Alaska Season Begins! Dave Ahrens Reports From Ruth Glacier.

Ruth Gorge, MM Collection

Seth Hob­by photo

Seth Hob­by photo

We’re excit­ed to announce that the Alas­ka climb­ing sea­son has begun, and Moun­tain Mad­ness teams are in the thick of the excitement.

Dave Ahrens is guid­ing our eight-day expe­di­tion train­ing course, which is held in the famous Ruth Gorge – only ten air miles south­east of Denali. The team is plan­ning to work on all the fun­da­men­tals of expe­di­tion-style moun­taineer­ing, like glac­i­er trav­el, nav­i­ga­tion, fixed line use, sled haul­ing, crevasse res­cue, and snow and ice climbing.

When we heard from Dave, he told us that they flew into the Ruth Gorge on Sun­day, as sched­uled. ​“They snuck right in!” he said.

The beau­ti­ful weath­er looks like it will hold for the week, accord­ing to Dave. The group was able to cov­er lots of skills yes­ter­day, and is tar­get­ing the West Face of Mount Dick­ey as an objec­tive to sat­is­fy the group’s goals.

Stay tuned for more updates on the Ruth Gorge expe­di­tion train­ing course! 

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