As a mother, wife, climber, cartographer and self-described “accidental adventurer,” Barbara Washburn was the antitheses of a ’40s housewife. “Sometimes [my] home would be in an igloo, at 12,000 feet, sharing Tang-flavored fig pudding with my husband; or as the lightest climber going first to test the cornices on a narrow exposed ridge; or staring out at summit views that no one else had seen.”
As the austral summer approaches, videographer and climber Tad McCrea reminisces about climbing seasons past and offers a bit of advice to climbers everywhere: “[S]cour the interwebs for cheap airfare, unearth your passports, patch your gear and pack your bags.”
Patrick Horne remembers his friend Brian Delaney, a New England climber who transformed his ambling gait into graceful movement whenever he touched rock.
A regular illustrator for our print magazine, Jamie Givens advises how to begin the monumental task of following your dreams. “Start with what you love,” he says. “Most people don’t realize that the knowledge they have about something that they are passionate about, the years spent memorizing information, physical skills developed, expertise, is all a marketable commodity.”
Blake Herrington adds his own saga to the story of Picket Range climbing.
Fred Degoulet and Benjamin Guigonnet lead the charge into a promising winter season in the Mont Blanc massif, and come back with photos.
Jed Williamson is retiring after four decades as the editor of Accidents in North American Mountaineering. Having dedicated some 5,000 hours to the journal, he may know more about North America’s climbing accidents than anyone else on the continent.
Mugs Stump Award recipient Kyle Dempster returns from Pakistan, not with a fresh routeline to draw up The Shining Wall of Gasherbrum IV (7925m), but with a story about choosing a friend over a summit.
Chris Van Leuven calls up a few friends of his mentor Brian McCray to share memories and create an outline of the late climber’s character and legacy.
Over the last decade behind his lens, Jon Griffith has focused on mountain sports photography: alpine, rock and ice climbing, backcountry skiing, BASE jumping, paragliding and speed riding. But beyond the dusky alpenglow and crisp ridgelines, the bulk of Griffith’s oeuvre is extraordinary in another important and more unusual way: it’s real.
