K2 2019 Summer Season Coverage – Too Few Porters, Too Much Snow
The 2019 Karakorum season seems to be getting off on the wrong boot. For over week now we keep hearing about poor weather on K2, now it’s the same story on Broad Peak. Kobler and Parter reports in with their 17 person team: At the moment the weather is not too favourable to go to […]
K2 2019 Summer Season Coverage – Snow Stalling K2 Progress
Only a few teams have arrived at K2 Base Camp thus far while many others are making their way closer by trekking on the Baltoro Glacier. Activity is also picking up on the other 8000ers in Pakistan. Finally, more deaths are being reported on the mountains this summer. Snow at K2 BC Swiss climber, Mike […]
Everest: Nepal Looking at Huge Permit Fee Increase
Its been rumored for the past two years that Nepal will increase the permit fee to climb Everest from the current $11,000 to $15,000 but now, according to conversations I had this week with both major foreign and Nepali operators, there is talk of increasing the Everest permit fees to as much as $25,000 per […]
K2 2019 Summer Season Coverage – First at K2 Base Camp
The first climbers have arrived at K2 Base camp. Mike Horn reported in that he experienced snowfall throughout the entire trek: Hello everyone, this is Mike reporting from K2 base camp. It has been an intense week trekking up to K2 base camp. Heavy snows started falling from day 1 and didn’t stop until we […]
K2 2019 Summer Season Coverage
Welcome to my annual coverage of the K2 summer climbing season. I will be reporting from my home in Colorado this year based on my personal experience of our successful 2014 K2 summit and covering the action the last four years. I try to report on K2 in the same style as my annual Everest […]
Everest 2019: Indians Fake their Summit Claim
Three Indian climbers came home to celebrations and fanfare for summiting Mt. Everest last month but there was only one problem – they never got above Camp 3 at 23,000-feet, much less on the summit at 29,035 feet. Vikas Rana, Shobha Banwala, and Ankush Kasana all from villages in Northern India, were climbing with the […]
Everest 2019: Season Summary The Year Everest Broke
Everest 2019 will go down as the year Everest finally broke. It was one of those seasons where a lot of things went wrong, more things went right and many trends took center stage with new and old lessons for members, support, guide companies and governments. The only remaining question is, is anyone listening? One […]
Everest 2019: Season Over?
One of the last teams known to still be on Everest made a gamble that they could catch the last available window, but as usual this year, the weather had the last word. Scott Woolums with his single client, John, along with three Sherpas: Migma,, Karma, and Namgyl spent much of April trekking in Nepal to […]
Everest 2019: Team Locations and Headlines
LATEST HEADLINE May 31: Season Over 11 Everest Deaths, 900 estimated total summits Welcome to the 2019 edition of Alan Arnette’s annual coverage of the Everest climbing season. I try to provide insight and interpretation of the activities ranging from routes to weather to the challenge and reward of climbing Everest. It’s based on my own three Everest […]
Everest 2019: Summit Wave Recap 7 – Quiet Summits, Another Death
While almost all the teams are packing up at base camps on both sides, a few are still aiming to summit and one did this Monday, May 27 morning. Mike Hammil’s Climbing the Seven Summits‘ team lead by Casey Grom summited with no one else around! They say the weather is perfect and they have […]