The price to climb the world’s tallest peak is on the rise.

On January 21, the reported that the government of Nepal will raise the permitting fee for foreign climbers hoping to ascend Mount Everest during the busy spring season from $11,000 to $15,000. The announcement has yet to appear in the Nepal Gazette, the government publication in which official laws and regulations are published.

If the fee structure is made official, it will mark the first time that Nepal has raised the price to ascend Everest since 2015. According to the The Kathmandu Post, the new fee—which represents a 36-percent increase—will go into effect on September 1, meaning that climbers ascending Everest during the 2025 spring season will still pay the current price.

Foreign climbers ascending the peak in spring aren’t the only ones feeling the pinch: the permit fee for domestic Sherpa climbers will double, from $550 to $1,100. And permits for the less-popular fall and winter seasons will also go up by 36 percent, rising to $7,500 and $3,750, respectively, for foreign climbers.

Guides told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű that the fee increases are unlikely to dampen the demand to climb Everest.

“Permit price is not the issue,” said Argentine guide Willie Benegas, who has climbed Everest 13 times. “Maybe a price increase of $10,000 or $15,000 would have an impact on climbers coming from emerging markets, like India and China. But not $4,000.”

Climber Alan Arnette, who chronicles the history of Everest expeditions on his website, agreed. “Higher permit fees may impact price-sensitive climbers who choose low-cost guides,” Arnette said. “But likely won’t affect Western climbers who prefer guides costing $75,000 or more. Overall impact seems minimal.”

The rise in permitting fees comes as no surprise—in 2023 Nepal government officials announced their intentions of raising the price in 2025. When government officials first revealed the fee increase, they attributed it to the cost of removing dead bodies from the peak.

“We are discussing making insurance mandatory in search and rescue operations for all to support the retrieval of bodies from the mountain,” Nima Nuru Sherpa, president of the Nepal Mountaineering Association at the time, told in 2023. “If the dead bodies are not retrieved during that particular time or season, we have urged the government to issue a royalty-free permit to retrieve them at any time during the season or the next year.”

Everest climbers must cover the cost for guides, porters, cooks, gear, food, bottled oxygen, insurance, and transportation to and from Base Camp. Even the most frugal bootstrappers on lower-budget expeditions pay around $40,000 for their shot at Everest. Most climbers pay closer to $60,000. Some Everest expedition operators charge twice that for trips that include luxurious accommodations at Base Camp and multiple Sherpa guides to the summit.

Benegas, who advertises his own guided Everest climbs for $85,000, does not expect to see a downturn in congestion on the peak after the government imposes higher fees. “Climbers will come to Everest regardless,” he said. “The issue is the massive expedition companies bringing 60, 70, 80, sometimes even 100 clients. Regulations need to be on the size of the teams.”

The Kathmandu Post indicated that the new fee structure is just one of a slew of new rules on Mount Everest for 2025 and beyond. Some of the rules are ostensibly aimed at combating pollution, accidents, and crowding. These include a shorter valid permit period, a raise in insurance coverage for high-altitude guides and Base Camp workers, andÌęexpansion of a rule introduced last year requiring climbers to collect and dispose of their own feces.

Perhaps the most impactful change is a rule that every two climbers on Everest and Nepal’s seven other peaks above 8,000-meters must pay for a guide or hire a licensed expedition operator. If the 2:1 climber rule is made official, it will mark the end of solo climbing on Everest.

Adrian Ballinger, whose Alpenglow Expeditions leads Everest expeditions from China, believes that this stipulation is beneficial during the spring season. All climbers on the peak during the preferred window—mid-May through early June—already rely on mountain workers to reach the top, even those ascending without a climbing Sherpa. “No one can truly say they soloed a normal route on Everest during the spring season,” Ballinger said. “Everyone benefits from the work—the fixed ropes, ladders, trailbreaking—being done on the mountain.” The stipulation could represent a financial boon for the local guides and porters who work on the peak.”

China has already adopted a stricter rule, requiring a 1:1 ratio of climbers to guides on its 8,000-meter peaks: Everest, Shishapangma, and Cho Oyu. The country also requires that all individuals use supplemental oxygen when climbing above 7,000 meters. Far fewer climbers ascend Everest from China compared to Nepal. Per The Himalayan Database, a website that charts ascents on Nepal’s 8,000-meter peaks, 91 percent of the 861 Everest summits in 2024 ascended the mountain from Nepal.

Ballinger, who stopped operating Everest trips from Nepal after 2014, said that other rules would better improve the standard of climbing Everest from Nepal. China, for example, also requires climbers to first ascend a 7,000-meter peak before applying for a permit for Everest. “Shit can still hit the fan on Everest,” Ballinger said. “Everyone needs to have experience up there.”

The announcement of new rules comes less than a year after Nepali officials enacted other regulations at Everest aimed at curbing pollution, overcrowding, and even opulence. On February 8, 2024, the Khumbu Pasang Lhamu Rural Municipality, the local governing body that oversees at Nepal’s Everest Base Camp, passed laws requiring climbers to from the peak in plastic WAG bags. Later in the month, the same officials banned large square and dome-shaped tents, prohibited helicopters from flying gear from Base Camp to higher camps on the peak, and required all campers at Base Camp to have a permit.

In May, 2024, Nepali officials on helicopter transport and tent size.

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In early December, a Canadian trail runner named Tina Lewis was two months into her extended trip to India when she ran into legal trouble due to her backcountry GPS communication device.

On December 6, Lewis, 51, arrived at Dabolim International Airport in the state of Goa, to fly to the nearby city of Kochi. She was traveling with a Garmin inReach Mini, a popular GPS and satellite messaging device often used by backpackers and climbers.

“It had been an amazing trip, the trip of a lifetime,” Lewis told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű.

But when Lewis removed her InReach from her carry-on bag and placed it onto a scanning tray, she said a security officer approached her and asked her questions about the device. Lewis said armed guards then removed her from the line.

Lewis missed her flight. For the next four hours she was detained and interrogated about the InReach. Although her eventual fine was just $11, Lewis said she spent more than $2,000 to pay legal fees and bail.

“They treated me like a frickin’ fugitive,” she said.

șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű reached out to India’s Central Industrial Security Force public relations office, as well as the Goa airport division, but neither agency provided comment. șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűÌęalso reached out to the Indian embassy in Washington D.C. but did not receive a comment.

Lewis had unknowingly violated an Indian law that requires individuals to obtain a license before owning or using a personal satellite communication device. Lewis spent the next six days attempting to get her passport back from authorities. She had to appear in court on three consecutive days, and she eventually hired lawyers to avoid jail time.

India’s laws prohibiting individuals from owning satellite devices : Unless registered and licensed by the government, satellite communicators are illegal. The Garmin website lists India as one of 14 countries that may “regulate or prohibit the use or possession of a satellite communicator” or are otherwise embargoed by the United States. The other nations on the list are Afghanistan, Ukrainian Crimea, Cuba, Georgia, Iran, North Korea, Myanmar, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Vietnam, China, and Russia.

But the roots of the law are tied to an obscure rule from India’s past. The ban on satellite communication originated with the Indian Telegraph Act of 1885 and the Wireless Telegraphy Act of 1933. According to , an international medical and security evacuation service, these older laws were reinforced after the Mumbai terror attacks of 2008, when an Islamist militia used satellite communicators to coordinate bombings and shootings that killed nearly 200 people.

Lewis argues that the GPS device was an integral part of her travel kit. She spent much of her vacation traveling alone, and the device provided an added layer of safety. “I was just using the device to stay in touch with my family, to let them know where I was,” she said. Before her arrest, she had used her inReach twice, both when in regions with little to no cell reception.

Lewis with the running website iRunFar, and she wrote about the ordeal on social media. She said that other travelers reached out to her online—many of those who contacted her were unaware of India’s ban on personal satellite devices, she said.

She isn’t the only traveler to run afoul of the law. On December 9, just three days after Lewis’ arrest, a with a Garmin was detained at another Goa state airport. The following day, an American named with a satellite phone in Dehradun. A month prior, at Chennai airport for the same reason.

A competitive trail runner and experienced climber, Lewis said she has previously traveled solo to West Africa, Cuba, Nepal, and China. She said it never occurred to her to leave her inReach behind. “I think it’s just so ingrained in my lifestyle to always have it,” she said. “Hiking technical terrain, scrambling, rock climbing, mountaineering. I always bring a Garmin, especially when traveling alone.”

After publishing her story online, Lewis said some commenters scolded her for not researching the laws before traveling.

“I brought my Garmin to every other country I’ve been to,” she said. “I didn’t think to research that, when our phones and our watches all have GPS now.”

Direct satellite communication features are increasingly standard in modern smartphones. The newest versions of Apple’s iPhones have satellite communication capabilities. iPhones allow users to send messages to emergency services, share location, and stay in touch with emergency contacts, all while off the grid, with no cellular or Wi-Fi coverage, via satellite connection.

Lewis called the law “ridiculous.”

“It needs to be challenged, and they need to update it,” she said.

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On October 30, British twins Hugo and Ross Turner ascended to 8,500 feet in an electric-powered paraglider-like aircraft, called a paramotor. The brothers soared over the ski resort Val d’Isere in the French Alps.

The 34-year-olds told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű their flight set a world record for highest altitude by a tandem team in one of the battery-powered devices, and that they have submitted their flight data to the Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI), the governing body for air sports.

A paramotor is a steerable parachute, similar to a paraglider, outfitted with a giant rear propeller. Unlike a traditional paraglider, where pilots must launch from a cliff or hillside and catch columns of rising warm air to ascend, the motor and propeller allow pilots to take off from open, flat ground—no hills or cliffs required. “This is why paramotoring is so popular in places like the United Kingdom,” Hugo said.

Though mostly reliant on gas-powered engines, some paramotor companies are aiming to become greener. But electric batteries are notoriously heavy, and, when flying a parachute, every ounce counts. “The big challenge the industry is facing is this conscious decision that we need to move away from petrol engines,” Hugo said, “but it’s difficult to get enough battery power to make the weight justifiable.”

Although the world’s first electric paramotor was built in 2006, the technology has seen little refinement in the nearly two decades since. Most of the devices are powered by two-stroke combustion engines which burn around a gallon of gasoline per hour, and can typically fly for two-to-three hours without refueling. “To get the same flight time out of an electric paramotor, you’re talking a battery weight that a human could not physically carry,” Hugo said. “The energy density of the battery is so much that getting an extended flight time is very difficult.”

The weight is a difficult problem to solve, but even beyond concerns about emissions, there are other advantages to electric paramotors. They’re quieter, and—like electric cars and motorcycles—smoother to drive. Electric motors offer instant, consistent torque, which makes flying an electric paramotor more predictable and controlled than a gas-powered paramotor. Electric power also comes with unique advantages at high elevation. As altitude increases, air pressure decreases, causing gas-powered motors to lose thrust due to a lower oxygen-fuel ratio. Electric motors, on the other hand, maintain consistent power output regardless of elevation.

There has never been a tandem electric paramotor altitude record before, so even the relatively low elevation of 8,500 feet was enough to get the brothers in the record books. But theirs isn’t the first altitude record set in any electric paramotor. American Nathan Finneman reached 14,790 feet with an electric-powered wingÌęin September.

Finneman was flying solo, however, and started from a much higher elevation, at over 10,000 feet in Leadville, Colorado. His paramotor battery put out 4.8 kiloWatt-hours (kWh) of power, and let him climb for 28 minutes despite brutally cold temperatures, which dropped to -13 degrees FahrenheitÌęwith windchill. “There are a handful of electric paramotors like this out there,” Ross said, “but they’re only designed for solo flight. We wanted to look past that, and see what we could do in tandem.”

“We’re all about pushing the limits of new technology through purposeful adventure,” Ross added. “We’ve started off with a blank canvas and said, ‘What is the best emission-free technology that we could use to make a benchmark?’”

Their paramotor, dubbed the E-Maverick Max, was custom designed by United Kingdom manufacturer Parajet International. The entire rig weighed about 88 pounds, 50 pounds of which was the battery. Their motor powered a carbon fiber propeller, sporting three 4.5-foot blades. This rig gave the twins 175 pounds of thrust, pumped out by a 5.8 kWh lithium ion pouch cell battery, which ran for 35 minutes in the air.

Thirty-five minutes is a far cry from the two or three hours that a gas-powered motor could last, but it’s a start, and was even more than the 28 minutes Finneman was able to fly with his solo paramotor. Though it may not sound like much time, it’s a significant achievement considering the twins weighed a staggering 530 pounds on takeoff.

The twins launched from 6,200 feet, and though they hoped to be able to get above 10,000 feet, their flight went awry. “We weighed so much that we really struggled to gain altitude,” Ross said, noting that the World Air Sports Federation (FAI) observer watching them was surprised they even managed to take off.

“We launched from the field, and we immediately started heading down-valley, and we just dropped,” he said. “This massive pocket of cold air made us sink quite fast. Fortunately we found this ridgeline, a fork between two valleys, and we got some lift there. That’s where we stayed, working patterns between the ridgelines to keep rising.” The twins crested 8,520 feet before the battery cut out. They are currently waiting for their record to be formally verified by the FAI.

Hugo and Ross explained that, while they likely could have climbed higher if they’d started at a higher elevation, FAI altitude record stipulations required that they launch from a flat location with a 330-foot radius in all directions, a rare sight in the Alps, where the twins live. “Otherwise, we could have certainly taken off on the top of a mountain,” Hugo said. “In any case, we hope this will start a trend towards making recreational flying greener, and better for the environment.”

“Electric is unquestionably the future,” said Parajet founder Gilo Gardozo. “Now it’s a question of people adopting that reality, and the technology delivering.”

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Born into a family of subsistence farmers in the tiny village of Arughat, Nepal, Purnima Shrestha thought that the mountains around her were out of reach. Her village is a stop on the Manaslu Circuit, en route to the eponymous 8,000-meter peak, but Shrestha’s family didn’t even have running water. As a woman, she was expected to marry young, raise children, and keep the house.

Shrestha decided early that this path wasn’t for her. First she broke from tradition by moving to Kathmandu at 16 to pursue her education. She stayed with relatives until she graduated from secondary school, then enrolled in college to study communications. Later she landed an internship with Hospitality, Food and Wine, kick-starting a career in publishing.

While covering the 2017 Everest Marathon, Shrestha became enthralled with the world’s highest summit. To her it represented a pinnacle of human achievement. “In Nepal and around the world, everyone thinks of Everest when they think of mountains,” she said. The 29,032-foot summit was an outsize goal for the daughter of poor farmers, but Shrestha took it a step at a time. “In the beginning I had nothing,” she said. “I had no experience. No money. I wasn’t even athletic. I had no idea how strong my body was, but I wanted to try.”

So Shrestha took out some loans, started training, and committed herself to climbing. In the seven years since, she has summited eight of the world’s 8,000-meter peaks. This year the 34-year-old became the first woman in history to summit Everest three times in a single season, between May 12 and May 25.

Shrestha didn’t set out to break records. Everest was just the highest, hardest goal she could imagine. “I wanted to see what I was capable of,” she said. After she summited once, she said, “All of my dreams centered on climbing it again. I prayed for a reason to go back.”

With her newfound visibility, Shrestha feels an obligation to be a beacon for change. Through her work, she has witnessed the problems facing her country’s mountaineering industry. Chief among them are the backbreaking labor Sherpa guides, porters, and other mountain workers undertake, along with the physical risks and scant benefits. “You can only do this job as long as your body allows,” Shrestha said. “It’s difficult, and there’s no security or insurance. This generation of mountain workers don’t want the next generations to get into the industry. It’s not sustainable.” Shrestha says that she hopes the Nepalese government will consider providing insurance and other benefits, such as a retirement fund, for mountain workers.

Success isn’t guaranteed when it comes to the world’s highest peaks, where avalanches, storms, and altitude can stymie the most capacious lungs and ironclad wills, but “the important thing is to try,” said Shrestha, particularly as a female climber. “People always make women feel weak, and we internalize this. We convince ourselves we can’t do things, that we’ll fail. I want to tell other women that there’s nothing that limits us.”

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Austrian powerhouse Barbara “Babsi” Zangerl has stunned the climbing world, becoming the first person in history to successfully flash a route on El Capitan. Zangerl blitzed the 3,300-foot granite monolith via the iconic Free RiderÌęroute over a four-day ground-up push from November 19 to 22, all without falling. Zangerl was supported by her longtime partner—on and off the wall—Jacopo Larcher, who was attempting a flash as well, but had a single fall.

Free Rider, a Huber-brothers variation to the SalathĂ© Wall, is one of the most famous routes in Yosemite Valley. It’s perhaps best known as the route Alex Honnold climbed in the film Free Solo.

For years, 36-year-old Zangerl has proven to be one of the most versatile climbers in the game. She’s bouldered V13, , and has made rare free ascents of both high altitude climbs like the Nameless Tower’s , the Eiger’s Odyssee, and iconic Yosemite lines like The Nose, El Niño, Zodiac, and . Zangerl was also the fourth person (and still only woman) to complete the “,” entailing three 5.14 multi-pitch routes in the Alps: Des Kaisers neue Kleider, Silbergeier, and End of Silence.

There are few climbers with such an appetite for long, big, bad routes, and Zangerl’s eyes aren’t bigger than her stomach. She puts it down. Now she’s become the first person to flash a route on the Big Stone.

Zangerl said for her friend Kolin Powick had spent years trying to convince her and Larcher that they should have a go at Free Rider, but she didn’t really believe a flash was possible. “I had really low expectations,” she said.

It’s worth noting that in 2014 Pete Whittaker also , but with two caveats. First, after he and partner Tom Randall’s first day on the wall, they descended to the ground to escape heavy traffic, so the ascent was not completed in a continuous, ground-up push. Second, he fell on the “Boulder Problem” and then pivoted to the alternate “Teflon Corner,” which he sent without falling. CĂ©dric Lachat “flashed” the route under similar circumstances in 2009. And Adam Ondra attempted to—but he fell above the Boulder Problem, on the Salathé’s “Headwall” pitch.

Zangerl took us through her climb. “The Freeblast was quite tricky,” she said, speaking of Free Rider’s initial 10 pitches, which go at 5.11 and are often completed as a route on their own. The climbing isn’t as physically demanding as some pitches higher on the route, but it’s techy, footwork-intensive climbing that demands full concentration. “There are a lot of pitches where you don’t have good handholds, and you’re standing on quite bad feet. It’s a lot of insecure climbing, smearing on slippery holds, there are so many chances to make a mistake and fall.”

 

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Another crux sequence, for Zangerl, was the “Monster Offwidth,” which she led first. As the name suggests, this is a sustained offwidth crack, requiring an arsenal of jams. “The Monster was a real fight for me,” she said. “I’m not really good at offwidth climbing.” She wore two shoes (one La Sportiva TC Pro inside another TC Pro) on her right foot during this pitch to lengthen her feet while heel-toe-camming.

A last-minute meeting with Alex Honnold just before they climbed may have saved the day. “Alex told me when it’s getting super exhausting on the Monster, I should lean out to the right, jamming my left leg, so I can rest,” Zangerl explained. “This was really helpful for me. There was a moment when I felt I couldn’t go any further, I was so exhausted, and then I leaned out of the crack like [Alex] told me, and it worked.”

The infamous “Boulder Problem” was the overwhelming crux, Zangerl said. Larcher took the first lead on this sequence, a tenuous, friction-based pitch that ends with a desperate “ninja kick” out to a dihedral, and this is where he took his fall, ending his flash attempt.

When Zangerl set off on lead, she quickly realized she was too short to use the same footholds as Larcher. She downclimbed to a rest and weighed her options. “When I found my own way, and got to the ninja kick, it was just completely out of control,” she explained. At the same time as Zangerl kicked her foot out, her left hand peeled off. “I thought I was falling,” she said. “But at the very last moment, I stuck the foot on the other side,” she said. “It was extremely insecure. I was really lucky.”

“The further up we got, there was more and more tension,” she explained, “as I began to think maybe it was possible.” Zangerl said that topping out with a flash left her with an incredible feeling. It was a feat she hadn’t really believed she could accomplish. But it was also tainted by the fact that her partner came up short by just a single move. “I was sad for Jacopo,” she said. “And, really, this was a team effort. We did this together. I could not have done this without Jacopo.” The duo has been climbing together for 11 years, and most of her hardest climbs, like Eternal Flame, have been completed with him on the other end of the rope. Zangerl admitted she also had an advantage over Larcher on the Boulder Problem, as he led the pitch first and provided real-time beta for her to consider.

Larcher offered some insight into his own experience . “I briefly felt relieved [after falling,] as now I could just climb the rest without pressure
 but after topping out, feelings changed. I won’t lie. This one meant a lot to me and failure is, and will be, hard to accept. We had an amazing time up there and I couldn’t be more proud of Babsi and her achievement!”

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On October 4, 2024, American climber Tracee Metcalfe trudged toward the summit of 26,335-footÌęShishapangma in Tibet. It was freezing, the snow was deep, and winds gusted up to 30 miles per hour. Metcalf, 50, was on the edge of her comfort zone.

“If there wasn’t so much at stake for a lot of people, we might have considered turning around,” Metcalfe told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. “Or at least, I would have.”

Metcalfe was a member of a guided expedition with the Nepali company called Imagine Nepal, alongside other paying clients and guides. She and the Imagine Nepal team picked their way around a knife-edge ridge, with nothing but air thousands of feet below them on either side. As they completed the traverse, the group reached the peak’s summit. The climbers celebrated as they took turns standing on the pinnacle. Metcalfe, however, was too focused on the impending descent to party. “It wasn’t this crazy, sublime moment like you might think—but none of my summits have been,” she said. “I have a hard time being in the moment up there.”

Metcalf has now been “up there” on all 14 of the world’s mountains above 8,000 meters. In reaching the summit of Shishapangma, she became the first American woman—and just the third U.S. citizen—to complete the achievement, which took her almost a decade. But Metcalfe’s accomplishment on Shishapangma had its roots in tragedy. In 2023, Metcalfe was on Shishapangma when avalanches swept down the flanks, killing climbing guides Mingmar Sherpa and Tenjen Lama, as well as American climbers Anna Gutu and Gina Marie Rzucidlo. Metcalfe and Rzucidlo were friends, and at the time, Rzucidlo and Gutu were each attempting to become the first American woman to complete the 14 peaks. Shishapangma was the final peak for both women.

In the wake of the accident, Metcalfe became the frontrunner to break the record—she already had ascended nine of the peaks. But the deaths left her wondering what compelled her to climb—and whether she wanted to complete the record for herself, or for the history books.

“People started asking, ‘Who has the most in the U.S. now? Who is going to be first?’” she said. “And it was me. I had the most. I tried hard to avoid those questions, because that wasn’t what I was climbing for.”

A Mountaineering Hobby Becomes a Passion

Metcalfe grew up in Los Angeles, and began rock climbing and mountaineering while attending college and medical school in Colorado. She hiked many of the state’s 14,000-foot peaks, and in 2013 began working as an expedition doctor in Alaska on Denali, an experience that motivated her to take on higher mountains in the Himalaya. She climbed Mount Everest in 2016, and in subsequent years ascended other peaks above 8,000 meters.

“It wasn’t necessarily that I wanted to go climb the 14 highest peaks in the world,” she said, “but I did want to climb bigger mountains, and I didn’t have a group of climbing buddies.”

The commercial climbing industry, with its guided expeditions to the top of Everest and other high peaks, offered Metcalfe community and structure. She signed up for more trips to Himalayan peaks. She nearly reached the summit of 8,000er Manaslu the fall after she summited Everest. The following year, she summited 22,349-foot Ama Dablam. She returned to 8,000-meter success with Cho Oyo in 2018, Makalu in 2019, Annapurna in 2021, and Dhaulagiri and Kangchenjunga in 2022.

“My friends were all starting families or busy with their jobs, and I wanted to keep climbing mountains,” she said. “But I’m not a professional climber, I’m not totally self-sufficient, and there is such a strong culture and community around these peaks, that it made sense to keep coming back. It flowed and evolved.”

In 2023 Metcalfe traveled to Shishapangma to ascend her tenth 8,000er. By then, the goal of becoming the first American to complete the 14 peaks seemed out of reach—both Rzucidlo and Gutu had 13 and arrived in Base Camp looking to reach the summit first.

“In a way, I was grateful,” Metcalfe said. “Like, ‘Cool, they want to get this record. Let that attention be on them. I’m going to focus on me.”

Being four peaks behind Gutu and Rzucidlo may have saved Metcalfe’s life. Conditions on Shishapangma became dangerous after a storm dumped fresh snow on the summit. On summit day, Metcalfe left Camp II at 22,300 feet elevation alongside Gutu, but the latter soon outpaced Metcalfe and the other Imagine Nepal clients. When the first avalanche killed Gutu and Mingmar Sherpa, Metcalfe and her companions turned back. Rzucidlo, who was further ahead and continued climbing, was killed in a second avalanche. “I can’t put myself in their shoes,” Metcalfe said. “If I was to have found out there was another American woman attempting the summit the same day as me, I don’t know how I would have felt.”

The deaths of Rzucidlo and Gutu were hard for Metcalfe to reckon with, and it showed her just how selfishÌęmountaineering can be at its core. But Metcalfe never considered abandoning the high peaks. “At a certain point, you can’t take the risk away,” she said. “Those avalanches could’ve wiped us out, too.” Metcalfe was also struck by how the deaths impacted the loved ones that Gutu and Rzucidlo left behind. “How shitty is it going to be for my family, my friends, if I end up dead doing this?” she asked herself.

Metcalfe’s relative anonymity in the world outside of mountaineering fueled her desire to return to the peaks. She’s not a climbing influencer with throngs of online followers and incentives to break records. She has just one sponsor—a Los Angeles-based orthopedic surgeon. Metcalfe has covered the lion’s share of her expedition costs out of her own pockets.

“No one is particularly interested in sponsoring a 50-year-old woman who has never achieved anything particularly remarkable and has fewer than 1,000 Instagram followers,” she said.

Pushing for the Record in 2024

So she returned to the mountains in 2024 and ascended five 8,000-meter peaks with Imagine Nepal: Gasherbrum I and II, and Broad Peak in Pakistan’s Karakoram range, and Himalayan peaks Lhotse and Shishapangma.

Metcalfe said that climbing that many mountains in one year had more to do with personal goals than the record. “I turned 50 this year,” she said. “I’m getting a partial knee replacement soon. I’m getting older. I only have so many climbs at this level left in me.”

Metcalfe reached the summit of Shishapangma on October 4. In the days afterward, a staggering number of climbers reached the top of that mountain to complete new records on the 14 peaks. Nima Rinji Sherpa, 18, became the youngest person to summit every 8,000er. A handful of women became the first of their respective nations to complete the 14 peaks: Alina Pekova the first Russian; Dorota Samocko the first Pole; Dawa Yangzum Sherpa the first Nepali; Naoko Watanabe the first Japanese; and Adriana Brownlee the first from the United Kingdom.

Grace Tseng became the first Taiwanese person, Adrian Laza the first Romanian, Alasdair Mckenzie the youngest European, and Shehroze Kashif the youngest Pakistani person.

șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű asked Metcalfe about the significance of these records. “Being the first doesn’t mean a whole lot to me,” she said. Rather, Metcalfe said that the significance was deeply personal—she endured a decade of climbing, which required dizzying logistics, physical fitness, plenty of cash, and personal grit.

“Yes, it’s cool to say, ‘I’m the first U.S. woman to do it,’” she said, “but I recognize I did it guided, using supplemental oxygen. I’m just proud of this goal because it was important to me.”

Metcalfe said she learned plenty of lessons during her 8,000-meter quest, but the biggest takeaway was the importance of being motivated by internal, and not external, forces. She told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűÌęshe climbed Shishapangma for herself, and not because she sought attention from news outlets or social media followers. She believes this led her to make smarter and safer decisions during her climbs.

Metcalfe also believes her feeling of accomplishment will endure, knowing that she completed a goal for herself and not for others.

“In two weeks, no one’s going to care. If that external motivation, that fame, was driving me, it would fade,” she said. “When it’s internal motivation, when you’re proud of yourself for what you did, nobody can take that away from you.”

Want more of șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s in-depth coverage of adventure stories like this one?Ìę.

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Gary Kristensen dipped his double-bladed paddle into the Columbia River and pulled as hard as he could. The effort felt fruitless—it was like he was paddling through peanut butter. Kristensen, 46, had expected a gentle tailwind for his boating journey, but gusts were cresting 35 miles per hour, sending waves splashing onto him. Next to Kristensen, a support kayak was having to paddle backward just to keep even with his sluggish pace.

Kristensen’s journey would have been easier, of course, if not for his chosen watercraft: a 950-pound pumpkin.

From October 12 to 13, Kristensen, a real estate appraiser from Happy Valley, Oregon, spent 26 hours paddling his enormous gourd down the Columbia River. He completed 45.67 miles, which the as the new record for a category titled “longest journey by pumpkin.” Kristensen told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű that the arduous journey was a true test for any paddler—especially when gusting winds kicked up.

“Water was coming over the top constantly,” Kristensen told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. “It was like paddling a bowl of soup.”

Kristensen is no stranger to using enormous gourds as boats—he’s been growing massive pumpkins since 2011 and paddling them since 2013. He’s raced pumpkins in the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta, an annual festival for seaworthy gourds held in the coastal town of Tualatin, every year since 2013, and has won the event four times since 2018.

Until this year, the standing record for longest pumpkin paddle was 39 miles, set last October on the Missouri River by Steve Kueny and his pumpkin, Huckleberry. But as he watched his own pumpkins grow this season, Kristensen thought he might have one that could rival Huckleberry. He dubbed this challenger “The Punky Loafster,” partly as an ode to the eighties sitcom, but also because he’d jammed wooden boards next to the pumpkin as it formed, so that it would grow in long and skinny, like a loaf of bread.

“If you’re going to race a pumpkin, you want a smaller pumpkin, like around 700 or 800 pounds,” Kristensen said.

Growing pumpkin watercraft is a science, Kristensen explained. For a long distance paddle, on a river like the Columbia, with boat traffic, wind, and waves, you want a larger gourd, to give yourself more space to stretch, and more room to take on water without sinking. You also want the pumpkin to be as long and symmetrical as possible, with a flat bottom and smooth skin.

Kristensen trained for his journey with daily runs, and long weekend paddling trips with pool noodles wrapped around his kayak, to simulate the drag he’d experience with the pumpkin. Punky Loafster—which measured 14 feet around—weighed 1,224 pounds before Kristensen hollowed it out, and it still weighed in at a monstrous 950 pounds before he hopped into it and began paddling. Compare that to the average canoe or kayak, which might run anywhere from 30 to 50 pounds, and it’s easy to see why manning the Loafster was so arduous.Ìę“You paddle, and it just doesn’t move,” he said.

When Kristensen hopped into the Loafster on October 12, he carried a small pump to bail water and a yoga mat to sit on. Aside from that, it was just him, a pumpkin, and a paddle.

Even by pumpkin paddling standards, Kristensen had a rough go. Previous record holder Kueny averaged around 3.5 mph on the Missouri River inside Huckleberry. Kristensen and Punky Loafster recorded an average speed around 1.7 mph. “It was pathetic,” he joked. “At best we had a half mile per hour current. But at times I think the current was even flowing backward, because of the tide.”

The strong winds, which began hammering him when he was only five miles down the river, made things particularly tough. “These were pretty big waves. They’d be a lot for any boat,” he said.Ìę Kristensen tried to stop paddling to pump water, but battered by the waves, without his paddles to balance the pumpkin, he was at constant risk of capsizing. It took an hour for him to get to shore, drain his pumpkin, and let the winds die down, but he managed to do it without sinking.

That evening, disaster struck again. The electric lights strung up on his friend’s support pontoon boat caught fire and were destroyed. “We were trying to use those lights to help us find a beach and a safe place to park the pumpkin,” Kristensen explained. Without the lights, they continued paddling through the night—17 hours of continuous paddling in total—until the sun rose and they could safely dock the pumpkin.

Finding a gentle beach, Kristensen moored his pumpkin and climbed out to take a nap. He woke an hour later to find tides had left the Loafster high and dry on the beach. “I tried to get it back in the water, and I couldn’t budge it at all,” he said. “It would not move an inch.” His friend, David, furiously began digging the pumpkin out, but the pair soon discovered that the beach had been used to moor barges, and there were large industrial cables underneath the ground. Gingerly rolling the 950-pound watercraft around this minefield of cables, it took three hours for Kristensen to get the Punky Loafster back in the water. Kristensen paddled the remainder of the day to finish out his 46-mile trip.

Despite all the obstacles, Kristensen didn’t didn’t end his paddle because his pumpkin sank or broke apart, or because he was too exhausted to continue. The Punky Loafster was still riverworthy, but as darkness fell on their second day of paddling, he and David decided to end their journey. It was Sunday, and they had to go back to work the following day. “I felt strong,” Kristensen said, “but we were running out of weekend.”

Kristensen may have entered the annals of Guinness World Record fame, but there will be no floating off into the sunset for the Punky Loafster. Kristensen left his craft lying on the banks of the Columbia River next to the boat ramp where he put out. “I’m sure it rotted away long ago,” he told me. He plans to return next year with another pumpkin, and see how much farther he can go.

The post This Man Just Paddled 46 Miles in a Gigantic Pumpkin appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

When the sun rose on the morning of October 5, climbers Fay Manners and Michelle DvorakÌęsat perched on a tiny rock ledge at 21,000 feet, high on the flanks of the 22,949-foot Himalayan peak Chaukhamba III. The pair had been stranded on the ledge for 48 hours without shelter, food, or water. A driving snowfall steadily buried them, and the two were exhausted and freezing.

Two days prior, Dvorak and Manners had been attempting a first ascent of the Indian peak when falling rocks sliced a rope and sent a bag full of their survival goods and technical gear plummeting to the valley floor. The accident left them stranded without critical items, such as a working communication device, tent, stove and fuel, and down apparel.

As the two rested, a search helicopter from the Indian Air Force appeared overhead—it circled the mountain several times, but flew off without spotting them. It was the second fly-by in as many days.

“We were shattered,” Manners told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. “At this point we haven’t eaten for two days. We’re severely dehydrated. We’re freezing. We’ve been on the wall seven days.”

Manners was near hypothermic. With the snowstorm worsening, she did not believe the two could survive another night on the precarious perch. She envisioned two options for survival: Stay on the ledge a third night and hope that the helicopters would find them, or descend the wall and then navigate a technical, crevasse-filled icefall with just one set of crampons and ice axes. Both choices came with deadly risks.

A Tricky Attempt at History

Manners, 37, and Dvorak, 31, are among the upper echelon of alpinists. Manners has established new routes from remote Pakistan to Greenland—the latter with Dvorak and . In 2022, the duo made an ascentÌęof Denali’s legendary Cassin Ridge, one of the most famous alpine routes in the world.

Chaukhamba III, in the Garhwal Himalaya of India’s mountainous Uttarakhand state, was a fitting objective for the pair. High and remote, with a gargantuan triangular southeast buttress that no one had ever attempted to climb, the peak offered an enticing challenge and the opportunity for a first ascent.

The two left Delhi for the remote mountain on September 15. After establishing a base camp, they spent September 24 to 26 planning their approach across a steep, winding line through a labyrinth of deadly crevasses to reach the peak’s southeast buttress. “Snowbridges broke on us, we were going down and up crevasses, having to ice climb with our axes and crampons—all before we even reached the col,” Manners said. “By the time we figured out how to get to our route, we felt like we’d done another route in itself.”

Manners and Dvorak left base camp for good on September 27, reaching the buttress the following day. Over the next five days, they ascended the sheer 2,000-foot granite face. It was hard, committing climbing, where a mistake would carry serious consequences. The women made steady progress. The conditions was dry and warm, which allowed them to climb with bare hands, but the balmy conditions carried a hidden danger. As temperatures rose around midday, snow and ice securing loose rocks on the buttress melted, causing blocks of rock and ice to tumble down. It was a risk they had to accept.

“We could only climb when it was warm,” Dvorak said. “As soon as the shade hit, our fingers were freezing, and it was impossible to climb.” After dawn-to-dusk days alternating between muddy scrambling on lower-angle sections and hard rock climbing on the steeper parts of the face, and long, near-sleepless nights cramped on small ledges, the pair was nearing the top of the 2,000-foot buttress. Soon, they would connect with the peak’s south ridge, where lower angles guarded the 22,949-foot summit.

At 1 P.M. on Thursday, October 3, Manners was in the lead, with Dvorak following behind. They were traveling in a fashion typical of big wall rock climbing, carrying some equipment in small packs on their back, but using a pulley system to lift a haul bag with the majority of their gear behind them. This duffel contained Manners’ Garmin satellite messenger, as well as their tent, stove, fuel, portable power banks, one pair of crampons and ice axes, down pants and headlamp, andÌęother essentials.

As Manners hauled the bag, the ropes became stuck. Dvorak, watching from below, climbed above the bag to try to free it. That’s when the cliff below her broke apart, slicing the rope holding their duffel. “These rocks just came out from under me,” she said. “The next thing I knew, I looked down, and the bag was gone.”

The loss of the gear was catastrophic, and signaled an immediate end to their summit push. At first, the women were simply disappointed that they wouldn’t be able to finish their route. But after a moment, they realized just how many of their essentials had been inside the haul bag. As if on command, dark clouds rolled in, and heavy snow began to fall. The warm weather that had accompanied them for the last five days was coming to an end. “The mood really changed,” Dvorak said. “We were just like, ‘Oh, shit. We are not safe on this mountain anymore.’”

Three Days of Snow and Wind

Though Manners’ Garmin was lost with the bag, Dvorak had a similar device, a ZOLEO. Unlike a Garmin inReach, this device doesn’t have its own screen, and requires a paired smartphone to operate. Dvorak’s phone had just enough charge for her to fire off a single SOS, but her phone died just moments after the message was sent. Manners and Dvorak knew their message was in the ether and their location had been marked for rescuers, but they had no idea if any were coming. So the women waited.

They had enough rope and gear to descend from the buttress, but once they did, they’d still have to navigate the icy, steep, crevasse-filled descent off the col to their camp. Descending this section with just one pair of crampons was a high-risk option. “Given the incredibly complex, challenging approach, we knew it wasn’t possible,” Manners said. “Even if we get down off the rock, how the hell are we going to operate on that terrain without our gear?”

It made more sense to stay put and wait for a rescue. When rescue helicopters showed up late on that first day, it seemed like their decision to stay was correct. But then the helicopters flew overhead without stopping. This happened again the next day.

“That’s when we started to have lengthy conversations about what we should do, about how much we should risk,” Manners said.

The duo had no food or no water. Dvorak had her down parka and pants, but Manners’ warm weather gear had been in the haul bag. They were sharing what they could, but Manners was certain she wouldn’t survive another night on the ledge. “I was going to freeze,” she said.

On the third day, the women began rappelling down the buttress. They weren’t sure how they’d navigate the approach. They could split up, with one person taking the sleeping bag and attempting to survive while the other used the crampons to descend to base camp. Or, they could each wear one crampon and attempt the descent together. Both options required strength and stamina, and the women were weakened by their stay on the ledge.

“We’d already waited two days up there. We were severely dehydrated, hungry, freezing,” Manners said. “Our bodies were weak, and even before we lost the haul bag we’d been climbing for six days, pushing our limits.”

The decision ended up being moot. While rappelling down the buttress late on Saturday, Manners and Dvorak saw a four-person team of climbers on the glacier. “We realized we had to catch these guys,’” Dvorak said. “This might be our only chance to get out of here.”

The four climbers were from the French Group Militaire de Haute Montagne of Chamonix. Due to the bad weather, they had abandoned their own attempt on the peak’s east pillar. That’s when they heard word of the missing Manners and Dvorak.

Dvorak and Manners rappelled as fast as they could down the buttress, and but lost sight of the French team. But after a few minutes, the squad appeared directly below them, just a hundred or so feet above the glacier.

“It was a miracle,” Manners said. “Perfect timing. When we got to them, they’d been trying to get to us as well. We were worried that maybe they didn’t even know we were missing, and were just coming to try their route, so my heart was overfull when we figured out they were there for us.”

With gear and support from the French team, Manners and Dvorak were able to descend to the French advanced base camp at around 17,000 feet. They were airlifted out by helicopter the following day.

The two said they received a warm welcome from the Indian Mountaineering Federation (IMF), which organized the rescue. “There’s no, ‘Here’s a giant bill for the rescue, you owe us,’ mentality,” said Manners. “The message was, ‘We are so happy we could get to you, and we want you to come back and we want you to try this mountain again.”

A Media Whirlwind

News of the rescue spread around the globe. The women were helicoptered out on the morning of Sunday, October 6, and within 48 hours, coverage of their ordeal appeared on numerous outlets, from the to . It was more publicity than either woman had received in their careers. But both told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűÌęthey had mixed feelings about the attention.

“Certainly both Michelle and I feel we put in a grand effort here,” Manners said. “But this is a mountain we didn’t summit. The mountains we have summited, the successes we’ve had, they haven’t received nearly as much publicity.”

Manners said that the pair seek to inspire women to get into the mountains—a goal that could be jeopardized by the stories. “I don’t want this story to put people off from the sport,” she said.

Manners and Dvorak told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍűÌęthey’d continually replayed the ordeal, asking themselves if they could have done things differently. A steeper route up the face may have reduced rockfall. Manners could have carried her Garmin in a pocket instead of in the haul bag.

But they admitted that it’s tough to nitpick. “It’s easy to say I would have picked a better route,” Manners said. “But we’re the first people that tried to make our way up this buttress. So it’s hard to say what a better route would have been.”

In some survival stories, teams break apart as the days wear on and the odds of living grow thin. șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű asked Manners and Dvorak ifÌę they experienced this dynamic. They said the opposite situation occurred on the peak. “The further we got into our suffering, the stronger our relationship became,” Dvorak said.

As the snow fell and the frigid hours dragged on, the two relied on each other, both for morale and for survival, hunkering together to conserve body heat and share meager supplies. “We were in need of each other, more and more,” Manners said. “Those first six days climbing, we could afford to have little spats, about not coiling a rope correctly or whatever. But when it got serious, we were closer than ever.”

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Four years ago, Brooke Raboutou became the to qualify for the discipline’s Olympic debut at the Tokyo Games.

Raboutou and 20 other women went head to head in a controversial triple-combined event, vying for a single gold medal based on an aggregate score from three different events: speed, bouldering, and lead. While bouldering and lead climbing share some characteristics—a focus on strength and the technical difficulty of climbing movement—speed climbing is a sport all its own, and requires a very different skillset. The format . Raboutou had a strong showing in bouldering, coming second behind Slovenian Janja Garnbret, who eventually won the gold medal. But she struggled in the other two disciplines and eventually finished fifth.

Now, Raboutou is back, and she hopes to grab a medal in sport climbing at the Paris Olympics. The climbing events run August 5-10.

Things are different for Raboutou and the other climbers whose sights are set on the Olympics. For starters, the International Olympic Committee has dramatically changed the format: speed climbing a stand-alone medal event in Paris. A second set of medals will be awarded based off of combined scores in the bouldering and lead competitions. We spoke with Raboutou about her ambitions in Paris, the atmosphere at the world’s biggest stage, and what the new format means for the world’s best competitive sport climbers.

OUTSIDE: What is your opinion of the new Olympic competition format?
I think it’s a great change, and I don’t know anyone who would argue it isn’t. When I competed in Tokyo, it was all three disciplines combined into one. That wasn’t only grueling physically, but the way it worked out for scoring wasn’t really fair. It was ranking-based. I think I can say none of us would have chosen to compete in all three events at once. The combined format did favor some competitors over others, but in general, Speed is a specialty that deserves its own medals.

Hopefully in the future Boulder and Lead will also be separate and then there will be a Combined event as well. But still, those are much more similar disciplines and require similar skills. A lot of us competitors do specialize in both of those, but not all three. I just think it makes a lot more sense for our sport and gives the opportunity for speed climbers to go to the Olympics and have their own medals. Some people are still annoyed that Boulder and Lead are combined. But this is only our second Games, so I’m grateful for anything we can get. That first split is incredible, and hopefully we can gain more traction and opportunities for more medal sets in the future that will allow more specialization. But I honestly do like the combined approach, so I hope we can have both individual and combined in the future. I’m just trying to take it as it comes and be grateful that we’re on this big stage.

What did your training look like in the lead up to Paris?
I’ll give you the basics. I climb five days a week, usually two days on, one day off, sometimes three days on, one or two days off. My training is planned, but it’s also adaptable. I train with a coach here who I’ve worked with for four years, Chris Danielson, who’s a big part of my growth. He’s a huge mentor to me. A lot of the training is on the wall, climbing, but I do strength training as well, weights for power and maintenance. And then I do a lot of mental work.

Mental work, like visualization or medication?
Both. Meditation just for my own well-being, and then visualization—working with sports psychologists and practicing imagery tactics to use throughout training and competition. That’s both visualization of the climbs, but also different cues to help get me in the present moment, focused on myself, and in a good mental place.

How does the atmosphere of the Olympics differ from that at major climbing events like the World Cup?
I remember having a moment of realization at the Games because it did feel so different in some ways. Like This is crazy. This is climbing’s first Olympics, and there are only 20 of us on the mat.ÌęSo I had that realization, but still, we’re just climbing. This is the same game that we get to do every day, at all the other competitions.

It’s more a perception change than an actual change, which to me is helpful. I like to look at it that way. It’s an exciting opportunity, how big this is, but at the end of the day, nothing has changed. We’re still doing what we love out there on the mats. So I don’t know. I would say yes and no. It is different for sure, but a lot of that is just perception as well, and attention toward our sport, less real internal change or physical change.

What draws you to competitive climbing?
I love climbing just for itself, for the movement. That’s something that drives me and I’m impassioned by, and I find that both indoors and outdoors. But I’ve really fallen in love with competition for the mental growth that it takes. Learning about myself through competition, through challenges, through success, it’s been really eye-opening and purposeful for me.

To be a high-level competitor and get to experience this world and those extremes, and have that time for myself to reflect on how I show up. I’ve learned so much through competition climbing about my own development. That’s something I’m really grateful for and love on a bigger picture perspective. Internally, I love the movement of climbing, and I love the feelings it gives me and the confidence it gives me in the way I’m able to express myself.

This interview was edited for space and clarity.Ìę

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In the eighties, nineties, and much of the early aughts, rock climbing gyms were little more than training grounds where climbers honed their skills in preparation for objectives on real rock. But these days are long gone. Over two percent of the U.S. population has in the last year; a growing subset of regular climbers (as much as 30 percent, by some estimates) exclusively climb inside; and there are many more for whom outdoor trips are rare vacations from near-daily trips to the plastic.

Despite the moaning of a few old crust kings, the recent proliferation of large, ornate climbing gyms isÌę simply a natural progression of our planet’s growing population and our sport’s growing popularity. It also means that many indoor gyms have become world-class destinations in their own right, as worthy of a visit as many a legendary sport crag or boulder field. Below are 13 of the world’s coolest climbing gyms, in no particular order.

The 13 Coolest Climbing Gyms

1. Kletterzentrum Innsbruck, Austria

We can’t have a list of the best climbing gyms in the world without (perhaps better known as “KI” for us Americans; looking at that first word gives me anxiety.) This sprawling Innsbruck training center is oft-touted as the world’s best climbing gym, due to the sheer size (60,000 square feet of climbing surface), variety (over 550 roped routes, 200-plus boulders), and world-class setting. It’s also the built in a single push (others have surpassed it in fits and starts), and a must-see if you’re in Innsbruck.

 

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2. B-PUMP Ogikubo, Japan

Japan puts out fiendishly strong climbers like Krispy Kreme puts donuts out on an assembly line—and when you visit gyms like , it’s easy to understand why.

The B-PUMP chain has a rich history dating back to 1993, and it now operates half a dozen gyms around Tokyo. Their Akihabara location is the largest gym in the country, but the boulder cave Ogikubo is perhaps the most iconic, due to its focus on top-shelf climbing, training, and diverse creative setting. You’ll see no shortage of Japanese IFSC pros on a visit to B-PUMP. (Be warned, the problems are notoriously stiff, even for Japan.)

 

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3. CATS Gymnastics, Colorado

The historic Boulder gym CATS () may be outshined by more modern gyms, but it deserves a place on any list like this for its history alone. Founded in 1988, CATS is one of North America’s oldest climbing walls (Vertical World edges it out by one year.)

The gym was built by gymnast and climber Robert Candelaria, and this history shows, because it’s as much a gymnastics training center as a bouldering gym. Where climbing is concerned, CATS puts a strong focus on competitive youth training and coaching, as opposed to casual climbing. American crushers from Brooke Raboutou to Daniel Woods have trained here, and pretty much every Colorado-based climber has hit the CATS spray wall at one time or another.

 

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As you can see, the holds are bad, the density is absurd, and the walls are never reset, which means you can test yourself on V14 testpieces that were first climbed decades ago. For instance, Bubble Wrap (V13/14), first climbed by Daniel Woods in 2013.

from on .

4. Climb BlueSky, Kenya

, in Nairobi, Kenya may not have the world-class facilities offered by the previous few gyms, but it’s noteworthy if only for the way it’s cultivated our sport, expanding access to climbing in this developing African nation. Bouldering and roped climbing are both available, and the gym offers classes, as well as day trips to crags like Hell’s Gate National Park and the Lukenya Hills. BlueSky also puts on an annual climbing competition, JamRock.

5. CopenHill, Denmark

The 280-foot outdoor wall at sits on the side of a building in downtown Copenhagen and is the in the world. Each of the wall’s five lead climbing lines offers two routes (10 total), and to get from the bottom to the top involves climbing four 65-foot pitches. This is no playhouse for newbies. A multi-pitch certification is required to climb the CopenHill, and although the easiest route on the wall goes at 5.9, most of the lines are harder, with difficulties up to 5.12c.

6. Excalibur, Klimcentrum Bjoeks, Netherlands

The eye-catching 121-foot Excalibur spire in the Dutch town of Groningen is often touted as the tallest freestanding climbing structure in the world. (As far as I can tell, this 137-foot tower at Georgia’s actually takes the cake, but for sheer vision and aesthetic value, you can’t beat Excalibur.) The tower’s silhouette is extremely imposing—at its steepest, the wall is 36 feet overhung—and the structure has both top ropes and lead routes up to 5.13c. And it is certainly a contender for the single coolest climbing gym in the world.

Excalibur is part of the climbing center, which also has an outdoor boulder park, home to over 200 problems on permanent concrete boulders. Per the Bjoeks website, camping on the grass beneath the tower is free, and you can also spend the night inside the tower by request. The gym has showers and a kitchenette with a microwave and refrigerator. It’s a destination gym if ever there was one.

7. Ouray Ice Park, Colorado

Ouray, Colorado’s —open every winter since 1994—is the largest man-made ice climbing arena in the world. Host of the legendary each January, the park houses more than 200 ice and mixed climbing routes along 1.7 miles of the Uncompahgre Gorge.

The ice park is open for around three months each year—-usually from mid-December to the end of March, depending on conditions—and is free for all climbers, though paying members get early access to the park each day. Although the park doesn’t offer ice climbing classes, there are a number of clinics run by commercial guides during the annual Ice Festival, so it’s a great place to pick up the sport if you’ve never climbed ice before.

 

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8. The School Room, England

The mysterious English School Room is invite-only, so you and I probably won’t be climbing there any time soon. But as far as gyms go, you’d be hard-pressed to make a case that there is a better rock guru den anywhere in the world. Almost everyone who is anyone in 1990s and 2000s British hard climbing—Ben Moon, Malcolm Smith, Rich Simpson, Stuart Cameron, Jerry Moffatt—cut their teeth here. And these days it’s still frequented by all-stars like Jim Pope, Molly Thompson-Smith, Aidan Robers, and Will Bosi.

The School Room was the iron that sharpened British hardmen to go outside and tackle some of the world’s first top-shelf 5.14s. It was also the birthplace of the legendary MoonBoard. First built in 1993 in the Anns Grove School, today the School Room operates out of a new warehouse space owned by MoonClimbing. If cool (for you) is a synonym for dingy, tweaky, historic, and hard, this is certainly up there (with CATS) as the coolest gym on the planet.

9. Edinburgh International Climbing Arena, Scotland

Built inside a repurposed quarry near Edinburgh, Scotland, the (EICA: Ratho) offers a unique take on indoor climbing, with a tarpaulin-roofed arena that feels like a blend between an outdoor crag and a gym.

In addition to several hundred roped and boulder problems on plastic, there are also on the exterior of the dolerite quarry, including classics of both trad—Shear Fear, Wally 1 —and sport—The Corrieman, and King Silly. Beyond climbing, the “arena” houses a cafe, and also offers aerial assault courses, fitness classes, and a soft play area for children. Gotta say, climbing outside while in a climbing gym is pretty cool.

 

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10. Parque de Escalada Los Silos, Chile

The mission of Chilean nonprofit Fundación Deporte Libre (Free Sport Foundation) is to transform abandoned urban spaces into public sports facilities. That’s exactly what they did with two derelict cement factory silos in Santiago de Chile in 2018. Now the “” is a colorful outdoor climbing gym, with 20 sport climbing routes up to 65 feet high along the walls of the silos, as well as a freestanding boulder with 500 square feet of climbing surface.

It’s free to climb at the Parque de Silos 365 days a year, and the gym also offers free climbing classes and free equipment rental for top roping. (Lead climbing is also available, but climbers must bring their own gear.)

In addition to the Parque de Silos, FundaciĂłn Deporte Libre operates around Chile, including other climbing walls, a skateboarding park, a mountain hut on the Calbuco volcano, and several traditional playgrounds and open spaces.

11. Diga di Luzzone, Switzerland

This isn’t a climbing gym, per se, but if you’re looking for audacious artificial climbing, you’d be hard pressed to find a cooler one than the , which is home to the tallest artificial climbing face in the world. The concave dam is climbable via a fully bolted, five-pitch 5.10b, and it costs 20 Euros per climber.

The final couple hundred feet are overhanging, so be prepared for some serious exposure! The bottom of the wall has no holds, you’ll need a ladder (locked up at the base of the climb) to reach them, which you’ll get access to after paying the fee.

 

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12. Gneis Lilleaker, Norway

This Oslo gym—which opened in the fall of 2023—houses 50-foot roped walls, 15 auto belays, and plenty of bouldering and training, but it’s the location that makes it stand out. Gneis Lilleaker’s walls are contained within a large glass atrium looking out on a waterfall and the river Lysakerelven outside. Per YouTuber Magnus Midtbö, is “the most beautiful climbing gym in the world.”

13. The Cave at CityRock, Colorado, USA

Housed in a former movie theater, Colorado Springs’ is a solid climbing gym in its own right, with 43-foot rope routes up to 5.14 and boulders at V12. However, the , dubbed “The Cave,” is something you can’t experience at any other climbing gym in the world.

A 40-foot vertical shaft and 225 feet of cave passages snake around and beneath CityRock. Treading lightly is the name of the game, since you’ll earn points based on how gentle you are when crawling through these artificial tunnels (sensors on the wall flash if you touch stalactites or get too close to a cave painting, for example).

Once you’re out, you can compare scores at the end to see which one of your party did the best job leaving no trace. Night-vision cameras let friends watch you while you’re in the caves, too. Admittedly, The Cave is more of a novelty for birthday parties, schools, and summer camps, but it also serves as a training ground for serious cavers, firefighters, and cave rescue teams. And it certainly makes CityRock unique.

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