Denali prep. 3 weeks out.
Posting from the road. My last work binge before family time is a road tripping tour of California’s record setting spring ski mountaineering. I came for the very deep snow, but am finding a renewed appreciation for other moments along the way. Much like our Denali experience could be; we go for the summit, but find so much more along the way. I can’t tell you what will speak to you, but I can enumerate some of the things that reliably touch my soul on an expedition like Denali.
The small plane ride in is epic and unforgettable.
Walking the lower Kahiltna, through the night. Either up or down or both, we will likely transit this gentle, massive plain of moving ice, overnight at least once. Watching sunrise and sunset, even if muted by clouds, from this hallway of mountain giants, is always spectacular.
Deepest belly laughs in the cook tent, over a meal you never would guess could taste so delicious.
The coziest of dry, fluffy down sleeping bag wrapping tired, damp, beat up bones.
The reassuring tension in a well-pitched tent fly as you button up for a stormy night of sleep.
Emerging from said tent, half a day later, to new snow and the tousle headed faces of dozens of your peers that shared the same immersed, quiet-but-stormy experience in their own cocoons.
The ideas and creativity spawned by weeks working in and with and parallel to this focused, diverse, moving mountaineering community. I go to Denali with one idea of what my mountaineering future could look like, and come back with 10, all of them different from what I once thought. In the best of ways.
The relief that comes with clarity on the resolution of the expedition. We will spend weeks more still, partially apart and then weeks together, uncertain of the outcome. That uncertainty is a big part of what we seek. Revel in it. However, we will also see the final path, at some point. That moment, no matter what that 2023 Denali path involves, is a blessed moment. Resolution of uncertainty is a fleeting, precious time in any pursuit.