mendenhall Towers, seven granite towers that rise high above the surrounding Mendenhall Glacier in southeast Alaska.
Found in Translation
Your Guide to Climbing at The New River Gorge
Life: An Objective Hazard
Zach Clanton’s Climbing Grief Fund Story
by Hannah Provost
Photos by AAC member Zach Clanton
Originally published in Guidebook XIII
I.
Zach Clanton was the photographer, so he was the last one to drop into the couloir. Sitting on the cornice as he strapped his board on, his camera tucked away now, his partners far below him and safe out of the avalanche track, he took a moment and looked at the skyline. He soaked in the jagged peaks, the snow and rock, the blue of the sky. And he said hello to his dead friends.
In the thin mountain air, as he was about to revel in the breathlessness of fast turns and the thrill of skating on a knife’s edge of danger, they were close by—the ones he’d lost to avalanches. Dave and Alecs. Liz and Brook. The people he had turned to for girlfriend advice, for sharing climbing and splitboarding joy. The people who had witnessed his successes and failures. Too many to name. Lost to the great allure, yet ever-present danger, of the big mountains.
Zach had always been the more conservative one in his friend group and among his big mountain splitboard partners. Still, year after year, he played the tricky game of pushing his snowboarding to epic places.
Zach is part of a disappearing breed of true dirtbags. Since 2012, he has lived inside for a total of ten months, otherwise based out of his Honda Element and later a truck camper, migrating from Alaska to Mexico as the seasons dictated. When he turned 30, something snapped. Maybe he lost his patience with the weather-waiting in Alaska. Maybe he just got burnt out on snowboarding after spending his entire life dedicated to the craft. Maybe he was fried from the danger of navigating avalanche terrain so often. Regardless, he decided to take a step back from splitboarding and fully dedicate his time to climbing, something that felt more controllable, less volatile. With rock climbing, he believed he would be able to get overhead snow and ice hazards out of his life. He was done playing that game.
Even as Zach disentangled his life and career from risky descents, avalanches still haunted him. Things hit a boiling point in 2021, when Zach lost four friends in one season, two of whom were like brothers. As can be the case with severe trauma, the stress of his grief showed up in his body—manifesting as alopecia barbae. He knew grief counseling could help, but it all felt too removed from his life. Who would understand his dirtbag lifestyle? Who would understand how he was compelled to live out of his car, and disappear into the wilderness whenever possible?
He grappled with his grief for years, unsure how to move forward. When, by chance, he listened to the Enormocast episode featuring Lincoln Stoller, a grief therapist who’s part of the AAC’s Climbing Grief Fund network and an adventurer in his own right—someone who had climbed with Fred Beckey and Galen Rowell, some of Zach’s climbing idols—a door seemed to crack open, a door leading toward resiliency, and letting go. He applied to the Climbing Grief Grant, and in 2024 he was able to start seeing Lincoln for grief counseling. He would start to see all of his close calls, memories, and losses in a new light.
Photo by AAC member Zach Clanton
II.
With his big mountain snowboarding days behind him, Zach turned to developing new routes for creativity and the indescribable pleasure of moving across rock that no one had climbed before. With a blank canvas, he felt like he was significantly mitigating and controlling any danger. There was limited objective hazard on the 1,500-foot limestone wall of La Gloria, a gorgeous pillar west of El Salto, Mexico, where he had created a multi-pitch classic called Rezando with his friend Dave in early 2020. Dave and Zach had become brothers in the process of creating Rezando, having both been snowboarders who were taking the winter off to rock climb. On La Gloria, it felt like the biggest trouble you could get into was fighting off the coatimundi, the dexterous ringtail racoon-like creatures that would steal their gear and snacks.
After free climbing all but two pitches of Rezando in February of 2020, when high winds and frigid temperatures drove them off the mountain, Zach was obsessed with the idea of going back and doing the first free ascent. He had more to give, and he wasn’t going to loosen his vise grip on that mountain. Besides, there was much more potential for future lines.
Dave Henkel on the bivy ledge atop pitch eight during the first ascent of Rezando. PC: Zach Clanton
But Dave decided to stay in Whistler that next winter, and died in an avalanche as Zach was in the process of bolting what would become the route Guerreras. After hearing the news, Zach alternated between being paralyzed by grief and manically bolting the route alone.
In a world where his friends seemed to be dropping like flies around him, at least he could control this.
Until the fire.
It was the end of the season, and his friend Tony had come to La Gloria to give seven-hour belays while Zach finished bolting the pitches of Guerreras ground-up. Just as they touched down after three bivvies and a successful summit, Tony spotted a wildfire roaring in their direction. Zach, his mind untrained on how fast forest fires can move, was inclined to shrug it off as less of an emergency than it really was. Wildfire wasn’t on the list of dangers he’d considered. But the fire was moving fast, ripping toward them, and it was the look on Tony’s face that convinced Zach to run for it.
In retrospect, Zach would likely not have made it off that mountain if it weren’t for Tony. He estimates they had 20 minutes to spare, and would have died of smoke inhalation if they had stayed any longer. When they returned the next winter, thousands of dollars of abandoned gear had disintegrated. The fire had singed Zach’s hopes of redemption—of honoring Dave with this route and busying his mind with a first ascent—to ash. It would only be years later, and through a lot of internal work, that Zach would learn that his vise grip on La Gloria was holding him back. He would open up the first ascent opportunity to others, and start to think of it as a gift only he could give, rather than a loss.
But in the moment, in 2021, this disaster was a crushing defeat among many. With the wildfire, the randomness of death and life started to settle in for Zach. There was only so much he could control. Life itself felt like an objective hazard.
III.
In January 2022, amid getting the burnt trash off the mountain and continuing his free attempts on Guerreras, Zach took a job as part of the film crew for the National Geographic show First Alaskans—a distraction from the depths of his grief. Already obsessed with all things Alaskan, he found that there was something unique and special about documenting Indigenous people in Alaska as they passed on traditional knowledge to the next generation. But on a shoot in Allakaket, a village in the southern Brooks Range, his plan for distraction disintegrated.
In the Athabascan tradition, trapping your first wolverine as a teenager is a rite of passage. Zach and the camera crew followed an Indigenous man and his two sons who had trapped a wolverine and were preparing to kill and process the animal. In all of his time spent splitboarding and climbing in these massive glaciated mountains that he loved so much, Zach had seen his fair share of wolverines— often the only wildlife to be found in these barren, icy landscapes. As he peered through the camera lens, he was reminded of the time he had wound through the Ruth Gorge, following wolverine tracks to avoid crevasses, or that time on a mountain pass, suddenly being charged by a wolverine galloping toward him. His own special relationship with these awkward, big-pawed creatures flooded into his mind. What am I doing here, documenting this? Was it even right to allow such beautiful, free creatures to be hunted in this way? he wondered.
The wolverine was stuck in a trap, clinging to a little tree. Every branch that the wolverine could reach she had gnawed away, and there were bite marks on the limbs of the wolverine where she’d attempted to chew her own arm off. Now, that chaos and desperation were in the past. The wolverine was just sitting, calm as can be, looking into the eyes of the humans around her. It felt like the wolverine was peering into Zach’s soul. He could sense that the wolverine knew she would die soon, that she had come to accept it. It was something about the hollowness of her stare.
He couldn’t help but think that the wolverine was just like all his friends who had died in the mountains, that there had to have been a moment when they realized they were going to be dead—a moment of pure loneliness in which they stared death in the face. It was the loneliest and most devastating way to go, and as the wolverine clung to the tree with its battered, huge, human-like paws, he saw the faces of his friends.
When would be the unmarked day on the calendar for me? He was overwhelmed by the question. What came next was a turning point.
With reverence and ceremony, the father led his sons through skinning the wolverine, and then the process of giving the wolverine back to the wild. They built a pyre, cutting the joints of the animal, and burning it, letting the smoke take the animal’s spirit back to where it came from, where the wolverine would tell the other animals that she had been treated right in her death. This would lead to a moose showing itself next week, the father told his sons, and other future food and resources for the tribe.
As Zach watched the smoke meander into the sky through the camera lens, the cycle of loss and life started to feel like it made a little more sense.
IV.
After a few sessions with Lincoln Stoller in the summer of 2024, funded by the Climbing Grief Fund Grant, Zach Clanton wasn’t just invested in processing and healing his grief—he was invested in the idea of building his own resiliency, of letting go in order to move forward.
On his next big expedition, he found that he had an extra tool in his toolbox that made all the difference.
They had found their objective by combing through information about old Fred Beckey ascents. A bush plane reconnaissance mission into the least mapped areas of southeast Alaska confirmed that this peak, near what they would call Rodeo Glacier, had epic potential. Over the years, with changing temperatures and conditions, what was once gnarly icefalls had turned into a clean granite face taller than El Cap, with a pyramid peak the size of La Gloria on top. A couple of years back, they had received an AAC Cutting Edge Grant to pursue this objective, but a last-minute injury had foiled their plans. This unnamed peak continued to lurk in the back of Zach’s mind, and he was finally ready to put some work in.
As Zach and James started off up this ocean of granite, everything was moving 100 miles per hour. Sleep deprived and totally strung out, they dashed through pitch after pitch, but soon, higher on the mountain, Zach started feeling a crushing weight in his chest, a welling of rage that was taking over his body and making it impossible to climb. He was following James to the next belay, and scaring the shit out of himself, unable to calm his body enough to pull over a lip. This was well within his abilities. What was happening? How come he couldn’t trust his body when he needed it most?
At the belay, Zach broke down. He was suddenly feeling terrified and helpless in this ocean of granite, with the unknown hovering above him. They had stood on the shore, determined to go as far into the unknown sea of rock as they could, while still coming back. When would be the breaking point? Could they trust themselves not to go too far?
Hesitantly at first, Zach spoke his thoughts, but he quickly found that James, who had similar experiences of losing friends in the mountains, understood what he was going through. As they talked through their exhaustion and fear and uncertainty, they recognized in each other the humbling experience of being uprooted by grief, and also the ability to process and keep going. They made the decision to keep climbing until sunset, swapping leads as needed. Zach was inspired, knowing how shattered he had felt, and yet still able to reach deep within to push through. With the resiliency tools he had worked on with Lincoln, this experience didn’t feel so debilitating.
Yet resilience also requires knowing when to say no, when something is too much. After a long, uncomfortable bivy halfway up a 5,000-foot rock climb, the two decided to start the long day of rappels, wary of a closing weather window.
Zach Clanton and his dog, Gustaf Peyote Clanton, at Widebird. “He [Gustaf] is a distinguished gentleman.” Photo by Holly Buehler
Back safely on the glacier, the two climbing partners realized it was their friend Reese’s death day. Taking a whiskey shot, and pouring one out for Reese, they parted ways—James to his tent for a nap, and Zach to roam the glacier.
The experience of oneness he found, roaming that desolate landscape, he compares to a powerful psychedelic experience. It was a snowball of grief, trauma, resilience, meditation, the connection he felt with the friends still here and those gone. It was like standing atop the mountain before he dropped into the spine, and the veil between this world and those who were gone was a little less opaque. He felt a little piece of himself—one that wanted a sense of certainty—loosen a little. The only way he was going to move forward was to let go.
He wasn’t fixed. Death wouldn’t disappear. Those friends were gone, and the rift they left behind would still be there. But he was ready to charge into the mountains again, and find the best they had to offer.
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The Height of Mountains
Guidebook XII—Member Spotlight
Josh Pollock “smedging” his way up Con Cuidado y Comunidad (5.6) at the Narrow Gauge Slabs. Land of the Ute and Cheyenne peoples. AAC Graphic Designer Foster Denney
Con Cuidado Y Communidad
By Sierra McGivney
Driving towards Highway 285, we pass strips of red rock cutting through the foothills of Morrison in Colorado’s Front Range, chasing the promise of new climbs. In the front seat, Josh Pollock describes the Narrow Gauge Slab, a new crag he has been developing in Jefferson County.
Pollock is the type of person who points out the ecology of the world around him. As the car weaves along the mid-elevation Ponderosa Pine forest, Pollock describes how we’ll see cute pin cushion cacti, black-chinned or broad-tailed hummingbirds, and Douglas-fir tussock moth caterpillars.
We pull into a three-level parking lot about seven miles down the Pine Valley Ranch Road. With no cell service and heavy packs, we set off along an old railroad trail toward the crag. Not even ten minutes into our walk, Pollock turns off, and we are greeted by a Jeffco trail crew building switchbacks to the crag.
As we approach the base of the Narrow Gauge Slab, Pollock picks up the dry soil. Fine granular rocks sit in the palm of his hand as he describes how this is the soil’s natural state because of Colorado’s alpine desert climate.
Photo by Anne Ludolph.
Unsurprisingly, Pollock was a high school teacher at the Rocky Mountain School of Expeditionary Learning in a past life; now, he is a freelance tutor and executive function coach. A Golden local and climbing developer, he has been working to develop the Narrow Gauge Slab since 2021.
Pollock first became interested in route development in 2011. He wasn’t climbing much then, instead focusing on raising his second child. Flipping through a climbing magazine one day, an article about route development caught his eye.
Between naps, diaper changes, and bottle-feeding cycles, he would go for quick trail runs in the foothills by his house in Golden. During his runs, Pollock noticed cliffs that weren’t in guidebooks or on Mountain Project. He began imagining how future climbers might experience and enjoy the rock.
“The routes I can produce for the community are moderate and adventurous but accessible,” said Pollock.
Climbing in Clear Creek is a high-volume affair. Jeffco Open Space (JCOS), the land management department for Jefferson Country, started to recognize this during the five years from 2008 to 2013 when climbing in the area exploded. With such a high volume of all kinds of outdoor enthusiasts recreating in Jefferson County, including climbers, adverse impacts on the land followed, including increased erosion and propagation of noxious weeds. Previously, Jeffco Open Space took a more hands-off approach when it came to climbing. However, because their mission is to protect and preserve open space and parkland, they concluded the increased popularity of climbing in the area warranted more active management.
While Jeffco Open Space had a few climbers on staff, they quickly realized they were not qualified to make decisions surrounding fixed hardware and route development. They turned to the local climbing community.
In 2015, Pollock began developing routes at Tiers of Zion, a wooded crag overlooking Clear Creek Canyon in Golden. In 2016, Jeffco Open Space established the Fixed Hardware Review Committee (FHRC) with Pollock as one of its seven advisors—now eight. The FHRC provides expert analysis to Jeffco staff members regarding applications for installing or replacing fixed hardware in the area (including slacklining). As a formal collaborative effort between local climbers, route developers, and Jeffco land managers, it is one of the first of its kind in the country.
Eric Krause, the Visitor Relations Program Manager and Park Ranger with Jeffco Open Space, deals with literal and figurative fires weekly and is responsible for all climbing management guidelines. He sits in on meetings and speaks for Jeffco.
“I think really good communication between a landowner or land manager and the climbing community is imperative,” said Krause.
Since 2015, Jeffco Open Space has invested more than 1.5 million dollars to improve the access and sustainability of existing crags by stabilizing eroding base areas, building durable and designated access trails, supplying stainless steel hardware to replace aging bolts, supplying portable toilet bags to reduce human waste at crags, and rehabilitating unsustainable areas.
If new routes for an existing crag are submitted to the FHRC via their online form, it’s already an impacted area, so it’s more likely to be approved. During their quarterly meeting, each member of the FHRC reviews the submission and discusses whether the new route(s) is a worthwhile addition to climbing in Jefferson County. A route that might be denied is within the 5.7-5.10 range at a crag with limited parking and heavy trail erosion, because routes in that range tend to attract the highest volume of climbers.
“We don’t really want to be adding more sites that are just going to degrade, and we’d rather get in there ahead of time and build it out to where it’s sustainable to begin with,” said Krause.
If a new crag is submitted, this triggers an entirely different internal review process called the “New Crag Evaluation Criteria (NCEC),” overseen by Jeffco Open Space. Every individual on the JCOS internal climb- ing committee (comprised of staff from the Park Ranger, Trails, Natural Resources, Planning, Park Services, and Visitor Relations teams) independently rates the new crag based on various categories: potential access trails, environmental considerations, parking, traffic, community input, organizational capacity, visitor experience, and sanitation management. They then average all of the scores for the submitted crag, and its viability is discussed.
To combat the ever-growing need for accessible places for new climbers, families, guided parties, and folks looking for high-quality moderate climbing, Jeffco asked the FHRC and others if they could find a beginner-friendly new crag in the southern part of the county, where there are fewer climbing areas.
According to Krause, Pollock took this request to heart and started looking all over the county for a new crag. He struggled to find a place with adequate parking, access to bathrooms, and the ability to build new trails on stable ground. “Threading that needle is hard, and it took several years and maybe half a dozen possible locations to find one that worked,” said Pollock.
An open space staffer suggested he look at the area that is now the Narrow Gauge Slab.
When Pollock first walked along the base of what would become a major project in his life, the Narrow Gauge Slab, he felt compelled by the rock’s position, composure, and aesthetic. He began imagining routes to climb. The crack features broke the wall up into clean-looking panels.
For Pollock, unlocking the potential of a crag is an unanswered question until the last moment.
“There’s a great drama to it,” said Pollock.
He proposed the crag in 2021. The Narrow Gauge Slab would become the first crag approved under the NCEC framework.
“I think what I’m most excited about is that this whole endeavor has been collaborative and cooperative with Jeffco Open Space from the get-go,” said Pollock.
Jeffco is constantly playing catch up with erosion damage in an arid climate like the Front Range. At the Narrow Gauge Slab, Jeffco had the opportunity to identify and implement adequate infrastructure for the area before route development began.
“In some ways [it is a] first of its kind experiment, with building a sustainable access trail and stabilizing belay pads on the base area and things like that before lots of user traffic shows up,” said Pollock. The Boulder Climbing Community, the AAC Denver Chapter, and Jeffco collaborated to stabilize and build out the area before the crag opened to the public.
According to Pollock, the crag does not have a theme. Since this crag has many developers, and sometimes multiple developers to any given climb, the route names have personal meaning to the developers or the circumstances of the route. But when you look closely, a kaleidoscope of meaning comes into view: collaboration.
His primary objective with the Narrow Gauge Slab was to develop a moderate and accessible crag, but the project evolved into something much more: mentoring climbers on route development. He reached out to different LCOs, such as Cruxing in Color, Brown Girls Climb Colorado, Escala, Latino Outdoors, and the AAC Denver Chapter, inviting members to participate in a mentorship program based on route development. In total, there are 16 mentees and five mentors, plus Pollock. Despite uncovering the crag, Pollock has barely put any hardware in.
Route development is a niche aspect of climbing that requires extensive resources and knowledge. Pollock wanted to invite new groups of climbers who might not consider themselves route developers but were interested in learning. He is pleased that the mentees have learned from this project and are developing new routes near the Front Range. Some mentees have been swallowed whole by the development bug. Lily Toyokura Hill is so enthused that she was recently appointed to the nearby Staunton Fixed Hardware Review Committee.
Photo by Anne Ludolph.
Hill and Ali Arfeen collaborated on Bonsai, a 5.7 climb featuring a tiny tree sticking out of the rock. Hill, who is shorter, and Arfeen, who is taller, would take Pollock’s kid’s sidewalk chalk and mark key holds they could reach, helping to determine where they would place bolts when they were developing the route’s first pitch.
To the left is Con Cuidado y Comunidad (With Care and Community), a three-pitch 5.6 put up by (P1) Sharon Yun and AAC employee Xavier Bravo, and (P2+3) Maureen Fitzpatrick and Cara Hubbell.
While Pollock racks up to lead Con Cuidado y Comunidad, Douglas-fir caterpillars inter- rupt our conversation. Pollock stops, pointing out the fuzzy horned creature on his bag. He describes how their population erupts every seven to ten years. His father was a biology teacher, and both of his children are fascinated by ecology.
On top of Con Cuidado y Comunidad, we picnic overlooking the epic landscape of the South Platte. Pollock explains how climbing at the Narrow Gauge Slab requires what he calls “smedging,” a mix of smearing and edging.
Climbs are littered with minuscule footholds and often require both smearing and edging to climb. Pollock prefers this type of movement: slow and thoughtful.
The last bolt for the Narrow Gauge Slab was drilled on August 19, just in time for opening day on the 24th. Pollock feels immense pride in the crag.
“It is really satisfying to share the crag with folks and give to the community,” said Pollock.
On these south-facing slabs, there are thirteen routes ranging from 5.4 to 5.9+, spread across the crag’s granite rock. You can listen to the babble of the South Platte River as you climb, breathing in the smell of fresh pine needles as you stand up on a tiny food hold. Don’t forget to look out for the Douglas-fir caterpillars inching their way across the rock as you clip the bolts.
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Guidebook XII—Grant Spotlight
The Emperor Face of Mt. Robson in water color and ink. AAC member Craig Muderlak
Mountain Sense
By Sierra McGivney
Usually, when Balin Miller encounters spindrift ice climbing, he puts his head down, waits for 10 to 20 seconds, and continues climbing. Halfway up the face of the Andromeda Strain, a line on the northeast face of Mount Andromeda in Alberta, Canada, Miller and his climbing partner Adrien Costa encountered an intense spindrift funnel. Thirty seconds passed, then one minute, two. After five minutes, he thought, f*** this, and downclimbed.
Miller was persistent, but the spindrift was relentless. They wasted a couple of hours trying to go around.
“You couldn’t see anything, even if you wanted to push through,” said Miller.
Miller and Costa peered around to where the climbing turned into a chimney. A wall of white snow poured down it. They turned back a pitch before the Hockey Stick Crack, disappointed that they wouldn’t be able to live the lore embedded in that pitch. This wouldn’t be the last time they tested their judgment in the mountains and turned away from an objective.
“I think what gets me most stoked for routes isn’t really how good they are, per se, but a lot of the history involved in it—the route that has some old trip report of people getting really scared on it,” said Miller.
This might be why Miller chose the Andromeda Strain as one of his objectives for this 2023 Mountaineering Fellowship Fund Grant (MFFG) trip. Apart from being one of the most popular yet serious alpine climbs in the Canadian Rockies, it has an epic story. An unsuccessful earlier group tried to ascend the off-width and found it too wide to take anything but one-foot lengths of hewn-off hockey sticks (an eerie, early rendition of the Trango Big Bro). Having no hockey sticks handy in 1983, Barry Blanchard, Dave Cheesmond, and Tim Friesen traversed beneath the off-width and around the corner to a steep snow-choked chimney that became the Hockey Stick Crack.
Miller originally applied for the MFFG from the American Alpine Club to support an expedition to the Alaska Range. He was awarded the grant but had to change his trip to the Canadian Rockies due to financial constraints. This grant funds climbers 25 years or younger seeking challenging climbs in remote places. One of Miller’s partners, Adrien Costa, has previously leveraged other AAC grants, including the Tincup Partner in Adventure Grant in 2021 and the Catalyst Grant in 2021 and 2023. The AAC grants can be a great jumping-off point for climbers looking to dream big.
Miller is an ice climber who spends his summers in Alaska and his winters in Bozeman. He got into climbing at the age of 12 and was versed in both ice and rock climbing growing up in Alaska. He is stalwart when it comes to ice climbing, but he has a goofy aura. You can deduce from photos of his trip that he doesn’t take himself too seriously, even on big alpine climbs.
After getting turned around on the Andromeda Strain, Miller and Costa climbed Dreambed (5.11 PG-13) on Mount Yamnuska and enjoyed a sunny day on rock. The two saw a weather window coming up and turned their gaze to Mount Robson or Yuh-hai- haskun (“The Mountain of the Spiral Road”), the highest peak in Canada. Infinite Patience (2200m, VI 5.9 WI5 M5) climbs the north side of the Emperor Face of Mount Robson until it merges with the Emperor Ridge (2500m, V 5.6). This was another big objective for Miller. Despite a solid weather window and the season being in their favor, new challenges awaited the group.
Aidan Whitelaw, six feet, four inches tall with a high-pitched voice, is one of Miller’s best friends. Despite being a student at Montana State University in Bozeman, he’s almost always down to skip class if it means going climbing.
With Whitelaw newly arrived, they set off on their adventure with only one rope, trying to go as light as possible. One rope between three climbers is OK if they don’t need to bail, but just in case, the team brought a Beal Escaper.
Miller wrote in his trip report: “Leaving the parking lot on October 5, Aidan Whitelaw, Adrien, and I hiked into Berg Lake, camping at the base of the face. [We] started up the face at 2 a.m. on the 6th. We soon realized that the direct start was out of condition. It’s usually [three pitches of WI 4 or 5] but turned out to be steep, wet melting snice. We opted to traverse right to gain Bubba’s Couloir. Unfortunately, there was no alpine ice left in the couloir. But the snow climbing was moderate but unprotectable. We eventually decided to bail after the House Traverse, which is roughly halfway up the Emperor Face to the ridge on Infinite Patience.”
Deciding to bail had become extremely obvious to the group. They encountered compact limestone with no cracks and nothing to sling. The group was fine leaving cams or pins but couldn’t find good placements to make anchors. They decided to deadman their ice tools, burying them to create a snow anchor to rappel off.
“It was the worst rock imaginable,” said Miller.
Eventually, they reached a bivy spot and got cozy, fitting three people into a two-person tent and Whitelaw and Miller into one sleeping bag. At noon the next day, they started their descent, which consisted of rappelling off V-threads and lousy rock anchors.
Balin Miller, Adrien Costa, and Aiden Whitelaw at the bivy spot on Infinite Patience getting cozy in a two-person tent. Land of the Mountain Metis, Stoney, Cree and Secwepemc peoples. AAC member Balin Miller
The Beal Escaper is a detachable rappelling device that allows you to descend on a single strand without permanently fixing the rappel and sacrificing the rope. To retrieve the rope, the climber tugs the rope ten to twenty times, causing the rope to inch through the Escaper and retrieve the rope.
The group was on 80-degree melting snow. No one had counted how many times they had pulled the rope to disengage the Escaper, but something was wrong. Everyone got quiet. They pulled as much rope through as they could, but ultimately, the rope refused to release. Unable to jug back up the rope out of fear that movement could release the device, and unable to solo back up because of 80 feet of steep bad snow and friable rock, they pulled out as much rope as they could and cut it. Only eight meters of rope were in their hands, the rest of it lost to the mountain. It was dark, and they didn’t know how far they were above the Mist Glacier.
They tied slings together as a pull cord, allowing them to do increments of full eight-meter rappels. Luckily, they were only 100 feet from the bottom.
Twenty-four hours later, Whitelaw was in class in Bozeman, Montana; no one was aware of the epic in the mountains he had just returned from.
Balin Miller questing off to lead a mixed pitch on Infinite Patience (VI5.9M5WI5).Land of the Mountain Metis, Stoney, Cree, and Secwepemc peoples. AAC member Adrian Costa
After several days off, Miller and Costa hiked into the Lloyd McKay Hut to attempt the north face of Alberta. However, they didn’t get the chance due to a storm and nine inches of wet snow. Miller wasn’t too bummed. Conditions weren’t in their favor, and there was always next year. Both Miller and Costa left after that, and Miller headed to Yosemite.
In November, Miller returned ready to ice climb. He climbed Suffer Machine (200m, WI5+ M7); Virtual Reality (100m, WI6+); Kittyhawk (150m, WI5), solo; and Nemesis (150m, WI6), solo.
He took a short break to visit his mom in Spokane, Washington. Ethan Berkeland flew out to meet him, and the pair drove about 430 miles back up to Canada with Slipstream in sight. Slipstream (900m, IV WI4+) climbs the east face of Snow Dome. It is infamous for it’s exposure to dangerous seracs, avalanches, and cornices, as evidenced by five reports in the Accidents in North American Climbing archive. Jim Elzinga and John Lauchlan first climbed it in 1979, and Mark Twight simul-soloed it in 1988 with Randy Rackliff.
“Anything Mark Twight does is awesome,” said Miller.
The previous fall, Miller had bailed after the approach when it had taken longer than expected, and “it just didn’t feel right.” Both Miller and Berkeland are solid ice climbers. They brought a full rope, a tagline, 14 screws, and a handful of draws, planning to solo the easier parts and pitch out the harder ones. They ended up simul-soloing the entire east face of Snow Dome on November 29 in four hours. In total, the day was thirteen hours from car to car.
After getting turned around on his previous alpine objectives, this was a great achievement for Miller.
Despite the epics on some of his original objectives, Miller found success. Each “failure” in the mountains is a lesson learned for the next climb, maybe even a cutting-edge ascent. The spindrift turned him around on Andromeda Strain, and Infinite Patience was out of condition, but Slipstream proved to be an amazing climb. Sometimes, infinite patience pays off in the mountains.
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Your contribution will significantly impact climbers—whether they are learning how to avoid accidents through our updated database, using research funding to analyze melting ice caps and the changing heights of iconic mountains, or pursuing first ascents around the world. Your gift makes these things possible.
Guidebook XII—AAC Advocacy
Photos by Torch Pictures.
Teaming Up in DC
By The Editors
As the AAC’s General Counsel and Advocacy Director, Byron Harvison, put it, advocacy work is like “being in charge of building and maintaining an aircraft while it’s already flying in the air—and there are still no guarantees. This work requires constant attention to detail and management of hundreds of relationships.” To your average climber who cares about public lands and advocating for climbing landscapes, the constant awareness of legislative processes and advocacy relationships can be exhausting— the runout pitch where you’d rather cede the lead. But for the AAC advocacy team and our partners like Outdoor Alliance, it’s the money pitch—our opportunity to ensure the perspec- tives of our members and other recreationists inform the policies that shape America’s public lands and recreational spaces.
That’s why this September, the AAC advocacy team, including AAC President Nina Williams, AAC Executive Director Ben Gabriel, AAC Deputy Director Ashlee Milanich, and AAC General Counsel and Advocacy Director Byron Harvison, showed up in DC–to pay attention to the details. One of those key details is our partnership with Outdoor Alliance (OA), a coalition of outdoor recreation nonprofit organizations that work together towards our shared goals of conservation and protecting public lands. On just this one trip to DC, the AAC team joined up with our OA coalition members, holding more than 80 meetings over two days with members of Congress and the Administration to advocate for protecting public lands, improving outdoor recreation, and funding the outdoors. Plus, we hung out with Tommy Caldwell to swap stories and inform legislators about the power of climbing in these incredible landscapes.
The trip was a celebration of Outdoor Alliance’s 10th anniversary, and the many wins that a collaboration between outdoor recreationists can accomplish. Since Outdoor Alliance started ten years ago, the coalition has collectively helped protect 40 million acres of public land and water, secured $5.1 billion in funding for the outdoors, and been instrumental in empowering outdoor enthu- siasts to become outdoor advocates. New to the Outdoor Alliance is the Grasstops Collective. It is a leadership and advocacy development program that trains grasstops advocates to build relationships with policymakers and advocate for conservation priorities. Grasstops leaders are unique for their meaningful voice in their communities, whether they are in business, nonprofit, or local government. This trip featured the OA’s first cohort from the Grasstops Collective joining legisla- tive and agency meetings.
“The collaborative energy of all the Outdoor Alliance organizations representing different sectors of the outdoor community was amaz- ing! There is a definite impact on legislators and their staff members when we all come to the table together. I’m a climber sitting next to a surfer and a paddler and a biker, and we all have different but equally compelling stories to share on why this legislation (the EXPLORE Act) should pass,” reflected Harvison.
One of OA and the AAC’s biggest policy priorities for the end of the year is the EXPLORE Act. The recreation community has been working for years on proposals to strengthen, protect, and expand outdoor recreation opportunities on our public lands and waters. As participation in outdoor recreation grows, it becomes even more important that public land management agencies like the Forest Service, Park Service, and Bureau of Land Management have sound policies and resources in place that will support sustainable and equitable outdoor recreation access. The EXPLORE Act is a first-of-its-kind package of recreation policy. It includes provisions that would safeguard rock climbing, identify and create long-distance bike trails, improve recreational permitting for outfitters and guides, and make permanent the Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership, which provides grants for green space in urban areas. Notably, the much talked about PARC Act, heavily supported by the Access Fund, is bundled into the EXPLORE Act, with the intention to protect the responsible use of bolts in Wilderness areas.
“The Outdoor Alliance 10th anniversary cele- bration in Washington DC reinforced the collective energy and determination needed to advance legislation like the EXPLORE Act. It highlights how partnerships are essential to advocating in service of our members,” said Ben Gabriel when reflecting on the power of the week-long trip.
Congress has a lot on its plate, including determining a federal budget, wading through the complexity of major wars throughout the world, and much more. With all that to work through, it’s no wonder that the EXPLORE Act has continued to be deferred as a main concern. However, there is overwhelming bipartisan support in the House and the Senate for the EXPLORE Act, and several complex paths for it to potentially pass. It’s all in the details, which is where outdoor advocates and policy leaders can step in.
We were joined by champions from American Whitewater, Access Fund, American Canoe Association, IMBA, The Mountaineers, Surfrider, Winter Wildlands Alliance, and leaders from the OA Grasstops Collective, as well as by partners at REI and Patagonia.
Support This Work— Join or Give Today
Your contribution will significantly impact climbers—whether they are learning how to avoid accidents through our updated database, using research funding to analyze melting ice caps and the changing heights of iconic mountains, or pursuing first ascents around the world. Your gift makes these things possible.
Guidebook XII—Rewind the Climb
Photo by AAC Staff Foster Denney.
The Naked Edge
By Hannah Provost
If you had to tell the story of the evolution of climbing within the history of one route, your most compelling choices might be The Nose of El Capitan or The Naked Edge in Eldorado Canyon. In this way, The Naked Edge is a time capsule containing within its memory: the much dreamed-of first ascent finally climbed by Layton Kor, Bob Culp, and Rick Horn; a period defining free ascent by Jim Erickson and Duncan Furgeson in the early 1970s; and one of the few battle- grounds for speed records in the United States. In 1962, Kor and Bob Culp were diverted attempting to aid the steep final edge, and today, climbers have speed climbed the route, bridge to bridge, in a little over 22 minutes. What is it about this climb that has allowed it to be the sketchbook for climbing legends to draw out the evolution of our sport? Anecdotes and artifacts from the American Alpine Club Library and archives provided the answer.
Perhaps it was all aesthetics—the compelling imagery of a climb that could divide dark- ness and light. Or maybe it was the fact that The Edge tends to rebuff many of its suitors. But whether The Naked Edge was dishing out a good humbling, or whether, as Jim Erickson famously argued, his free ascent style “humbled the climb” instead, The Naked Edge might live so prominently in our collective climbing memory because it encapsulates one of the great questions of each climbing endeavor. Who holds the power here? The climb or the climber?
At first, the route held all the cards. Layton Kor, known for his hulking height and wild, almost demonic, drive, could usually weaponize his determination and fearlessness to get through any hard climbing he might envision for himself. Yet when Layton Kor and Bob Culp attempted to aid the route in 1962, having each been turned away in 1961 on separate occasions, they still had to deviate from the original vision and finished the climb via a dihedral slightly to the left of the stunning final overhang. It wasn’t until Kor came back with Rick Horn in 1964 that The Edge, as we climb it today, was first done in its entirety.
Jim Erickson, a young gun with a knowing grin, hadn’t always been a hotshot. However, by the early 1970s, he had gotten into the habit of proving a point—freeing the old obscure aid lines in Eldo put up by Robbins, Kor, Dalke, and Ament the decade before. After several failed attempts to free The Naked Edge, repeatedly retreating from the first pitch finger crack due to a strict avoidance of hangdog- ging and rehearsing, freeing The Naked Edge was his foremost ambition.
By 1971, The Naked Edge had been ascended 30 or so times using direct aid. Erickson was envisioning a new phase of the route’s life. Yet his first moderately successful attempt, with prolific free climber Steve Wunsch, was yet another humbling. As he wrote for Climb!: The History of Rock Climbing in Colorado, the fourth pitch was daunting to the point of existential: “Steve dubs it impossible. I give it a disheartened try, but it is late so down we come, pondering the ultimate metaphysical questions: ‘Is there life after birth? Sex after death?’”
When Erickson and Duncan Ferguson returned a week later, things went a little more smoothly. Though The Naked Edge was the last major climb that the two would ascend using pitons, it wasn’t the use of pitons that haunted Erickson and sent him off on his staunch commitment to only onsight free -climbing. Rather, when Erickson reflects on the effort and technique of pitoncraft, and the incredible added effort of free climbing on pitons, he seems almost to be creating something, tinkering. Describing nailing the crux of the first thin pitch in an interview for the Legacy Series, a project of the AAC to preserve the history of climbing, Erickson painted a picture of immense toil: “You’re in this strenuous fingertip layback, with shoes that didn’t smear very well...You had to first of all figure out which piton you were going to place, you had to set it in the crack, you were doing all of this with one hand while you were hanging on. Then you had to tap the piton once to make sure you didn’t lose it... because if you missed it and dropped it you’re back to square one, so you had to tap the pin, finally hit it in, test it to see if it was good, then you’d clip a single free carabiner, and a second free carabiner into it, and then you would clip your rope in, all while you were hanging on with one hand in a bad finger lock.”
In the 1960s and 1970s, once a route was freed, it was not to be aided again. The rock had been sufficiently humbled, and all climbers seeking to prove their worth on that rock must level up their skills to prove themselves worthy.
Lynn Hill and Beth Bennett set out to capture an ascent of The Edge with filmmaker Bob Carmichael in 1981, who may have let the reputation of the climb leak into the produc- tion notes, asking the climbers to fall repeatedly on the first pitch and editing in a training mon- tage. Though the film claims to document the struggle of the first all-female ascent, Bennett reports: “the film with Lynn was a fictionalized account.” Bennett had already clinched the FFFA in 1977, and reports doing the first all-fe- male ascent with Louise Shepherd and Jean Dempsey (née Ruwitch) a year later. Similarly, Hill had become the first woman to climb 7c (5.12d) two years before, and was clearly stronger than the film suggests. Their humbling was played up for the sake of drama, and Hill wishes she could have properly attempted an onsight. In the case of this ascent, the humbling reputation of the climb dominated the narra- tive, obscuring the power the climbers’ held in that fight.
These days, news about The Naked Edge revolves around the potentially most hubristic
part of modern rock climbing: soloing and speed ascents. Speed ascents of this iconic route began in the early 1990s with Micheal Gilbert and Rob Slater. As the record dwin- dled, a friendly rivalry emerged between two teams consisting of Stefan Griebel and Jason Wells, and Brad Gobright and Scott Bennett. Before Gobright and Wells died in respective climbing accidents in Mexico and California, this friendly rivalry had pushed the record to 24 minutes and 29 seconds. New kids Ben Wilbur and John Ebers arrived on the scene in 2020 and, with just a few practice runs, cut down the record to 24 minutes and 14 sec- onds. In 2022, Griebel put on his racing shoes again and paired up with local Joe Kennedy, climbing The Naked Edge in 22 minutes and 44 seconds, bridge to bridge.
Griebel has climbed the route over 350 times. Sometimes pitched out and casual, some- times as reconnaissance missions, sometimes as three laps in three hours as he and Joe got closer to going for the Fastest Known Time. For these speed climbers, the route has become a “third place,” even more so than the climbing gym. Besides work and home, it has become the other, alternative place where one is social, makes connections, and refines one’s identity. Kennedy writes: “You could argue it’s a waste of time to climb it over and over, but doing so has led to some of the most meaningful friendships and climbing experiences I’ve had in my life. It has turned the route into a meeting place, a fitness test, a playground, and something so much more significant than just a rock climb.”
But even these modern masters of this stone can be humbled by the climb in their own way. Kennedy reflects: “I was totally humbled by the route when I first climbed it. It was much more difficult than I expected–thin, techy, pumpy, and slick. And when I don’t climb it for a while, I never fail to get more pumped than I thought, no matter how dialed my beta is.” Griebel is adamant the rock always does the humbling: “Sometimes it feels like the easiest one-pitch 5.9 warm-up in the canyon, and other days I mess up a crux sequence in the smallest way and suddenly get pumped and scared! The rock always does the humbling, not the other way around. I’ve seen 5.13 sport climbers fall out of the Bombay Chimney onto that 50-year-old pin!”
Reflecting today, Jim Erickson says his famous quote is often misunderstood. Indeed, he believes the style in which he and Furguson freed The Edge wasn’t the ethics he truly believed in—despite yo-yoing being an accepted practice at the time, he only ever truly felt satisfied by onsight climbing. But he also insists that he and his partners were hum- bled by the climb, too. In contrast to Griebel, Kennedy, and others, Erickson has never gotten back on The Naked Edge after his his- tory-making ascent. It was such a special experience that he worried that climbing it again would destroy the myth of it. Still, he can remember nearly every piece of beta, each pound of the hammer required to secure each piton.
Climbing it only once, Erickson is still torn by the question of humility. Climbing it hundreds of times, Griebel has yet to come any closer to finding the answer. So, who is doing the humbling? Perhaps, the fact that the answer is so elusive is why the pursuit of the question remains so satisfying.
Climbing Grief Fund Spotlight: Gratitude
PC: Jessica Glassberg/Louder Than 11
Grief, Beauty, and Loss in the Mountains
by Hannah Provost
“When Meg climbs on the Diamond these days, she can’t seem to shake a glimpse of red in her periphery–the color of Tom’s red Patagonia R1 as he climbed with her. When she turns to catch a better look, he’s not there. Tom: her dear friend, who fed a bumblebee on a belay ledge to bring it back to life; who encouraged Meg to lead harder and harder pitches on gear; who introduced her to her husband; who she trusted more than anyone on rock. She wants to turn and see Tom’s red R1 climbing up the pitch behind her. But Tom won’t ever climb the Diamond again.
Meg Yingling is an American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA) rock guide, a lover of the high places, deeply embedded in our community—and intimately aware of the grief that haunts our sport. When she lost her friend, Tom Wright, to a climbing accident in the summer of 2020, her relationship to climbing radically changed—it mellowed and thickened and burst all at once. But thanks to the Climbing Grief Fund Grant (CGF), she was able to get the resources she needed to start processing her grief, her new relationship to climbing, and actively sit with the messiness of it all…”
Read more about Meg’s experiences with both grief and beauty in the mountains:
Climb United Feature: Finding Impact in a World of Performance
Salt Lake Area Queer Climbers (SLAQC) showing some pride at Black Rocks, St. George, UT. Land of the Pueblos and Paiute people. AAC member Bobbie Lee
A Deep Look Into the Affiliate Support Network
By Shara Zaia
Drawing on personal experience in co-creating Cruxing in Color, and the experience of affinity group leaders across the country, Shara Zaia reflects on the unpaid labor that goes into creating affinity spaces within climbing—and yet just how much it means to so many traditionally marginalized climbers to find community. Zaia uncovers the true cost and benefit of this work, and lays out why the AAC has developed the Affiliate Support Network (ASN)—our Climb United program that provides fiduciary and other administrative support to affinity groups across the country so that they can raise donations and/or become nonprofits, ultimately making their organizations more sustainable and long-lasting. Dive in to get a behind-the-scenes look at the incredible power of this work, and how the Climb United team has been determined to find impact.
Artist Spotlight: Marty Schnure & The Art of Maps
By Sierra McGivney
Photo courtesy of Marty Schnure.
In this profile of cartographer Marty Schnure, we uncover the philosophy that has influenced her creation of several beautiful maps for the American Alpine Journal (AAJ), the world-renowned AAC publication that reports the cutting-edge ascents and descents of each year. For Schnure, map-making is about blending geographical information while also evoking and displaying the relationship between that geography and whatever is important about that place to the map user—aka climbing routes, or the animal corridors of that area. Dive into this article to learn about the art of map-making, and how Schure thinks about the responsibility of a cartographer, the power of maps to express an idea, and more.
Rewind the Climb: The North Face of North Twin
Photos Courtesy of the George Lowe Collection
First Ascent by George Lowe and Chris Jones
By Grey Satterfield
Fifty years ago, George Lowe and Chris Jones plunged deep into the Canadian Rockies in search of an adventure. They had read in the 1966 American Alpine Journal of a “mountain wall which acts like a strong drug on the mind.” This wall was the north face of Twin Tower (more often referred to as the north face of North Twin), and Lowe and Jones’ adventure turned into one of the proudest ascents in the history of alpinism…
To this day, their route has yet to see a full second ascent. The north face was finally climbed again by a different route 11 years later. In 50 years, only five teams have started at the bottom of the north face and made the summit. Every climber returned with a story more harrowing than the next.
Dive in as Grey Satterfield revisits this historic ascent, and uncovers truths that helps us reflect on modern climbing:
Grant Spotlight: The Cornerstone Grant
PC: Grey Satterfield
In this article, writer Holly You Tung Chen captures the energy and effort that goes into sustainably developing a new bouldering area. Thanks to the AAC’s Cornerstone Grant, the Carolinas Climber’s Coalition was able to build trails and develop a parking lot for the McKinney Gap and Weaver Knob boulders. Dive in to hear about the process of discovering the boulders, sending and first ascents, and marshaling resources to responsibly open access to climbers everywhere.
Pull Focus: Behind the Scenes with Sophi Rutherford
Sophi Rutherford in action during the making of Dear Mother. PC: Cody Kaemmerlan.
Sophi Rutherford is the recipient of the first ever Pull Focus Grant, a grant that provides historically underserved outdoor filmmakers the opportunity to intern with a premier photo/video production studio, Louder Than Eleven, and advance their careers in this notoriously competitive space. Through this paid internship, she served as the assistant director on the upcoming film Dear Mother, a transracial adoption story, following the climber Cody Kaemmerlan as he grapples with his identity and ultimately travels to Korea to meet his birth parents. In this profile on Sophi, Holly Yu Tung Chen uncovers Sophi’s artistic philosophy, the importance of telling transracial adoption stories, and the pull to hide behind a camera. Dive in to get a glimpse at the process behind making Dear Mother, and get to know Sophi Rutherford as an emerging filmmaker.
In Dear Mother, climber and transracial Asian-American, Cody Kaemmerlen, searches for connection with his birth parents after a near-death fall leaves him shaken and grasping for answers.
Learn More
Emerging Filmmaker: Sophi Rutherford
Film Subject: Cody Kaemmerlan
Writer: Holly Yu Tung Chen
The Pull Focus Grant Was Made Possible By:
Navajo Rising: An Indigenous Emergence Story
Shiprock (Tsé Bit a í, “winged rock”) rises over 1,500 feet above the desert floor of the Navajo Nation in San Juan County, New Mexico (Diné, Pueblos, Ute lands). Shiprock was a sought-after summit during the late 1930s, until the first ascent was done in 1939 by David Brower and Sierra Club team. It marks one of the first times bolts were placed for protection in the history of North American climbing. However, the rock formation is highly sacred to the Navajo people, having historical and religious significance. In 1966, the Navajo Nation banned all climbing on their lands, including Shiprock.
by Aaron Mike
This Indigenous People’s Day, we’re reposting a beautifully written essay by Navajo climber Aaron Mike that we published in 2019.
Acknowledging the roots and conceptualizations of the outdoor activities that we so passionately pursue enriches our participation and ties us to the land, as well as to one another. When we view our industry through a historical lens, we inevitably hear about John Muir, Sir Edmund Hillary, Royal Robbins, and other giants of outdoor recreation. We revere them based on their successes and physical accomplishments. There is one similarity between them that is rarely mentioned: the entirety of their recreational pursuits took place on ancestral homelands of Indigenous Peoples. The Miwok and Piute resided amongst the majestic granite walls of what is now Yosemite National Park. The Havasupai and Hualapai cultivated the areas of the Grand Canyon. The Shoshone, Bannock, Blackfoot, Crow, Flathead, Gros Ventre, and the Nez Perce tribes inhabited what is now Grand Teton National Park. The history and heritage of Indigenous peoples as an inherent part of the lands on which we recreate is a topic that must be part of the conversation if we are to achieve a responsible, sustainable, and inclusive industry. Especially today, this topic is paramount not only because it enhances the care and stewardship of the lands we all love, but also because it is a statement against the systematic dehumanization of a people.
Diné Bahane’, the Navajo creation story, tells of the journey through three worlds to the fourth world, where the Navajo people now reside. The story details chaos and drama as the Diné, or “Holy people,” moved through Black World, which contained no light; Blue World, which contained light; and Yellow World, which contained great rivers. Eventually, in the 4th world, White World, the Diné would assume human form after gaining greater intelligence and awareness. Through these worlds deities, vegetation, and animals accompanied the Diné, as well as our four sacred mountains; Sis Naajini (Blanca Peak), Tsoodził (Mount Taylor), Dook’o’oosłid (the San Francisco Peaks) and Dibé Nitsaa (Mount Hesperus).
Like the story of my people, my tribe, I have gone through many different worlds to walk the path that I am on today. My first world, Ni’hodiłhił, consisted of a surreal state of constantly spending time in the outdoors on the Navajo Nation from Sanders, AZ to Monument Valley, AZ, as well as my hometown of Gallup, NM. Weekends and summers were spent playing with my cousins through the tranquility provided, or turbulence imposed, by our Mother Nature. My grandparents taught me about sheep herding with blue heelers, building hogáns, and butchering sheep. I learned how to take care of horses and cattle, and how to live off of the land. During the spring and summer I spent nights sleeping under the stars and a Pendleton blanket in the back of my grandfather’s early 1990’s Ford F-150. During the fall and winter, I woke up sweating under a sheep woolskin blanket next to a wood burning stove that my grandfather had installed.
I blinked my eyes and I was in the second world of my journey, Ni’hodootł’izh, far from the Navajo Nation in the Northwest, transported to an environment where all of those activities that had made me feel so real were not customary or necessary, and were even frowned upon. Due to my Diné heritage and my personality, being in the outdoors is a necessity. It is hardwired into my entire being. In this second world, the connection to the land that I had experienced and loved was diverted and diminished. I began to feel disconnected from my Diné roots and felt a growing spiritual void.
I awoke for my first day in a new desert environment and into my third world, Ni’haltsoh. By this time, high school, my identity was in constant flux. I struggled to find my place and individual path in a sea of foreign values and ambitions. I blew through various sports, political ideas, social scenes, and academic areas of study. Amidst the chaos of these years, I found a vehicle that would take me into my fourth world, rock climbing. Being on the walls and boulders in Yosemite National Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, the eastern Sierra Nevada, Cochise Stronghold, Hueco Tanks State Park, and Mount Lemmon with people that shared similar values brought me back to a feeling of connection. Rock climbing became my missing identity puzzle piece; a reincarnation of my first world.
Ni’halgai, the fourth world of my journey: I am Tábaahá, the Edgewater clan, born for Tł’ógí, the Zia clan. My maternal grandfather is Táchii’nii and paternal grandfather is Tódích’íi’nii. After 16 years of redpoints, boulders, summits, alpine ascents, and first ascents, I am an Indigenous rock climbing guide, guide company owner, professional rock climbing athlete, and advocate for the protection of sacred land resources. My fourth world came about after I resolved that I am committed to the path I am on and that I do not want my story to be unique. It is my goal to provide the same access that was gifted to me to Indigenous youth as a means of connection to their land and to their heritage.
The author, Aaron Mike, bouldering in Northern Arizona (Hopi, Yavapai, Western Apache, Ancestral Puebloan lands). PC: James Q Martin
Simply acknowledging Indigenous heritage and history as a part of the land is not the only answer. It is a step in our First World, eventually leading to our Fourth World of evolution. Accountability is not only assumed with the people and organizations in the industry that are trying to make a sustainable difference, but should be carried out through the actions of each and every climber. Throughout the decades and in my personal experience there has been a culture in climbing that tries to nullify existing law on sacred lands, specifically on the Navajo Nation. Climbers drill fresh bolts and pay to poach sacred formations behind excuses like “good intentions” or “having a Native friend.” These illegal actions are a modern day conquer-and-destroy mentality that fails to respect Indigenous sovereignty and deteriorates the credibility of potential sustainable rock climbing efforts.
Indigenous Peoples are not extinct. Not everything needs to be climbed. Recreation must take a back seat to respecting Indigenous practices that have existed for millennia. Media channels promote first ascents, first free ascents, first descents, and sending of beautiful lines in remote places on rock, snow, or water, which can overlook Indigenous values. The actions that we take must respect Indigenous culture and it is up to us as the greater climbing community to decide the direction that we wish to pursue. Like climbers’ push for Leave No Trace implementation and education, it is up to all of us to push our Local Climbing Organizations to provide information on how to recreate with respect on or near sacred lands and to develop relationships with local Tribes. We must shift the ethos from a western “take” culture in order to not only respect the original stewards of the land, but to ensure that Nahasdzáán, the Earth, will be healthy for our future generations.
Aaron Mike is a Navajo rock climbing guide, a NativeOutdoors athlete, and a Native Lands Regional Coordinator for the Access Fund. Since the time of this being originally published, he has also joined the Protect Our Winters athlete team. Find him here.
Rewind the Climb
The First Ascent of Mt. Vinson
A Story from the AAC Archives
by Grey Satterfield
When inspiration for our next climbing trip strikes, we’re flooded with options to seek out every last possible detail. We pour over guidebooks with full-page spreads of color topos. We log on to Mountain Project and read about every route on the cliff. We find YouTube videos with move-by-move beta of the routes and boulders we want to try. Then we hop on Google Maps and get to-the-minute estimates of how long it will take to get there. We whip out our phone and get a hyper-detailed forecast with temps, wind speed, humidity, and anything else we’d ever care to know about the weather.
By the time we arrive, there’s no mystery. We’ve discovered everything there is to know.
That wasn’t always the case. In 1966 the American Alpine Club sent ten American climbers into the heart of the unknown: Antarctica. Read the full story here and explore photos and artifacts from the expedition.
Protecting Pine Mountain
A Story from the AAC Policy Team
by Chris Morissette
PC: AAC member Nate Ptacek
Only an hour and a half drive from the coast, Pine Mountain is one of a few remaining sky islands in California, a unique geological formation that consists of isolated mountains surrounded by radically different lowland environments. At an elevation of 7,000’, it is one of the best summer bouldering, hiking, and camping destinations almost anywhere in central and southern California. However, its under attack. The Reyes Peak Forest Health and Fuels Reduction Project is the United States Forest Service’s (USFS) plan to cut trees and clear chaparral across 755 acres on the Pine Mountain ridgeline. This story covers why logging on Pine Mountain would be a disaster for the ecology of this area, why the area is so culturally important for climbers and local Tribes, and the legal action that the AAC is taking to address this.
Update on Pine Mountain Litigation
We are disappointed to learn that a federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled against protecting a 755 acre tract of land on the top of Pine Mountain and Reyes Peak in the Los Padres National Forest area. The AAC, Los Padres ForestWatch, Keep Sespe Wild Committee, and Earth Island Institute—collectively represented by the Environmental Defense Center—joined up with the Center for Biological Diversity, California Chaparral Institute, and Patagonia Works—represented by the Center for Biological Diversity. Together, we filed a lawsuit in 2022 to halt a controversial logging and vegetation clearing project (The Reyes Peak Forest Health and Fuels Reduction Project) the U.S. Forest approved nearly two-years ago. The area, enjoyed by climbers, hikers, bikers and other outdoor enthusiasts, is one of the few remaining "sky islands" in California. The lawsuit alleged violations of NEPA, Roadless Area Conservation Rule, Endangered Species Act, and the National Forest Management Act. The AAC is working with their partners in the litigation and their legal team to determine next steps.
The Ultimate Freelancer
Member Spotlight: Lauren DeLaunay Miller
by Hannah Provost
AAC member Drew Smith
Many of our members have a unique relationship with the Club, finding their niche and contributing in their own way. Lauren DeLaunay Miller describes her role with the AAC as “the ultimate freelancer position.” Lauren’s contributions to the Club seem endless: she was a sound engineer and editor for The Cutting Edge Podcast and the American Alpine Club Podcast, the California editor for the American Alpine Journal and Accidents in North American Climbing, and an event coordinator for the Bishop Highball Craggin’ Classic. In addition, she’s spent three summers working for Yosemite Search and Rescue (YOSAR) and is the editor of the newly released anthology Valley of Giants: Stories from Women at the Heart of Yosemite Climbing. We sat down to talk with Lauren about her time at YOSAR, her book, and the story behind her love of the AAC.
The Foundation of Our Progress
Volunteer Spotlight: BIPOC Initiatives at AAC Twin Cities
by Rodel Querubin
PC: AAC member Rodel Querubin
One of our dedicated volunteers from the AAC Twin Cities Chapter, Rodel Querubin reflects on his incredible success in building an (ever growing) BIPOC climbing community there, as well as lessons learned from the process of growing his initiative. Querubin’s analysis of the intentional and thoughtful programming that the Twin Cities Chapter has rolled out over the last few years is an informative roadmap for the climbing world as we work toward being the most inclusive community we can be.