Cover photo courtesy of Chris Ashenbrener

On the morning of May 18, 1980, Chris Ashenbrener was pouring concrete on the edge of Lake Pend Oreille, far from his stomping grounds in the Cascade Range. Hours after he began, the sky began snowing ash. Ashenbrener retreated to his tent and watched as confused birds navigated the darkening skies, then eventually turned on the radio to hear a voice on the other side telling people to stay indoors. 

“Of course, I thought the Ruskies were coming,” Ashenbrener recalled. But it was just Mount St. Helens, making good on her recent and frequent promises. 

When St. Helens erupted in all her might, she blew out her side with such force that miles of forest around her were flattened and her once-proud summit was amputated of 1,300 feet. Fifty-seven people died, hundreds of homes and structures were lost, nearly 200 miles of road destroyed, and geological history made. 

Lawetlat’la, or Loowit, as the local Indigenous Peoples refer to her, had long been a moody mountain with evidence of prior eruptions. She is unplacated by her occasional tantrums and remains the most active volcano in the Cascade Range. When she reopened to climbers in 1987, she was one of the few volcanoes of the range Ashenbrener had not climbed. 

His interest in climbing began more than a decade earlier, though he’d say he preferred traverses to bagging peaks. After pursuing the usual path of the wayward but being maternally influenced (see: reluctant completion of a degree prior to hitchhiking around America), Ashenbrener gave up his attempts at using mind-control to get picked up by drivers and went to law school. He didn’t really intend to practice law, but meeting classmate and fellow outdoorsman, Ted Gathe, made the years of education worth it. 

The pair and various friends had been exploring the Cascade Range since the mid-1970s, when Ashenbrener moved to Spokane. Raising young families and launching their careers, most of their adventures involved cramming in as much mountain as possible somewhere between Friday and Monday, preferably with some use for their skis along the way. Mount St. Helens was no different. 

The mountain reopened to climbers in May 1987. Ashenbrener remembers it being the weekend of Bloomsday, making the decision to bail on the running race to climb instead. It was also the last weekend climbers could summit without a permit (which has been required since 1986). For the growing alpinist community of the Pacific Northwest, it was a festive affair. 

Trails had not been marked or restored, so parties were approaching from all sides. Gathe and Ashenbrener decided to begin in the lowlands, but the soft snow would slow their approach. They remedied this by bringing their Nordic skis. This got them thinking they should bring their alpine skis, too, for the descent would be long and epic. Of course, they also needed crampons, rope, ice axes, lunch, and the usual layers of mountaineering, packs, and the debris of a day out in the wild. 

They skied in through the trees and over the mushy terrain. As the slope steepened, they stashed their Nordic skis and switched to climbing boots, now only sinking to their knees. With their alpine skis and poles dangling off their packs and looking like traveling trinket salesmen, they made their clunky way across the snow.  

It was a perfect blue-sky day and the sense of celebration was real. As the men pushed toward the summit, which was now just a mile-wide rim of ice and snow, a helicopter approached them, landing nearby. It was ABC News, who had grown curious about the amount of stuff the two were schlepping up the side of a volcano and wanted to interview them for the evening news with Peter Jennings. The crew commented that the pair were the only ones carrying skis to the top. In fact, they were not.  

Mountaineering legend Kathy Phibbs also climbed the mountain that day with her skis, while wearing a red dress and a pillbox hat. Five women from Women Climbers Northwest joined her and danced the Can-Can at the top (they only made the Seattle Times). Phibbs’ pilgrimage of summits in skirts, specifically that one, sparked the annual Mother’s Day Climb on Mount St. Helens that continues to this day.

 

If Ashenbrener and Gathe were more a spectacle than the broads doing Broadway on the rim, it was the accidental result of their testosterone-fueled ambition and “Grapes of Wrath laden journey,” as he refers to it. Clanking with a flea-market load of equipment, they slogged their way to the rim while questioning their life choices. Now, they had the added pressure of getting back in time to see the evening news. The crampons and the ice axes were used in a final push, but the rope stayed in the pack. 

Upon cresting the rim, the gravity of the mountain’s history struck Ashenbrener, who recalls it looked like a “mountain with the top completely sliced off with a machete.” Along the newly formed rim were dozens of climbers peering into the crater, stepping too far out onto frozen ledges and cornices. Other climbers yelled warnings at them while Ashenbrener worried for their safety. Hundreds of feet beneath them, the crater steamed. A new lava dome had already risen out of the crater’s floor. Beyond them, where her belly had split open and poured forth, nature had been decimated.  

When Mount St. Helens erupted, 24,000 megatons of thermal energy were released, 7,000 of which occurred in the initial blast. (In a morbid comparison, this is the explosive equivalent of approximately 1,600 WWII atomic bombs.) Entire swaths of forest were flattened, thousands of acres of trees left like charred toothpicks fanning away from the mountain. The rivers of lava, snow, and mud (known as lahars) carried millions of tons of debris down the Toutle and Cowlitz rivers, wiping out bridges, lumber camps, and homes along the way. Thousands of large animals were killed, entire species of small and large mammals as well as amphibians, extirpated. 

By the time Ashenbrener made it to the rim seven years after the eruption, only patches of fireweed had begun a brave return. Stretching miles before him still lay the carnage of a landscape turned shades of gray-brown. He was struck by a sense of geological fascination and wonder, by the power within the Earth to make a whole mountain disappear. 

Not wanting to miss the evening news, the men rearranged their boots into their overloaded packs and donned their skis. “Forever, I will remember the sound of clicking into our bindings and pushing off,” Ashenbrener said. “We seemingly sailed off the top, over the heads of the climbers.” It was validation of the day’s gear-slog. In turn after turn, they descended 5,000 feet of snow, from one kind of crunchy ice to softer grains until they reached their Nordic skis, quads aflame with the burden of their descent. It’s one thing to ski down a volcano; it’s another thing to do it with a pack full of 1980s climbing gear. 

The two raced back toward civilization in search of a bar with a TV on and a phone to call their families and tell them to watch the news. But that night, Jennings was busy reporting about presidential candidate Gary Hart’s tryst with Donna Rice and the men were bumped from national evening news by a woman after all.  

“We are fortunate here in the PNW,” says Ashenbrener with charming optimism. “We don’t have cyclones, typhoons, hurricanes, flash floods. We just have the Big Burn of 1910 and the volcano of 1980.” Would Ashenbrener climb the iconic route again? “No,” he said, “I don’t do things twice.” Perhaps that is because some things can only be done once.  

Ammi Midstokke lives in North Idaho, where the hills don’t explode. This season, she’ll be traveling to the Peloponnese to climb another less volatile mound of rock. 

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Wild Walls Climbing Gym will mark its 30th anniversary on Saturday, Oct. 11, with a day of free-entry climbing, the free Dirty Thirty climbing competition and a party that evening. The anniversary bash from 4 to 8 p.m. will be co-hosted by the Bower Climbing Coalition (BCC)—also celebrating its 10th anniversary—with beer proceeds benefiting BCC’s important work, which includes replacing dangerous, corroded climbing anchors and bolts and organizing crag cleanups. Feast World Kitchen will be serving up international eats from Spokane’s immigrant and refugee community. Indoor climbing will remain free all day, and DJ N8BIT will be spinning through the evening. 

Founded in Spokane’s historic Old State Armory building in 1995, Wild Walls was one of the first indoor climbing gyms to open in the Northwest and has expanded its space and offerings several times over the years. The 12,000-square-foot gym includes two large bouldering areas and 40-foot top-roping and lead walls. Wild Walls provides beginner and advanced classes, youth programs, yoga, group event options and a portable wall for rent. 

“The party and competition are a celebration of 30 years and a thank-you to the continued support from our community,” notes general manager Todd Mires. “We are honored that so many people have had their first climbing experience with us, and we will continue to be a climbing-community hub and place people can call home.” 

The full day of anniversary celebrations kicks off with the Dirty Thirty route and boulder comps that run from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Participants can compete at any time throughout the day. Point values will be assigned to every existing route and boulder in the gym, with a final score tallied from the combined point value of the top 30 routes or boulders. Find more details at Wildwalls.com. (OTO) 

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Photo by John Roskelley / Nameless Tower on the left and the ski route the team took off the top of Great Trango on the right.

Mountainfilm on Tour returns to Spokane on Sept. 11 with a selection of inspiring films from the flagship Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride, Colo. This year’s film tour screening, brought to town by the Jess Roskelley Foundation, will take place at Gonzaga University’s Myrtle Woldson Performing Arts Center.

Canadian ski mountaineer and professional skier Christina “Lusti” Lustenberger, whose team of three alpinists claimed the first ski descent off the 20,623-foot summit of Pakistan’s Great Trango Tower in 2024, will make a special in-person appearance. The feat, documented in the film “Trango,” promises to be an inspiring highlight of the Mountainfilm tour stop in Spokane. The event includes a selection of other festival films featuring a range of adventure, activism and social justice themes.

Lustenberger will be joined on stage for a Q&A following the film with legendary Spokane mountaineer John Roskelley, who was part of the team of five climbers who pulled off the first ascent of the same Karakoram-region peak back in 1977. As a prelude to the film, Roskelley will also share stories, images and reflections from climbing the peak with Galen Rowell, Dennis Hennek, Kim Schmitz, and Jim Morrissey.

The film “Trango” follows the dramatic and at times emotional two-year attempt at making the first ski descent off the Great Trango Tower by Lustenberger and fellow ski mountaineer Jim Morrison. It’s an exceptional piece of visual ski-mountaineering storytelling with dramatic drone footage that gives viewers unique perspectives on the vast, extreme terrain and the mountaineering and skiing challenges posed by the otherworldly peaks. From avalanches and crevasse crossings in thin air to unpredictable snow conditions and weather, the filmmakers capture the big mountain hazards and raw risk that the climbers turned skiers endured.

The first attempt by Lustenberger and Morrison with Nick McNutt in 2023 was thwarted by poor conditions and altitude sickness. Lustenberger and Morrison returned in 2024 with Chantel Astorga to finally reach the top on May 9, where the team unfurled a Protect Our Winters banner before transitioning for the top-of-the-world ski descent of Great Trango Tower’s West Face, a route that’s been described as some of the most challenging ski terrain on the planet.   

The team’s journey to the top of Trango, which included weeks of living out of tents while waiting for the right weather window, was also a deeply emotional one, heightened by the near-constant physical challenges and risk and the extreme and harsh nature of the place. The film crew eloquently captured the expedition members’ personal reflections on grief, loss, and moving forward in pursuit of dreams, which followed the team into the mountains.

Most notably, in 2022, Morrison lost his ski mountaineering and life partner Hilaree Nelson (after experiencing the crushing loss of his wife and two children in a plane crash in 2011). Nelson was swept away by an avalanche and killed while the pair were skiing together from the summit of Manaslu, and the shadow of that recent tragedy can be felt throughout the film. Lustenberger, at times, also grapples with nagging unease stemming from the enormity of the undertaking and even shame at exposing so many people to so much risk. The 45-minute film is a showcase of the strength and skill necessary to pull off such expeditions, but also the essential role of trust and support among teammates to keep moving forward in the face of suffering, both physical and of the heart.  

That indispensable act of putting trust in your fellow climbers or skiers is one thing that hasn’t changed much in the mountaineering world in the nearly 50 years since Roskelley’s team first scaled Trango. “I can’t say that in 1977 any of us even dreamed of skiing off the top of Great Trango Tower,” Roskelley reflects. Extreme athletes who take on ski-mountaineering projects on remote, difficult, high-altitude peaks like Great Trango Tower prepare physically and mentally for years, he notes, yet the inherent risk is still immense even with advancements in equipment design and weather-forecasting technology. “If you cross a tip, choose the wrong line, hit a small rock sticking out of the ice, death is imminent. All of them understood the consequences of a mistake,” adds Roskelley.

Photo by Galen Rowell / The 1977 first-ascent route up the southeast face with Nameless Tower on the right.

In the final moments of the film, Lustenberger confronts the question that many of us who watch films like “Trango” wind up asking: What drives athletes to risk their lives on such big mountain challenges? “I thought about this a lot,” Lustenberger says. “And it’s the only place where you’re so alive but also the closest to death. To be found is to be in these places.” Those last words in the film, she says, sum up what drives her to continue to take on such truly wild challenges in the face of so much peril. “When you completely find your place—it can be a moment or anything—and yet not feel lost and to feel like you’re just in the right place, the right time in the universe. That is just like those pinch-me moments.”  

Watching the stunning production of the film “Trango” on a big screen will be a treat for any skier, snowboarder, or climber of mountains of any size. “The film has spectacular videography from the DJI drones, as well as GoPro footage from the skiers,” notes Roskelley. “You’ll be at the edge of your seat and wondering, like I did, what were they thinking standing on the very summit of Great Trango Tower just prior to turning their skis and beginning a journey that might not end well. Fortunately, Christina will be there to answer this question.”

The crossing paths of Roskelley and Lustenberger in person at the showing of this film to share stories from their incredible adventures is a unique alignment of the mountaineering world stars. Anyone in the Inland Northwest who has ever dared or dreamed of hiking, climbing, skiing or snowboarding big mountains won’t want to miss it. The Spokane Mountainfilm on Tour event starts at 6:30 p.m., with doors opening at 5:30 p.m. with a silent auction. This event is a fundraiser for the Jess Roskelley Foundation, which provides artificial climbing features in public parks around the Spokane region. The foundation works to promote public projects and outdoor activities that were a defining force in the life of Jess Roskelley, while preserving his legacy as a lifelong Spokane native and elite international alpinist. Tickets are available at Jessroskelleyfoundation.com.

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By JP Vallières 

Cover photo courtesy of Angus Meredith

In my 20s, I’d drive a full hour on a gridlocked Long Island Expressway to rock climb. In a gym. On the long, rude drive (full of honking and middle fingers) I’d dream of someday living in distant cities that were near crags: Salt Lake City, Boulder . . . Spokane.  

Eventually, through determination and youthful recklessness, I headed west to live in a place I’d never visited. I’ll never forget witnessing all those mountains, the wild spaces, seemingly endless opportunities for adventure. Before that moment, I figured all those pictures in the magazines were lies. That was the only way I could rationalize the unimaginable beauty I was missing out on. Suffice it to say, these last 14 years, I have been climbing in the gyms and outdoors around Spokane.  

At first, I didn’t know where to begin. Climbing is weird like that. Sure, you can buy the guidebook, but often the guidebook gives you just enough information to get you lost, down some herd path, forever. The most reasonable option was to head to the local gym. It’s the best place to meet people who know when to bang a right at the pile of moose scat followed by a left where the granite’s shaped like a tea kettle. You follow them, and eventually, you’re the experienced one, knowing exactly where the best climbs are.  

In the Inland Northwest we have three great public gyms: Coeur Climbing Company, Wild Walls, and Bloc Yard as well as the non-profit Sandpoint Rock Gym open to gym members. These places are packed with people who want to tell you everything they know about the sport, even if you didn’t ask.  

Inland Northwest Gym to Crag Climbing Courses 

If you’re into a more structured approach on how to climb in the outdoors, check out Coeur Climbing Company’s first-ever Gym to Crag Climbing Course. Once you know basic climbing skills, learned from the Intro to Rock Climbing Course, you will plunge into a four-day accelerated path that will teach you everything you need to know. The skills, techniques, all the gear, and the cool climber lingo: gaston, dyno, crimp, sloper. And how to stay safe while having the best time of your life.  

Spokane Mountaineers Rock School has a similar annual course, where you’ll be trained in the basics and instructed by topnotch climbers who have been doing this longer than any multipitch route in Leavenworth. Meaning, you learn from them, and then you’re set free to climb the remainder of your days. Consider it the deal of a lifetime. 

Gearing Up for Outdoor Climbing 

These courses will lead you into three potential styles of climbing: bouldering, sport climbing, and traditional climbing. For all three, you’ll need a pair of climbing shoes. Get a good tight fit, like a small glove that eventually stretches. Second, chalk and a chalk bag. Now you’re set up for (arguably) the purest form: bouldering. Think of bouldering as climbing to a reasonable height, until you either get to the top or fall on your friend’s cushy “crash pad.” I can’t tell you how many climbers start off with the goal of scaling Everest but decide, after a few weeks, to stick to bouldering. It’s just that much fun.  

But for others, there’s still the lure of great heights. These folks need more gear. Harness, helmet, and a trusted climbing partner. Between the two of you, a dynamic rope, various cords / webbings, and a plethora of hardware will get you safely up any local climbing route. It might seem like a lot, at first, but you don’t need every piece of gear right away. Climbers are great at sharing, as long as you repay the favor with a future belay.  

Most people I meet in the gym are total newbs, buying their first pair of climbing shoes, a chalk bag, and just bumming around. Climbing is a very social sport, attracting all personalities, even those who claim to be antisocial. We all hang out between climbs and sit around and talk. Everyone has something to say, because we’re so happy to be here. At some point, we make plans to climb outside.  

We check the weather report and meet up on the day it’s dry and cool. After the hike in, we climb something easy, an established route, one we’ve all done before. Once we’re warm and ready, we look to test ourselves on the route we’ve been dreaming about for weeks, months, maybe years. We’re wondering if all that time in the gym has prepared our forearms for the real thing. We look at each other and ask, “So, who wants to lead?” Everyone wants to, even if we’re afraid to admit this thing we do is a little crazy.  

Humans weren’t meant to live so high up, right? But honestly, the best thing about climbing, the thing that makes us return to the crag every week, is once we grab that first hold, all life’s distractions fade away. There’s no social media or suffering economy or gridlocked traffic. Nothing left to do, nothing left to think, but climb.  

JP Vallières is the author of the novel, “The Ketchup Factory: a love story.” You can find him climbing at Q’emiln Park in Post Falls.  

The post From Gym to Crag  appeared first on Out There Venture.

For two decades, Reel Rock has been sharing some of the greatest climbing adventures and achievements on film. Come watch this year’s films and support the Bower Climbing Coalition’s work to maintain, expand, and preserve Inland Northwest climbing. Mark your calendar for Sunday, March 23 from 4-8 p.m. and head to the Washington Cracker Co.

Building in downtown Spokane. Come enjoy food, drink, a silent auction, gear raffle, and some sick climbing films! The silent auction includes some amazing items from La Sportiva, Evolv, REI, and many more organizations. This year’s films include “Death of Villains,” featuring Kai Lightner and Joe Kinder; “Riders on the Storm,” featuring Siebe Vanhee, Sean Villanueva O’Driscoll and Nico Favresse; and “The Cobra & The Heart,” featuring Didier Berthod, Thomasina Pidgeon and Cedar Pidgeon. Get tickets at Bowerclimbingcoalition.com.  

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Wild Walls was the passion project of climbing buddies and outdoors enthusiasts Timon Behan and Bill Lockwood. At a time with few indoor climbing gyms, the two worked with experts in the climbing industry and builders in the community to construct two main pillars from 60,000 pounds of steel, plywood and concrete, opening doors in the heart of downtown Spokane in 1995. A lot of climbing space has been added since then, and Wild Walls is now a staple of the Spokane-area climbing community.  

While climbing may have an intimidating reputation for some, Wild Walls manager Todd Mires says the climbing community in Spokane is very welcoming and has grown considerably in the last decade. “The community was small and climbing was a very niche sport and subculture,” says Mires. “Thankfully, climbing has become fairly mainstream, and the bigger the sport, the more people involved, the better the community. Climbing is for anyone and everyone who wants it.” 

Mires’ own climbing story is one of finding a place to fit in and grow in confidence. He fell in love instantly when he began climbing at the age of 12. “I hadn’t excelled at anything athletically up to that point and didn’t feel like I fit in anywhere, so climbing truly rescued my self-esteem. Since then, I’ve observed my story play out similarly for many young climbers. I see my role as creating an environment for everyone to enjoy what climbing has to offer, and hopefully people will fall in love as I did,” he says.  

To give Wild Walls a try, drop by and ask to try bouldering or auto-belaying. “There’s no pressure for those with understandable apprehension with regards to heights,” says Mires. “You are in control of how high you climb. We just want everyone to go at their own pace and what makes them comfortable.” Wild Walls offers belay classes when you’re ready to take your climbing to the next level too.  

The gym also has a yoga studio on site, offering vinyasa and acro yoga classes, which are included with any membership, punch card or day pass. While it may not be immediately obvious, the practices of yoga and climbing can really complement one another. “Yoga serves climbing by improving flexibility and mindfulness, while climbing serves yoga by improving strength and stamina,” says Mires. “I feel yoga and climbing demand a level of focus and body awareness that help tune out stress and anxiety and force participants to be present.”  

This year will be Wild Walls’ 30^th anniversary, so stay tuned for a special celebration. “We greatly appreciate everyone, especially our members, and hope to see you on the walls in 2025,” says Mires. You can find all the details on classes, rental equipment, and climbing times at Wildwalls.com. 

Sponsored

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If you are a mountain biker, hiker, skier, climber, road biker, whitewater boater, snowmobiler, off-roader, or do just about any other outdoor activity in the backcountry or travel on back roads in the Inland Northwest, you should already have a Life Flight Network membership. This emergency air transportation service is offered to members in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana, and in the case of a life-threatening emergency, Life Flight will swoop in to pick you up and take you to a hospital when necessary via helicopter, plan, or ground transport. It’s like an added backcountry insurance policy that just may save your life or the lives of your family members. This vital service is available to anyone and reduces the time it would otherwise take to get to the needed medical services. Life Flight membership will cover any transport services at no out-of-pocket cost to you or your family. Starting as low as $85 a year, it’s a no-brainer investment for any Out There reader. Become a member at www.lifeflight.org. (OTO) 

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Cover photo by Angus Meredith courtesy of Coeur Climbing

By Alana Livingston 

We’re all about the outdoors, but we admit that there are some pretty cool indoors-y things going on that can promote wellness and cross-training during the darkest, coldest, and wettest months in our region. From hot yoga to parkour, or giving those beautiful silks a try, here’s a collection of local ways to stay active in “the great indoors.” Especially if you don’t ski or snowboard, these options will help keep you fit and moving throughout the season.  

With so many options, it’s easy to stay active and energized indoors this winter in the Spokane region. Search for similar activities in your immediate area to help ward off the winter blues.  

Harmony Yoga Studio 
This inviting studio offers yoga classes tailored to different needs, including beginner, restorative, and vinyasa styles. Its calm atmosphere makes it a go-to spot for improving flexibility and building strength while reducing stress. (1717 W 6th Ave) 

Wild Walls 
Perfect for those who enjoy climbing or want to give it a try. Wild Walls features top-rope climbing, auto-belay systems, and bouldering areas. They also offer classes and workshops for all experience levels to help you improve your climbing skills. (202 W 2nd Ave) 

Coil Studio 
This studio provides unique fitness classes, including belly dancing, yoga, and aerial arts. The creative sessions focus on dynamic movement and self-expression, making it a fun and energizing way to stay fit. (314 W 2nd Ave) 

The Warehouse 
With six dedicated indoor pickleball courts, The Warehouse is a great spot for players of all levels. The courts are open weekdays from October to April, with nets and balls provided, so you can jump right into the action. (800 N Hamilton St) 

Bloc Yard Bouldering Gym 
Bloc Yard caters to climbers with its range of bouldering routes and training options. The gym also holds regular clinics to help climbers refine their techniques while building strength and endurance. (233 E Erie St) 

Krete Academy 
This parkour-focused gym in Spokane Valley offers structured classes for all ages. Learn to move with confidence and agility or take advantage of open gym sessions to practice on your own. (15215 E Marietta Ave, Suite B105) 

Beyoutiful Hot Yoga 
Experience the benefits of heated yoga at Beyoutiful, where classes range from gentle to high-energy flows. The warmth helps deepen stretches and detoxify the body. (12422 N Division St) 

Coeur Climbing 
Climb the walls at Coeur Climbing in Post Falls for a great indoor workout or fun outing with kids! The region’s newest indoor climbing hot spot is a full-service climbing gym with routes and activities for all abilities, including an awesome kids’ area, bouldering, an auto belay, top-roping, and lead climbing. Look for deals and more info in their ad in this issue (764 Clearwater Loop Suite 101, Post Falls). 

Spokane Great Outdoors Expo (Feb 22-23) 
This annual event put on by Out There Venture at the Spokane Convention Center features outdoor recreation, bike and travel exhibitors including many outdoor clubs and organizations, kids’ activities, an extreme skateboarding show, presentations on outdoorsy topics, demonstrations, marshmallow roasting, live Americana music, hourly prize drawings, display RVs, a full bar and more (Spokaneoutdoorexpo.com).  

The post Getting Out in the Spokane Area’s great indoors appeared first on Out There Venture.

Cover photo courtesy Ammi Midstokke 

Not everyone feels the same about risk. It’s a subjective assessment, nuanced by things like how many kids you still have to feed and who will see you shit yourself if things go wrong. 

Our party of three was not in agreement about how we got here. And by here, I mean clinging to the rocky edges of Mount Olympus, staring down a Chasm-of-Imminent-Death on one side and a Crash-Plummet-of-Maiming on the other side. We were wearing helmets, but helmets don’t keep you attached to the mountain. 

My most reliable adventure buddy, Liz, and I had invited ourselves to visit an old friend in Greece and created an itinerary of sailing, seafood and tsipouro, and this one hill we wanted to climb. Judging by the loss of color in Alex’s face that afternoon, we did not have the same definition of what constitutes risk.  

Olympus is a moderate climb from the east-facing side of Greece. We began at the Prionia trailhead, planning to overnight at a refuge perched in the last of the trees just below 7,000 feet. We wound our way into the folds of the Olympus Range, through a forest of beech and oak, and ever upward into the thick, swaying black pines. These trees have their own distinct sound, and, as the evening winds picked up, we listened to their symphony while sitting at picnic tables, chatting with other climbers. 

Looking at the other hikers, I assumed the climb was benign. There were a lot of retired Germans drinking a lot of wine and bragging about days in the Dolomites and their La Sportiva expedition grade boots. I may have both a fluent grasp of Deutsch and a fair bit of judgement. Also, I read the reviews online: hike with a brief scramble to the summit, average of one death per year from all causes, including cardiac events, falls, exposure, etc.  

Alex had spent a lifetime playing in the area mountains, backcountry snowboarding, visiting the other refuges, but never summited the 9,572-foot peak of Mytikas. In our 25 years of our friendship, we’d never climbed mountains together. Which is kind of funny, because it’s generally a friendship prerequisite for me. I made some subconscious assumptions that were not fair or fairly assessed—such as that we’d have the same comfort level on exposed rock and he knew what he was getting into.  

The following morning, the higher we climbed out of the trees and the wind-rattled alpine fields of flowers, the more I was filled with joy and purpose. I can’t say whether it’s the powerful wind gusts or the wide and endless expanses of possibilities in the form of ridges and sky that fill my soul. Mountains always offer me a sense of deep satisfaction and simplification of my purpose: to get to the top. But safely. 

We reached the ridge and paused to question the jagged, exposed, and much-more-vertical traverse to the summit. The route looked challenging until we saw some teenagers returning in jeans and Nikes. I forgot teenagers have an exceptionally dulled sense of risk. Something got lost in the wind or my pursuit of joy, and we agreed to try the route. Or maybe just look at it. In any case, I picked my way across the face of mountain, Alex and Liz bringing up the rear. 

Somewhere along the eastern face, I noticed Alex’s scowl connecting his two eyebrows into one strip of pissed-off. Liz had a head cold and had grimaced her way up the mountain while producing inhuman amounts of snot. She didn’t look happy either. I assumed they just didn’t have a good bowel movement that morning. I was still in my uncontained happy place, grinning wildly.  

I looked around at the dramatic, exposed rock and casually referred to it as a no-fall zone—a place where you don’t fall for a number of reasons related to homeostasis. 

“It would be a bad idea to fall here,” I said, helpfully. Alex wasn’t particularly calmed by this piece of guidance. Liz might’ve flipped me off if she could’ve peeled a hand off the rock for long enough. I know what she is capable of, and I know she’d tell me before she was no longer capable (or wanting). But I didn’t know Alex’s ability or comfort level. That is perhaps the most risky thing of all.  

At the summit, he described our route in terms varying widely from how I would describe it, as if ‘deadly’ and ‘dangerous’ were interchangeable. Where he saw imminent risk of death, I saw a handholds and stable footing. Where he saw a “vertical face,” I saw a Class 3 scramble (confirmed by research). 

Right or wrong about descriptors, he did not have as much fun as I, and that is a loss. 

The scramble to the summit became an important reminder about safety in the outdoors. It’s not just about what we’re carrying in our packs, but how we communicate with our companions along the way. Our responsibility lies in sharing our needs, fears, and abilities and also in proactively checking in with others so they might share theirs along the way. 

At least by the time we descended back to the safety of beech trees and cold creeks, we were talking about other routes to try. I wanted to explore the whole magnificent ridge. Liz wanted a nap. Alex wanted a rope. 

Ammi Midstokke is a columnist for Out There and loves mountainous nature and friends. She aims to preserve both. 

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