Hello, from Kyrgyzstan! The Madison Mountaineering team has arrived, marking the start of their Peak Lenin expedition. Our team has slowly trickled in over the last few days, and came together today for a gear check, orientation, and team dinner to kick things off. It’s been an enjoyable start with tours of the city and some rest after the long days of travel. Tomorrow, we’ll be boarding another flight to continue the journey towards the climb ahead! Expedition leader, Terray Sylvester checks in with this inaugural dispatch to kick off the 2026 Peak Lenin expedition:

Hello! This is Terray calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Peak Lenin expedition. Today is June 30th and we are in Bishkek (800m/2,600ft), the capital of Kyrgyzstan!

Over the last few days, our climbers have arrived from their home countries. So we spent today doing an orientation and gear checks, and then enjoying Bishkek in the summer. It’s a beautiful city! We were out sightseeing today, and we had some great views of the Tian Shan Mountains, just outside of town. We just wrapped up our team dinner and now we’re heading to bed early.

The plan for tomorrow is to fly south to the city of Osh (963m/3,159ft). We’ll spend one night there and then we’ll start the drive to Peak Lenin Base Camp (3600m/11,811ft).

All is well here in Central Asia, and we’ll be in touch tomorrow.

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In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow our teams as they make their attempts on the world’s most formidable mountains on:

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

• Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear our daily audio expedition updates on select expeditions.  Just say, “Alexa, play my flash briefing.“

– Instagram:

• @MadisonMtng
• @GarrettMadison1
• @terray_s