How To Climb Denali

denali is one of my favorite mountains to climb alaska in the summer with that 24 hour a day sunlight is just an awesome you feel alive you feel the energy from the sun being in the alaska range is like being back in an ice age but denali is not an easy peak a lot of people rank it up there with mount everest in terms of how difficult it is to climb obviously everest you know the difficulty comes in the high altitude that the thin air whereas denali it's more about the loads and the amount of work you have to do typically you leave denali base camp with 120 pounds of gear about 50 kilos of gear per person and you're dragging a sled or carrying that in a in a pack and it's just an incredible amount of work so it's a very physical peak and also there's no help on denali there are no mules no yaks no porters to help carry carry the gear so everything is on you denali has climbed in the north american summer it's at such an extreme latitude 62-63 degrees north latitude that any other time of the year it's just too cold you climb through a tiny little climbing town named talkeet now alaska that's where you catch the plane into base camp in general you climb a route called the west buttress that's where probably eighty percent of the traffic on denali is and that follows the kiln the glacier which is a very large glacier up most of the route until you start heading up kind of the west buttress proper and it's typically a three-week expedition you're in snow camping on glaciers the entire time the difficulties of denali are not necessarily the technical difficulties it's more the hazards it's one of the most potentially hazardous climbs certainly of the seven summits and in the world really the size of the terrain you know you're on these massive glaciers with huge crevasses and also the the extremes of the weather you get these massive storms that come in and can pummel you with high winds and snow for a week or more so you need to have a certain skill set you know you need to be really competent managing yourself in the cold to tackle denali you know there are certain climbs that you can do that that will help you train for an ascent of denali uh vincent is a great expedition for denali because you know it's the same you're camping in the snow you're dealing with those really extreme colds elbrus in russia climbing lobuche in the himalayas it's about the same altitude you're dealing with the fixed line climbing so that's a great prep climb also orizaba in mexico and the ecuadorian volcanoes you know of course denali is an extremely cold peak especially up high on summit day so you need to have the absolute warmest gear you can get that means triple boots that means the heaviest down parka and down pants you can get uh big mitts um you know certainly heavy balaclava and face masks also one piece of gear that you're using on denali that you don't use on many other peaks except for maybe vinson is sled it can take some getting used to certainly like keeping the center of gravity low on the sled so it's not always tipping over on you and just kind of how to lash your duffel bag on there is is really important denali is not one of those peaks that you can just have good general fitness and go climb you really need to train specifically for it it's such a big challenge that you really need to be training you know five six months in advance if not a year you might leave base camp carrying 120 pounds 50 kilos of gear between your pack and your sled you need to train for that you can't just show up and expect to be able to to carry 120 pounds if you're just out training with 30 pounds so dragging a tire behind you on a harness on dirt roads on a beach training specifically for that is very important for denali so obviously you need a huge pack the biggest pack you can find it needs to be over a hundred liters so the mountain hardwear bmg is great option uh the hyper light 5400 porter is kind of the smallest you'd want to go i think you know osprey makes some really big packs as well those are the options you want to be looking at it's really important to maintain the hygiene on the mountain and pack out what you pack in so trash obviously you know you can collect that trash as you go up the mountain you can cash it you can leave it out of camp pick it up on your way down to save yourself that weight in terms of human waste you use something called a cmc a clean mountain can and then you seal these up and again you can cash these pick them up on your way back down drop them off at the ranger station and they take care of them for you if you're climbing with a guide service pricing amongst the the different concessionaires on denali is generally about the same it's absolutely critical to make sure that you know the people in your team have the requisite skills so glacier travel crevasse rescue and to be able to perform these skills in adverse conditions really if you're climbing on your own just remember that you you need to be a very experienced climber it's a very wild extreme environment you know you can get into trouble pretty easily there are lots of hazards so make sure you have the requisite skills you need to stay safe on denali

Channel: Climbing the Seven Summits

Views: 68,279

Keywords: climbing the seven summits, seven summits, Mike Hamill, 7 summits, mountaineering, climbing, mountains, mount everest, climbing the 7 summits, ctss, denali, how to climb denali, mt mckinley, mckinley, climbing denali, west buttress denali, denali guides, michael hamill, alaska, alaska mountaineering, alaska mountains, alaska climbing, north america climbing, mountaineering america

Id: Dr_7msb_9aY

Length: 5min 46sec (346 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 02 2021