Mortenson

"My wife called me from 8,000 miles away to let me know that Alex Lowe, Mark Synnott and Jared Ogden HAVE summitted the mile-high, vertical Great Trango NW Wall (6,286 meters)..."

The American Trango team was in a close race with a four-man Russian team lead by Alexander Odinitzov to make the first ascent of what is perhaps the biggest vertical wall in the world. Their outstanding achievement ranks as the greatest wall climb of all times and will set a precedent for the millennium to come.

Great Trango Wall

In early July, after a week into the climb, the Trango team had some major disagreements and nearly abandoned their endeavor. Lowe left Trango for Paiyu Camp for two days to sort things out and recuperate from a bout of bronchitis. In Paiyu, he met Steve Swensonís Gasherbrum IV team and a friend from Bozeman, Dr. Steve Gipe on his way to Gasherbrum II with the Seattle-based Mountain Madness commercial expedition. Gipe, an emergency physician, checked Lowe out and took time out to walk with him back to Great Trango. It's obvious with the amount of teamwork required to surmount their climb that they worked things out and pulled off an unprecedented, successful coup of the Great Trango.

Iíve visited the Trango area a few times. The imposing Great Trango looks like a handful of Empire State buildings stacked on top of each other. But no building can match the sheer wall and magnificence of the Great Trango.

Alex Lowe, Great Trango

To put their effort in a time frame perspective: a horizontal mile can be run in under four minutes. Multiply four minutes X 22,000 to equal the time the North Face climbing team covered the same distance vertically in five weeks. Way to go, guys!

As for myself, I havenít moved a vertical foot in the last three days. Rain and overcast skies have grounded the 50-minute Boeing 727 flight to Skardu, the staging area for the Karakorams. Plan B is to jump on a rickety Bedford bus and blast up the Karakoram highway for 24 hours. Bon Voyage.

Hector Ponce 'de Leon' Summits Gasherbrum II
Another call from my Bozeman home brought the great news that Hector Ponce 'de Leon' has summitted Gasherbrum II. Unfortunately, my brother-in-law, Brent Bishop, and Kelly Rhodes turned back near the summit because of high winds. I know how much much Brent wanted GII, but also know that he has a tremendous 'inner voice' that guides his decisions and directives. It takes tremendous courage to make the decision to turn back. But when he gets home to Seattle airport and sees his two wonderful young sons, Bear and Reed, yelling, "Daddy, Daddy" it will all make sense. Way to go, Bro!

A second assault is underway by expedition leader Chris Boskoff, Greg Ritchie and Jeff Rhodes. Although GII is considered to be one of the easier 8,000 meter peaks to climb, it is still an amazing feat. The 'thin and rarefied air' above 7,000 meters can leave you like a tongue-hanging dog panting in the Sahara. Way to go, Ponce!

Brent Bishop is well known for his climbing prowess, but few know about the incredible work he has done in the Karakorams since 1997. That year, he asked me to help him start a Karakoram base camp cleanup modeled after his successful Everest cleanup from 1994 to 1996. The unique feature of Brent's cleanups are that they are entirely managed by local porters, with no association to any foreign climbing expeditions.

"The 'thin and rarefied air' above 7,000 meters can leave you like a tongue-hanging dog panting in the Sahara..."

Since 1997, the Balti porters of the Karakorams have removed the staggering amount of more than 20,000 pounds of expedition garbage from the base camps through Brent's efforts. They manage the cleanups by themselves at the fraction of the cost of a foreign cleanup expedition. Often, expeditions use the name 'environmental' or 'cleanup' to seek endorsement or sponsorship. When the climb gets underway, their cleanup efforts often fall short of their goal in pursuit of the summit. Brent is the conservation chairman of the American Alpine Club and is working on a draft to establish criteria for expeditions that seek endorsement as 'environmental' expeditions. Brent is one serious high-altitude garbage man! Bravo.

In addition, we started Pakistan's first porter training program which stresses conservation awareness, hygiene and sanitation, first aid, crevasse rescue, and transport and government regulations. To date, more than 620 porters have attended the program.

We learned two important lessons in our work with the porters. One: if expeditions and trekking groups take time out to talk and communicate with their porters, it can make a tremendous difference. Secondly: porters can also share their own knowledge of resource management and conservation with visitors to their mountain home. After all, they are the ones who have survived and thrived for centuries in harsh living conditions with a life adapted to the constraints of the environment.

Enough said. Get out there and make a difference!

— Greg Mortenson, MountainZone.com Correspondent