The trekking has started! The weather Gods permitted the whole team to fly to the mountain village of Lukla (2850m/9,350ft) and complete the first day of trekking towards Everest Base Camp. Madison Mountaineering guide Terray Sylvester provides a recap of the day:
Hello! This is Terray calling in for the 2022 Madison Mountaineering Mount Everest expedition! It’s Monday, April 4th. Today we flew from Kathmandu to Lukla. We had good weather for our flights which was nice because it’s been a little rainy and hazy lately and there was some concern that we would not be able to fly up to Lukla.
Then we trekked on to Phakding (2640m/8,661ft). So we’re here tonight, just starting dinner, and looking forward to our trek up to Namche (3450m/11,319ft) tomorrow. The weather is nice, warm, a little cloudy, but dry!
We’ll be in touch!
Ready to fly to Lukla!
Trekking to Phakding
Mani Stones
Taking a break on the trek to Phakding
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Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates on select expeditions. Just say, “Alexa, play my Madison Mountaineering flash briefing.“
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Today the climbing and trekking teams enjoy a wonderful tour of some of the major sites of Kathmandu and are getting ready to fly up to the mountain village of Luka to begin the trek to Everest base camp tomorrow. Madison Mountaineering guide Terray Sylvester provides a recap of the day:
Tomorrow our plan is to fly to Lukla so we can begin our trek up to Everest Base Camp. That’s an exciting day and so far the weather forecast looks good! So if all goes as planned, our fixed-winged flights will depart Kathmandu early in the morning and will be in Lukla in time for breakfast.
So all is well here in Nepal and we’ll be in touch!
A stone carving at Pashupatinath Temple
Trekker Ryan S. visiting a Buddhist Temple in Boudha
Butter lamps at Boudhanath Stupa
Pashupatinath Temple
Boudhanath Stupa
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:
Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates on select expeditions. Just say, “Alexa, play my Madison Mountaineering flash briefing.“
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Welcome to Kathmandu! The Madison Mountaineering Everest 2022 team has arrived in Kathmandu to kick off the Everest expedition and base camp trek. Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, provided this update:
Hello! This is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Everest expedition team! Today is April 2nd and all of our members are here now in Kathamandu. We just finished our gear checks today and had a nice team dinner and we’re looking forward to a city tour tomorrow. Everyone’s doing well and we’re happy to be here in Nepal and excited to get the adventure underway.
Thanks and we’ll check in soon!
Sara S. chatting with Madison Mountaineering guide Cacho Beiza at the gear check
Climber Sara S. very excited about all the duffels and being in Kathmandu!!
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:
Enable the skill and add to your flash briefing to hear Garrett Madison’s daily audio expedition updates on select expeditions. Just say, “Alexa, play my Madison Mountaineering flash briefing.“
The Aconcagua team are now all back down to base camp safely after standing on the summit of the highest point in South America. Here’s expedition leader Garrett Madison with today’s expedition dispatch:
Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Aconcagua team dispatch. Today’s Friday, February 11th.
Today we descended from Camp 3 (5989m/19,650ft) on Aconcagua down to base camp (4367m/14,327ft). We had a nice day. Got down in the early afternoon, set up camp, took some showers, had a nice barbeque lunch, and a celebration dinner this evening. Everyone’s doing great, we’re happy to be down here in base camp after our summit day yesterday where everyone made it to the top and had great views from the summit.
We’ve heading out tomorrow, hiking back to the Horcones trailhead and then driving to Mendoza.
All’s well here in Argentina. We’ll check in soon.
On the way up to the top of Aconcagua
Celebration toast in base camp for 100% Aconcagua summit success!
Climbing to the top of Aconcagua at sunrise
View from Aconcagua high camp of the moon and sunset
Sunset on Aconcagua
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:
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Fantastic news! The entire Aconcagua team stood on the summit (6961m/22,837ft) today and are now safely back down to Camp 3. Here’s team member Krisli Melesk reporting the happy news:
I have some excellent news! The whole team who we started with in Mendoza has just summitted and we are back safely in Camp 3! We just has some nice beverages and also some snacks. Everybody is in high spirits and we’re looking forward to heading back to base camp for some warm showers tomorrow and some more beverages, maybe. Haha.
Everybody’s doing great and we have an excellent team. Everybody been super casual and super nice. The weather has been amazing today, we were so lucky – clear skies and beautiful views.
I think that’s me over and out. Lots of love to everybody, family, and friends. Bye now!
(photo from the Madison Mountaineering Aconcagua archives)
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:
Our 2022 Aconcagua team has moved up to High Camp (C3) (5989m/19,650ft) and is in position for the summit attempt tonight! Here’s team member, Todd Ammerman, with today’s dispatch:
We moved from Camp 2 to Camp 3 which I have now learned is at approximately 19,700ft (6005m). We are getting well hydrated and fueled up. We’ll start tomorrow for an early summit push. Everybody is here and in good shape and good spirit.
We are looking for a wonderful day tomorrow. Hopefully this next dispatch will have great success stories. Until then!
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:
Making a slight change of plans to optimize the summit day forecasted weather, our Aconcagua team made a light carry up to High Camp (C3) (5989m/19,650ft) and returned to Nido de Condores Camp (C2) (5522m/18,117ft) for the night. Calling in via sat phone, here’s team member Peter Horsman with today’s expedition dispatch:
Instead of moving to Camp 3, we actually had a change in schedule because it looks like weather is significantly improving. So instead of summiting on the 9th, we are now summiting on the 10th, hopefully. So today we actually had a great day. We had, again, a wonderful breakfast by our Agentinian guides Neno and Cacho. Then we took some gear and food and clothing up to Camp 3. A pretty nice hike – wonderful weather, great scenery.
Overall the team is doing really, really well. We’re all feeling very strong and are very excited to move to Camp 3 tomorrow where we will then spend a couple of hours of sleep and then the day after tomorrow we’re going to go for a summit attempt.
All is well here in Camp 2 and Melina, I love you. Bye bye.
(photo from the Madison Mountaineering Aconcagua archives)
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:
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Our Aconcagua team moved up to Nido de Condores Camp (C2) (5522m/18,117ft) yesterday and are enjoying a rest day today. Here’s team member, Peter Horsman, with today’s dispatch and the plan for the days ahead:
Today we are having a really nice rest day. We’ve just been served amazing pizza by Neno and Cacho, who are our Argentinian guides and are amazing. Everything is going really well! The team’s feeling well. It’s a really nice, sunny day here. We’re all feeling the altitude a little bit, but that’s normal at this altitude.
Our plan is to move to Camp 3 tomorrow. And then, hopefully, try for the summit on the 9th, so the day after tomorrow.
Everybody is feeling really strong. Garrett‘s doing well, he’s smiling, cutting the pizza for us! Maybe the whole team can say something like… I don’t know… shout something. “Yee-haw!” That was [garbled] in case you were wondering. “Viva Aconcagua!” Viva Aconcagua, that’s good.
All right, well thank you. You’ll hear more from us tomorrow. Melina, I love you and I’ll see you soon. Bye, bye.
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:
Our Aconcagua team moved up to Camp 1 (5060m/16,600ft) (aka Canada Camp) today where they plan to spend one night before making a single carry/move to Camp 2 (5522m/18,117ft) tomorrow. Here’s team member, Josh G., from Camp 1 with today’s expedition dispatch:
Hey! Josh here from Aconcagua in Argentina! We made it up to Camp 1 today. 2,200 foot climb and made it in three hours and ten minutes with all of our team members making it safely up to Camp 1. Tomorrow we move up to Camp 2 at about 5500m (18,045ft) and it’s going to be one of our heaviest days. So, we’re looking forward to the challenge.
I would like to say hey to [garbled], April, and all my friends back in Helen, Georgia. I miss you guys!
Camp 1 on Aconcagua
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:
Back in base camp (4367m/14,327ft) for the night, our Aconcagua team completed their gear carry to Camp 1 (5060m/16,600ft) today to prepare for their move up to Camp 1 tomorrow, weather pending. Here’s team member, Erwin Visser, from Plaza de Mulas base camp with today’s expedition dispatch:
Hey! This is Erwin Visser calling from Aconcagua base camp. We had a great day today.
We went up to camp 1, or also called Camp Canada (5060m/16,600ft), to do a carry. We brought water and fuel and food already to camp 1 so when we are going to go on our move trying to make the summit, we already didn’t have to carry that up at the same time. It was a pretty special day today for me – because it was my first time reaching 5000m! I did all my climbing in Europe in the Alps as well as in the state of Washington and, frankly, there are no peaks there of 5000m. So it was kind of a personal record and a nice moment for me to hit that altitude.
We have a great team here. I saw everybody made it easy up to camp 1. Everybody’s pretty strong here, so it was great to see how well we did – how fast we did. The second milestone for today is that we also did our medical test and everybody passed – also great news. They test your blood pressure, as well as your blood oxygen levels to make sure that you are safe going up to the mountain. And great to hear that everybody made it. So, yeah, we as a team we’re ready to go when the weather is good. Tomorrow that is our plan. Our plan is that when the weather is good, we are going up to camp 1 with all our stuff and start our summit attempt. Which means going to camp 1, camp 2, camp 3, hopefully the summit, camp 3, and then back to base camp.
I also have a couple of personal messages here: First, big thanks to all the people that are following us as a team, but also personally me. Your encourging words or texts means a lot to everyone. A couple of call outs specifically, one is that it’s really super to hear that my nine-year-old nephew Will that his whole class is following the climb. It’s exciting to hear that they do it! And hey Will when I’m back I’m coming to your class again and will show the pictures. Yeah, also a quick shout out to Juliette, my 17-year-old daughter who becomes 18 on the 12th. I feel really bad that I’m not going to be there and hey Juliette I’m going to make it up with you so I promise.
Yes, that’s kinda it. Hey as a closing I really wanna thank everybody again following us, following the whole team. Special call out to Sara, my Mom of course, Karen, and all the kids.
So hey we will check in with a new dispatch hopefully tomorrow. Thank you!
Camp 1 on Aconcagua
Plaza de Mulas base camp on Aconcagua
Sunset on Aconcagua
Trekking up to base camp on Aconcagua
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:
