12-Year-Old Climber Sets Sights on Seven Summits

by Kraig Becker on

The Seven Summits are the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents, and climbing them all is considered one of the premiere achievements for climbers and adventurers the world over. The concept originated with a man named Dick Bass who was the first to successfully gain this achievement back in 1985, and since then, dozens of other climbers have followed in his footsteps.

Currently, the youngest person to have climbed the Seven Summits is Samantha Larson, who accomplished the feat at the age of 18 when she topped out on Mt. Everest back in 2007. But there is another young climber looking to snatch that record, as 12-year-old Jordan Romero closes in on the mark.
Jordan, who was recently interviewed by Outside Online, caught the climbing bug when he reached the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa, at the age of 10. After that, he made it a goal to go after the remaining summits as well, and has now successfully reached the top of Elbrus (Europe), Aconcagua (South America), Denali (North America), and Kosciuszko (Australia). That leaves Mt. Vinson in Antarctica, and Everest in Asia, as the two remaining mountains in the traditional Seven Summits. This summer, Romero will climb a mountain called Carstensz Pyramid in Papua New Guinea. Carstensz is considered the tallest mountain in Oceania, often replacing Kosciusko as the seventh summit. Jordan’s covering all his bases and climbing both, making this a Seven Summits plus One.

If everything goes as planned, the young climber will be on Everest by the time he’s 16, and finishing off his quest. Jordan says that the most difficult challenge is actually fund raising, and he estimates he’ll need roughly $180,000 to complete the Seven Summits, the bulk of which will be used on Everest and Vinson. Good luck Jordan!

Yay! It’s snowing on Mt. Kilimanjaro

by Jerry Guo on

The simple fact there was snow during the high season (which is this month and next) for climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro was enough to warrant a front-page feature in this week’s travel section of the New York Times. Seeing the white-capped summit–the highest in Africa–is just part of a growing trend of “see it while it’s still there” tourism, which Aaron wrote about a few weeks ago.

Anyways, it turns out there was “several weeks of heavy rain and snow” right before the writer showed up. By the way, this was during last January, so perhaps our readers can update us on whether there’s any snow left this January. One of the Tanzanian guides on the trip had this to say about global warming at Mt. Kilimanjaro, “When I first started climbing, we had big snow, big glaciers. The glaciers were bigger and taller than now. And also, the weather changed. We had heavier rain than we have now.”

But here’s the trouble about climbing the summit to appreciate the mythic glaciers and snow-caps. On the writer’s trip, there were 11 American climbers, 3 Tanzanian guides, and 38 porters and cooks. That’s a rather big carbon footprint, dont’cha think?

If you’re still up for the trip, and I don’t blame you if you are, we’ve written about the logistics of getting there and picking a climbing outfit here.

Kilimanjaro’s Glaciers May Last Longer Than Predicted

by Willy Volk on

Weirdness.

In contrast to reports of global wreaking havoc worldwide — from Kiribati, to Greenland; from Costa Rica, to Siberia; from the US, to numerous other destinations — a joint Austrian-U.S. research team is reporting that there’s one place that isn’t succumbing to global warming quite as fast as expected: Kilimanjaro.

After reviewing 7 years of measurements taken from weather stations atop Africa’s tallest mountain, the researchers have concluded that Kili’s ice fields will be around for another 30 to 40 years, at least — and the glaciers on its slopes could last even longer. That’s pretty sweet news, especially considering Kili’s icepacks have been retreating since the 1800s, and scientists had thought they could disappear altogether as early as 2020.

Before you get all giddy about the prospect of the ice pack being around forever, it’s important to bear in mind that the glaciers now measure about 0.8 square miles, down from 4.6 square miles in 1912. However, it appears that the 2006 El Niño brought heavy snowfall to the mountain that fattened the peak’s glaciers, increasing their thickness even though their surface area stayed the same. Of course, 0.8 square miles is still pretty tiny, but not too tiny to plan that once-in-a-lifetime trip to tackle Kili.

[Thanks, Marilyn!]