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Image 1 of 2: This photo and the one below originally appeared as a panorama across two pages in Alpinist 75; it has been split into two frames to allow for better viewing on the webpage. It shows the view from Mt. Ilse (2506m), during its first ascent by Natalia Martinez and Camilo Rada in April 2021, in the Southern Patagonian Ice Field. Mt. Ilse is named for Ilse von Rentzell, who roamed the area in 1933. Only one of the summits in this photo has been climbed, Martinez says. [Photo] Camilo Rada/UNCHARTED project

Living Maps of Patagonia: Toward a New Future of Exploration

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Natalia Martinez and Camilo Rada, titled “Living Maps of Patagonia: Toward a New Future of Exploration.” They write: “We decided…to create living maps. These are maps that do not adhere to official names. Instead, we follow a historical approach trying to help restore the heritage of Indigenous people and explorers. We constantly update the maps to record each new ascent, each new encounter and each new adventure. Our aim is to create maps that are not only a miniature of a place’s geography, but that convey the feelings the geography evokes as well as the passions of those who have striven to unravel it…. Many of the unclimbed peaks that appear insignificant on sheets of contour lines could present some of the finest alpine challenges of these regions.”

Phil Henderson on the summit of Denali (20,310'), Dena'ina, Upper Kuskokwim and Koyukon Dene land, in the Alaska Range, June 27, 2013. [Photo] Kt Miller

Climbers of Color Come Full Circle: The Future of Expanded Representation

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by James Edward Mills, titled “Climbers of Color Come Full Circle: The Future of Expanded Representation.” He writes: “Through our personal initiative, skills and agency, people of color are affirming their roles as leaders in the climbing world. [Philip] Henderson is now organizing the first all-Black American team to attempt the world’s highest mountain in 2022. He calls it the Full Circle Everest Expedition…. Each member of this team aims to share their experience to inspire others to follow in their example…. US alpinists of color are also continuing to pursue cutting-edge objectives….”

A mountaineering chronicler and an occasional critic of the overuse of communications technology, Damien Gildea describes this photo of himself in the Sentinel Range of Antarctica. [Photo] Stephen Chaplin

Taking Time To Tell: The Future of Trip Reports

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Damien Gildea, titled “Taking Time To Tell: The Future of Trip Reports.” He writes: “Alpinism is always about choices, and new technologies keep giving us more avenues to talk about our climbs. The choice of expedition media, how we use it, but also when we use it, can have lasting impacts…. If you choose to tell, by waiting for a while after the summit, you might create a more meaningful and accurate narrative…. The ego hits from ‘Likes’ are temporary, but an honest insight, gained after a period of reflection, might last indefinitely, or at least outlast you.”

A screenshot of images from Instagram: #myalpinelesson, a hashtag launched to encourage climbers to share stories of their accidents and close calls to help others improve their risk management skills. [Images] Instagram, #myalpinelesson

Sharing Misadventures, not just Adventures: The Future of Climbing Accidentology

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Maud Vanpoulle, titled “Sharing Misadventures, not just Adventures: The Future of Climbing Accidentology.” She writes: “Alpinists are often reluctant to talk about their own accidents. There can be a sense of guilt that haunts survivors or a reluctance to admit mistakes…. A change of attitude seems to be taking place at the heart of different mountain communities. Among other examples, social sciences researchers, in collaboration with the administrators of the French Web forum camptocamp.org, have established a debriefing system for ‘incidents and accidents’ that permits anonymous reporting and that encourages users to ‘participate in the construction of a collective knowledge base.'”

Aaron Mike before the couloir he skied on Dibee Nitsaa, Dinetah, with fellow Dine/Navajo mountaineer Len Necefer. [Photo] Isaiah Branch-Boyle

Sounds of Ceremony: The Future of Sacred Landscapes

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Len Necefer, titled “Sounds of Ceremony: The Future of Sacred Landscapes.” He writes: “Alpinism has provided me with a means to grow deeper roots into my own personal identity and the long-standing bonds with mountains of my Navajo heritage…. Within cultures around the world, the existence of mountain landscapes serves as an intergenerational reminder of the sacred. In our shared future of climate change, we must all ensure that we steward mountain landscapes for the generations ahead–to keep intact the many ways they nourish ecosystems and societies, but also to preserve the varied connections that we each maintain with them.”

Mt. Khumbila, Khumbu, Nepal. [Photo] Un Sherpa

Mountain As Metaphor: A Future of Multiple Worldviews

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Dr. Pasang Yangjee Sherpa, titled “Mountain As Metaphor: A Future of Multiple Worldviews.” She writes: “In the future, I hope alpinism is able to project multiple worldviews together at once–not as a competition to establish a hierarchy, but as a way to learn from each other and to treat everyone with dignity. I hope alpinism is not just about stepping on the mountain, but about strengthening our relationship with it and with each other….”

Koyo Zom (6877m), Hindu Raj range, Pakistan. [Photo] Tom Livingstone

Free and High: A Future of Cutting-Edge Alpinism

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, including this one by Tom Livingstone, titled “Free and High: A Future of Cutting-Edge Alpinism.”

Yangmaiyong (5958m), Sichuan, China. [Photo] Tamotsu Nakamura

The Cresset and the Light: The Many Futures of Alpinism

“The Future of Alpinism,” is the theme of Alpinist 75–which is now on newsstands and in our online store. This special issue includes 18 essays from authors around the globe, along with comments and quotes from many others on the topic. We are sharing eight of these essays online, starting with the introduction by Editor-in-Chief Katie Ives, titled “The Cresset and the Light: The Many Futures of Alpinism.” She observes that “the story of the future of alpinism will not be one story, but many stories…reflecting a wide range of values, perspectives and experiences. It became impossible for me to read these essays without thinking about this collection as a letter to the future. Messages of fears and hopes”–not just about climbing by itself, but also about the broader world in which it takes place.

The route line for Jaume Peiro and Alex Gonzalez' Big Fighter (6c [5.11b/c] A2, 740m) on Chaupi Huanca. [Photo] Alex Gonzalez

Young Spanish team establishes Big Fighter, a 740-meter route on Chaupi Huanca, Peru

Between July 1 and 3, young Spanish climbers Jaume Peiro (20) and Alex Gonzalez (18) made the first ascent of the northwest spur of Chaupi Huanca in the Rurec Valley of the Cordillera Blanca in Peru. They climbed their 740-meter route–Big Fighter–at 6c (5.11b/c) A2, and estimated it would go free at 8a+ (5.13c). Peiro and Gonzalez succeeded on the line that two previous parties (an Argentinean team in 2016, and an Ecuadorian team in 2021) had previously attempted, adding 470 meters to the Ecuadorian team’s high point that was 270 meters up the wall.