Uisdean Hawthorn and Tom Livingstone went to the Central Alaska Range for 7 weeks in May/June 2017. Unfortunately they were unsuccessful in all their objectives (a new route on the Father and Sons Wall, reaching the summit of Mt. Hunter/Begguya via the Moonflower, and the Slovak Direct on Denali).
The Avellano Towers are an incredible place in the Patagonian wilderness of Chile. Taking Jim Donini up on his offer of, “something a little different”, 5 years ago is one of the best things I’ve ever done.
After a multi-day trek up the steep Sumur Lungpa to establish a base camp by the Sumur Lakes at 5,160m, Derek, Drew, Rafal and Howard made the first ascent of Point 6068 via its technically easy SW slopes (Alpine F) on 18th September following an arduous 5h of post-holing from a high camp at 5,743m. Deceptively, this top turned out to be the high point of three convergent ridges rather than a true peak per se and was thus called Deception Point. We were unable to get a Ladakhi translation. Only roped glacier travel was required.
In August 2017, four friends travelled to the Shimshal valley in northern Pakistan to look for unclimbed peaks. George, Steve, Clay and Ross had previous expedition experience but due to work commitments could only afford three weeks away.
