All Antarctica expedition dispatches

Carrying loads towards Low Camp

Hauling sleds!

After a day of carrying loads up towards Low Camp, expedition leader, Garrett Madison, checks in via sat phone from Vinson base camp:

Hello, this is Garrett Madison calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Mount Vinson expedtion #1. Today is December 22nd and we are at Vinson base camp. We had a great day. We carried a load up part way to Low Camp, returned back to base camp and organized our gear and our food for our move up tomorrow to Low Camp. Everyone is doing great here in base camp, weather is improving and we’re looking forward to moving up the mountain soon. Everything’s well here at Vinson.  We’ll check in soon!

(photo:  Madison Mountaineering archive)

By the way, it’s not too early to start making your plans to join us on Mount Vinson for the 2020/2021 season next December!  Contact our office for details.

In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the teams as they make their attempts to summit the highest mountain in Antarctica on:

– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:

  • Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates

– Instagram:

– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking maps:

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Mount Vinson Base Camp

Our team has arrived at Mount Vinson Base Camp and expedition leader, Garrett Madison, provides a brief recap of today’s activities via satellite phone:

Hello! This is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Mount Vinson climb #1. We made it to Mount Vinson base camp today. The Twin Otter flew us out of Union Glacier camp. We arrived at Vinson base camp in the afternoon, set up our camp and cooked dinner.  We had a great meal and now were just tucked into our tents and our sleeping bags getting ready for a good night’s rest.  All’s well here at Vinson base camp.  We’ll check in soon.  Thanks!

(photo:  Madison Mountaineering archives)

By the way, it’s not too early to start making your plans to join us on Mount Vinson for the 2020/2021 season next December!  Contact our office for details.

In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the teams as they make their attempts to summit the highest mountain in Antarctica on:

– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:

  • Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates

– Instagram:

– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking maps:

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Vinson team arrives Union Glacier camp, Antarctica

Union Glacier Camp

Garrett and our first Mount Vinson team for the season have arrived at Union Glacier camp, Antarctica and are looking forward to flying on to Mount Vinson base camp today:

Hello, this is Garrett Madison calling in for the Mount Vinson team #1. We have arrived at Union Glacier camp! We got in about 1:00 AM today, Saturday December 21st. We’re really happy to get out of Punta Arenas and had a smooth flight to Antarctica and landing at Union Glacier camp.

 

We got in, had a nice meal and set up our tents and now we are all tucked in and looking forward to a good sleep and having breakfast tomorrow at 9:00 AM. Hopefully the weather will be good tomorrow and we can fly over to Vinson base. We’ll check in soon, thanks!

(photo:  Linda Wohlgemuth from the Madison Mountaineering archives)

By the way, it’s not too early to start making your plans to join us on Mount Vinson for the 2020/2021 season next December!  Contact our office for details.

In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the teams as they make their attempts to summit the highest mountain in Antarctica on:

– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:

  • Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates

– Instagram:

– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking maps:

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Vinson team #1 standing by in Punta Arenas

Punta Arenas

Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, called in today reporting on the kick-off of our first Mount Vinson expedition of the season in Antarctica:

Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Mount Vinson expedition #1. Today is Wednesday, December 18th, and we are in Punta Arenas. We’ve been here a few days, all packed up, and ready to go. Everything is loaded on the Ilyushin Il-76 jet ready to fly us from here to Union Glacier camp, Antarctica.

 

But, the weather is bad so we can’t fly so we’re just waiting here. But, we are making the most of it. We’ve had a great time visiting the penguins, checking out the museums in town, walking along the coastline, and enjoying some great meals here in Punta Arenas. Some wonderful restaurants!

 

So everyone’s doing well, we’re having a good time, and just hoping with fingers crossed that we will have some good weather in a couple of days to fly to Antarctica.

Mount Vinson team #1 ready to go!

Dinner in Punta Arenas

By the way, it’s not too early to start making your plans to join us on Mount Vinson for the 2020/2021 season next December!  Contact our office for details.

In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the teams as they make their attempts to summit the highest mountain in Antarctica on:

– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:

  • Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates

– Instagram:

– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking maps:

 

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Mount Vinson Kicking-off Soon!

We are excited to once again be heading off to Antarctica to climb the southernmost of the Seven Summits, Mount Vinson.  The first of our two expeditions this season heads out on December 18th.  Stay tuned here for daily updates once we get underway.

By the way, it’s not too early to start making your plans to join us on Mount Vinson for the 2020/2021 season next December!  Contact our office for details.

In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the teams as they make their attempts to summit the highest mountain in Antarctica on:

– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:

  • Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates

– Instagram:

– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking maps:

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From Mount Vinson High Camp to Union Glacier Camp

Union Glacier Camp

Our final Mount Vinson expedition of the season was able to go all the way from Mount Vinson High Camp to Union Glacier Camp in a day.  Listen in to expedition leader Garrett Madison‘s audio expedition dispatch:

Hello!  This is Garrett calling in for the Mount Vinson expedition with Jim Lumberg and Garrett Madison (in conjunction with PolarExplorers).  Today is January 19th and we have arrived back at Union Glacier Camp.  We had a great summit yesterday on Mount Vinson, the highest peak in Antarctica.  Today we woke up at High Camp, packed up our camp, descended down to Low Camp, and then all the way to Vinson Base Camp.  We were very fortunate to be met by a Twin Otter aircraft which then shuttled us 45-minutes back to Union Glacier Camp, the main hub here in Antarctica.

 

The plan is that tomorrow we hope to fly out on the llyshun jet back to Punta Arenas, Chile.  Then, in the next few days, be homeward bound.  We were very lucky to get out today from Mount Vinson to Union Glacier.  We are both doing well, just had a great dinner, and looking forward to some much needed rest.

 

Thanks for following along.  We will check in soon.

(photo:  Madison Mountaineering 2019 Mount Vinson team two)

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Vinson Summit – making 3 for 3!

Climbing up Mount Vinson

This just in from expedition leader, Garrett Madison.  Our third and final expedition of the season reached the Mount Vinson summit making 3 for 3!

Hello, this is Garrett calling in for Mount Vinson expedition with Jim Lumberg and Garrett Madison.  Today is January 18th and we summited Mount Vinson today!  We had a beautiful summit day with the mountain all to ourselves.  We are back at High Camp about to have some pad thai dehydrated meals.

 

Our plan is to head down tomorrow to Vinson Base Camp and hopefully soon catch a flight to back to Union Glacier Camp.  It’s been a great climb so far.  We just have to get down the steep fixed rope section tomorrow and down on to Vinson Base Camp.

 

All is well here and it’s been a wonderful expedition!  This is Garrett Madison and Madison Mountaineering in collaboration with PolarExplorers.

(photo:  Madison Mountaineering 2019 team two)

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The move to High Camp

Branscomb Ridge

Our final Mount Vinson expedition, in conjunction with PolarExplorers, made the move to High Camp today as reported in the satellite phone dispatch from expedition leader, Garrett Madison:

Hi, this is Garrett calling in for the Mount Vinson expedition number three with Garret and Jim Lumberg.  We are up at high camp today on January 17th.  We made the push from Low Camp up to High Camp after waking up this morning at Low Camp and having a nice breakfast.  Then we climbed up the fixed ropes about 1,000 meters or 3,300 feet to High Camp.  It was a little cool and windy once we got to High Camp.  But we managed to set up tents, get some water going, had dinner.  And now we are tucked into our sleeping bags, ready for a nice long sleep.

 

There were a couple of other teams that were up here and summitted today:  the Alpine Ascents and IMG crews.  They will be heading down tomorrow and it will be just us up here!  So we are looking forward to having the mountain all to ourselves.  We are going to take a rest day tomorrow and see what the weather forecast brings for a potential summit the following day.

 

Everything is great here on Vinson!  We will check in soon.

(photo:  Madison Mountaineering Vinson 2019 team two)

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Mount Vinson Team Two Photos!

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Union Glacier to Mount Vinson Low Camp!

Twin Otter aircraft at Vinson base camp

Our third and final Mount Vinson expedition for 2019 got going in style today, moving all the way from Union Glacier to Mount Vinson Low Camp as reported by expedition leader, Garrett Madison:

Hello, this is Garrett calling in for Mount Vinson expedition number three:  Garrett Madison and Jim Lumberg in collaboration with PolarExplorers!  Today we left Union Glacier camp and flew via Twin Otter aircraft to Mount Vinson base camp at 7,800 ft..  We rigged our sleds and backpacks and started climbing up to Low Camp.  It took us about five and a half hours to get to Low Camp.  We arrived, pitched our tents, fired up our stoves, started melting snow for water, and cooked a great dinner.  Now we’re getting ready for bed.

 

Tomorrow our plan is to climb up the fixed ropes to High Camp, gaining just over 3,000 ft..  Then we will settle into High Camp around 12,400 ft. and see what the weather brings.  We are both doing well here!  It’s a beautiful day on Mount Vinson – sunny / no wind.  We are the only ones here in camp, so we have the mountain to ourselves!  It’s really special to be here.

 

We will check in soon.  Thanks!

(photo:  Vinson 2019 team two from earlier this week)

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