Climbing

Women have always been at the center of Yosemite, climbing on the walls, crafting their own equipment, establishing new routes, and showing us all what it means to dance with rock. Lynn Hill freed the Nose, Beth Rodden established the hardest single pitch climb in the Valley, and Sylvia Vidal raised the bar for hard aid solos. More recently, Libby Sauter, Josie McKee, and Quinn Brett completed mind-blowing speed ascents and link-ups, and Chelsea Griffie became the first African American woman to climb El Cap. Read more…

I first set foot on Mount Baker’s Coleman Glacier in August of 1972, accompanied by my friend Mary Bramble. Mary and I met two years before climbing Glacier Peak with the Mazamas, and had done some hiking and climbing since. ‘72 was also the year I had begun climbing outside the club (to the anxiety of my parents), with friends who possessed the same desire to lead climb on more difficult peaks. Read more…

Meryl Lassen (she/they) is a 7-year member, Super Volunteer, and member of our Equity & Inclusion Working Group. She has written about her personal journey to find belonging in the outdoors, and she’s an outspoken supporter of The Mountaineers efforts to create a community where all people feel belonging. Read more…

Unsurprisingly, August was a busy time for The Mountaineers community. From the looks of these trip reports, it’s clear that we are all reveling in the ongoing late summer weather that affords such tremendous outdoor opportunities here in the mountains and waters of the Pacific Northwest. Read more…

Get to know this week's member spotlight! Read more…

“Almost 60 years after the first successful American ascent of Mount Everest, a team of U.S. climbers aims to make history once again on the world’s highest peak. Led by Phil Henderson, a former instructor at the National Outdoor Leadership School and a veteran  mountaineer, this group, made up of athletes from across the country, aspires to be the first all-Black American expedition to reach the summit.” wrote James Edward Mills, Mountaineers Books Author and freelance journalist, in an article for Outside Business Journal announcing the project in late August 2021. Read more…

Steve Swenson and Scott Johnston, both 67, have a combined 103 years of climbing between them. Steve is still making first ascents in the Karakoram, and Scott is an active climber and co-founder of Uphill Athlete, a service that offers educational resources, training plans, and coaching to amateur and professional mountain sports athletes. Read more…

Jason Hardrath is an Oregon schoolteacher and an enthusiastic Fastest Known Time (FKT) participant. His passion for fitness began in middle school, where he set the audacious goal of achieving a sub-6 minute mile, and carried him into his mid-twenties as a runner, triathlete, and climber. Then a horrific car accident changed his life in an instant. He fought for years to recover, using the mountains as a place for motivation and healing. Read more…

When our volunteers designed our donor-funded Seattle Program Center (SPC), which opened in 2009, the goal was to create a top-notch instructional center to teach outdoor skills. As we've grown, we continue to add new features and spaces for experiential learning. In total, the Seattle Program Center has nearly 400 bolts around the building, and we've been able to decrease our trips into the mountains by 40%, decreasing our carbon footprint on our wild places. Read more…

Last Sunday, search and rescue teams responded to an emergency call from a popular early-season climb in the Olympic mountains. Two climbers slipped on a steep snowy slope while climbing The Brothers. One fell “into an opening in the snow and over a rock face with running melt water,” and sadly did not survive. This tragic accident has brought an annually recurring hazard back into the thoughts of everyone within the outdoor community: the danger posed by snow bridges.  Read more…

As Mountaineers, we are committed to learning from our experiences. We examine every incident that happens on a Mountaineers trip for opportunities to improve the ways we explore and teach. Our volunteer safety committee reviews every incident report and picks a few each month to share as examples of ‘Lessons Learned’. The trip report below describes what happened on this trip, in the leader’s own words, and outlines the lessons the leader has identified. In some cases, we offer additional key learnings from the incident. Read more…

While traveling solo to remote and wild places, I had been in some dicey situations. The risks were real, but I knew of no one else interested in exploring the nether regions of wilderness, nor the Himalayan front range from east to west, nor the ancient trade routes that connect Tibet to India through massive ranges, passes that cut deep, from north to south where borders often go unmarked – and so I had gone alone. Read more…

As Mountaineers, we are committed to learning from our experiences. We examine every incident that happens on a Mountaineers trip for opportunities to improve the ways we explore and teach. Our volunteer safety committee reviews every incident report and picks a few each month to share as examples of ‘Lessons Learned’. The trip report below describes what happened on this trip, in the leader’s own words, and outlines the lessons the leader has identified. In some cases, we offer additional key learnings from the incident. Read more…

This year was a hard one. I hit rock bottom mid-May when I unexpectedly found myself crying alone in a tent in the middle of my living room floor. The chasm between the person I had planned to be when I set goals for 2020 and the person I actually was felt insurmountable. My carefully made plans, proudly anticipated fitness milestones, and dreams of adventure were slipping through my fingers. Read more…

It’s a chilly March morning in Provo, Utah, 2020. Kimber Cross has been flown here by the outdoor meal brand Peak Refuel to shoot a short film about her journey into ice climbing. As the team walks down the snow-packed trail to a frozen waterfall, Kimber feels the eyes of passersby, and they’re staring. Maybe it’s because of the big, red cameras that stand in contrast to the stark landscape, but an old fear starts to creep into her psyche, a fear that tells her to hide. All eyes focus on the tool strapped to her pack. Read more…

Join Jennifer Hull, author of Shook: An Earthquake, a Legendary Mountain Guide, and Everest's Deadliest Day, and mountain guide Dave Hahn for a virtual event to benefit the Juniper Fund, Alex Lowe Charitable Foundation, and The Mountaineers. Read more…

In the past several years, climbing El Capitan in Yosemite National Park has blown up in the mainstream consciousness. With Free Solo winning an Oscar and the Dawn Wall ascent getting publicized in The New York Times, it seems as if everyone has a clear picture of what climbing El Cap is like. It is easy to imagine being up on the side of the wall when you see it on a high definition movie theater screen. But is it as easy as people make it look?  Read more…

The Mountaineers Ten Essentials™ dates back to our climbing courses of the 1930s. This widely respected safety and packing system was formalized in the third edition of Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills, released in 1974. Each of the nine editions of Freedom, as it is affectionately known, was written entirely by volunteers and reflects the collective wisdom of hundreds of outdoor skills instructors. The list has always sought to answer two basic questions: Read more…

While it's been a slower summer than usual for our Seattle Branch Climbing Committee and community, we have taught a number of students and enjoyed a handful of socially responsible trips together. Here are a few highlights from our summer, along with an invite to our reunion party and a call to join our committee as a leader: Read more…

UPDATE 10/15/20 - CLIMBING HOLDS HAVE SOLD OUT. 

Over the past year, Mountaineers volunteers and staff have chipped in to help clean, update, and repair our various climbing structures at the Seattle Program Center. The goal of the ongoing project is to improve the safety of the climbing structures with safe, clear color coded routes. Additionally, we hope the improvements will facilitate better teaching with more anchor stations, cleaner climbing lines, and offer more technical routes.  Read more…

Every night after putting my boys to bed, I ran. On dark nights my feet would thud against the pavement, headlamp shining through the rain. I did it because I had to – it pushed out the despondency and grief that had been following me for almost two years. I knew pushing my body would bring me closer to what I needed: self-confidence, a distraction from the pain, physical and emotional strength. I moved toward my goal, one foot at a time. Read more…

We're excited to be partnering with Climbers of Color in support of their mission to create more leaders of color in mountaineering. Established in 2017, Climbers of Color is a Washington State nonprofit that aims to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in the climbing and mountaineering community by developing leaders of color. To accomplish its mission, Climbers of Color provides supportive mentorship, technical training from BIPOC professional guides, and access to key resources including gear and scholarships. Read more…

Theresa Silveyra and Amber Chang are both accomplished climbers and mountaineers. They recently teamed up for Theresa’s #30Before30 project: an ambitious plan for Teresa to climb Wy’east (Mt. Hood) 30 times before Theresa turned 30. Amber joined Teresa for a celebratory summit number 31! Read more…

The American Alpine Club, Appalachian Mountain Club, Colorado Mountain Club, Mazamas, and The Mountaineers join with those speaking out and taking action against racist, sexist, and otherwise derogatory route names, and we welcome the conversation about how best to move forward as a community.  Read more…

When my partner and I moved to Seattle two years ago, we both felt pretty lucky. Here we’d found a place with year-round outdoor activities, a cohort of adventure partners, and views of the mountains from every angle. I was warned that winters could be tough in the Pacific Northwest and to be prepared to go a while without seeing the sun. I steeled myself for this reality, checking the weather app every morning with my coffee to see how many minutes of daylight we’d be gifted that day. Read more…

Exposing ourselves to the most unforgiving elements of nature can be cathartic, electrifying – and dangerous. Uncertainty is a necessary part of her appeal, but when Mother Nature (or plain bad luck) starts baring her teeth, today we have measures in place to help you get home safely. Read more…

One of the most important relationships of my life is not my husband. My (other) other half can complete my sentences, always knows just what to say, and somehow manages to love me before I’ve had my morning coffee. She catches me when I fall, keeps my spirts high, and ropes me into some of the best adventures I’ve ever had. Yes, my husband knows, and the three of us get along great. I’m talking, of course, about my climbing partner.  Read more…

The Spanish Flu swept the globe in 1918, just over 100 years ago. While we could find little reference of how this impacted Mountaineers at the time, we’re watching as a similar pandemic grinds our spring and summer plans to a halt. At the time of writing, the Stay Home, Stay Safe order is still in place, and we don’t know how and when getting outside will return to ’normal.’ So for this Retro Rewind, we decided to look back one century ago at the summer excursion of 1920, to see just what Mountaineers members were up to and find inspiration in their intrepid spirits.  Read more…

With great sadness we share the news of the passing of Marty Babare, an active 23-year member of The Mountaineers Tacoma Branch. Marty was at his cabin in Hood Canal when he suffered a heart attack on Saturday, June 13, 2020. Multiple resuscitation attempts were unsuccessful.  Read more…

“Hiking is free. As long as you have shoes and an Orca card, you can go anywhere.” Read more…