I would have to say that it's probably one of the coolest lights I've ever been
on. You step on board and you feel like it's a solid, solid plane that could take you anywhere.
It was a pretty fun ride, especially arriving at Union Glacier at like two in the morning.
Just that real sense of being out there in a way and just totally unplugged from everything is
just a phenomenal experience. It was just like the closest thing I've ever come to where you
were leaving confines of a known continent and going to an unknown. You first step foot on it,
it's a very special feeling. You're away from the internet, you're away from the news. A lot of
people have a lot of inner peace when they're here. Everything that you do here requires a
tremendous amount of planning. It's not a place that people naturally inhabit. You have to think
big, think vast to get down here. Our weather at Mount Vinson Base Camp is at 1300 Zulu. We
have calm winds, temperature minus 11, visibility unlimited to the south, points visible, alpha,
delta, Juliet, India and hotel. The highest point on this huge massif is the highest peak you can
see on the left. Mount Vinson. This is the finale, number seven. Yeah, it's exciting. Two is clear.
You don't need to play these. It's easy to forget how remote we are here. You remember that past
the glacier there's not a small mountain town or a highway or a landing strip. There's just more
and more ice and then miles and miles of ocean. We definitely have one of the best toilet views in
the world. Our toilet view looks out across the vast white Antarctic wilderness. It's great.
It's something just exotic about climbing the highest peak in the coldest continent in the whole
world. It's just amazing. The staff is a whole. Every person I talked to was more impressive
than the last person I talked to. Lapka is a world record holder. He summited Everest from
base camp in 10 hours and 56 minutes. Incredibly humble, really friendly. I couldn't be more
confident in that person with my life. Scott, who is our base camp manager, he's one summit away
from doing the seven summits seven times. You're talking about a guy that has an incredible amount
of experience. Dave, another of the guys, has eight Everest. Our other Sherpa, Namgat, he has 12
Everest summits. So between those four guys has 42 Everest summits. That's a huge experience. With
the goggles on, there's pretty much no skin showing. I've been on 8,000 meter expeditions
and nowhere near this well qualified or it's professional. What a lovely morning in our 10
hour maybe afternoon. Good luck, everybody. We're going up from base camp to low camp. It was a nice
day. First time ever hauling a load on a sled. Technically, it wasn't too challenging. Roped
up in groups of four, traversing the glacier. Really light pack and not too heavy of a sled.
Got a lot hotter than I think most people would expect. It's a long way. It's about four to five
hours. We rest about every hour. And you are surrounded by this beautiful mountain peaks all
around. Really gets you into the expedition mindset. You arrive and you see a big dome.
Low camp is actually a very sweet setup. We've got walls prebuilt up there. We've got tents
cached up there. We begin to put up the tents. We make water. We make food and we kind of move
in and just start living up there waiting for a good weather window to head higher up on the mountain.
Tent behind us is sort of the communal tent where we eat our meals, where they do all the cooking.
They've really done a great job. Basically, today was winds 20 to 25 knots plus minus 33 on the
summit. Copy that. Our plan was to move everyone up to high camp tomorrow. The weather forecast
we've just got through indicates that tomorrow could be quite windy, which in these temperatures
would be a little unpleasant. So have some tea, some hot coffee, some meal, ready to go sleep.
When the sun goes behind the mountains, it was like an alarm clock for everyone.
I knew something was amiss whenever I woke up and I saw ice crystals all in my tent.
As we were informed, lower camp had reached negative 28.
I started to see frost forming on the outside of your bag from the condensation of your breath.
You'd have to zip up your bag and, you know, put on your hat.
It was a cold night, no doubt. Then you'd wake up again in the morning when the sun would pass
from out behind the mountains. Those sorts of temperature swings are really something to
experience. Visibility is four kilometers to the north, unlimited to the south. Over.
10 o'clock in the morning, we think we're doing this. 11 o'clock in the morning,
we're doing something completely different. And we just have to be ready for that,
really being at the will of Mother Nature.
Heading up yonder into the wild blue.
Low camp to high camp, we travel up glacier little ways and then we actually get onto some fixed line.
You see a wall of ice. You see 45 degrees going up with a straight line and you have to go up there.
For me, it was the most interesting and fun part.
The fixed lines were the best put together I've ever seen.
Much better than Denali. Better than Everest. 200 meter ropes.
Anchored it. Two deep snow pickets with webbing and locking carabiners. Really solid anchors.
Everyone did really well. The fixed lines are very long and they take you up a few thousand feet
up to plateau that will take you right into high camp.
That's when I felt a bit of the altitude.
I was acclimatized fairly well, I thought, but at that point I felt, yeah, I'm feeling it.
That is a long day.
Every time you arrive in camp, it's the most beautiful picture you can imagine.
The view is extraordinary. I've never seen anything like it. I never will again, so we gotta enjoy it over here.
The guides and sherpas put this thing together, so it was beautiful to arrive and your tent is already up.
Whenever you clip off, you clip onto the new lines. They have two tipis, the triangle things.
You sit around, there you boil water, you prepare your meals.
You have a good opportunity to get to know your climbing partners. It's nice to hang out then in high camp.
Talk to out tonight. Do or need this, do or need that, and keep it all in one pile, so when you're waking up, all these things go in your backpack and go.
It was a go, a green light. Yeah, we were pumped.
We were pumped. Summer day was incredible. Looks gorgeous. I had a tough time sleeping the night before.
I think most mountaineers will agree that you're not going to get a continuous
sleep of, you know, six to eight hours, but if you can nap throughout the evening in preparation for your next effort, then that's acceptable at altitude.
I can describe summer day as a long day because you're slogging like four miles one way to get to the summit.
Don't forget that we are at altitude. Vincent's 16,000 feet. It's not low. It's high, especially at this southern latitude.
Anytime you get on one of these big expeditions, you have a lot of time alone.
For me, it's a very meditative experience. The time to think about everything, work, my career, girlfriend, my life, family, what I want to do, what I want to be.
I think it's a great opportunity to just sort of give your life a different perspective.
I've had a lot of problems with my hands. I got frostbite on Denali on three fingers and it seemed like something has happened where I have low resistance.
Yeah, I just wasn't feeling well and I felt like, you know, I was maybe imposing on the team or something.
If somebody did need to turn around, Rangers could actually take them down.
But as a guide, you know, it's kind of a point of pride when I get everybody to the top.
And so I try as hard as I can to not wear anybody out by going at slow pace.
I was kind of debating about quitting, but then Namda said, we've gone halfway, you know, in distance.
And I also took a peek at his watch and I could see the altitude on his watch.
I said, I can do that again. I think at that point I knew I had it. And so I said, yes, let's go.
The further we got up, the colder it got and it got a little bit windy.
When we reached the summit ridge, our guide Andy told us there would be a chance that we would not
make it to the summit that day. We put on all our best gear, covered the faces, had good meetings on,
very warm parkas. And due to that fact, we were able to go all the way to the summit.
You come to this ridge and it makes the whole slog of the day just worth it. Because it's a
beautiful ridge that's, you know, drops off pretty steeply on each side.
Relatively exposed up there and you're stepping around rocks and climbing around.
And, you know, you're able to look out. It's just beautiful.
That little trek was probably the hardest part for me. It took me by surprise. There
were some very narrow ledges to get through. It's rocks, it's ice. So you have to be very
careful. A little bit of experience with crampons in small places. I had some issues with goggles
fogging up and, you know, keeping my face warm. Up top is about 35 knot winds. Temperature was about
minus 30 as well. Factoring the wind chill. It was cold up there.
Ah, I say release. You make the summit.
We made it and I'm stoked and I'm standing on the peak of Antarctica. Couldn't be happier.
My face is very cold. But aside from that, I'm doing great.
All the people made it to the summit that day, which made it even a greater feeling.
Ah, it's really, really, really beautiful. More amazing than I could imagine. But it's cold though.
The thing that surprised me about the top was all the mountain ranges all around that you never
see in other people's photographs. And that's kind of why I insisted when we had our group photo that
it was not on that horn thing, but it was more with incredible background over our shoulders.
For many years, I had not thought about pursuing the seven summits. This was the last one.
To go here, touch it and to leave it as you saw it was quite special.
Yeah, I'm going to have to say a couple of thumbs up for this organization. Oh, I have thumbs. Yeah.
All right, welcome back.
