I swear, this is not a love letter. This is not a fan letter, although I am, it seems, a fan. My mighty Prius with Blizzaks zipped from Bend to Salt Lake City to support some friends on Tuesday evening. There, ski alpinists, ski mountaineers, alpinists-skiers, under-the-radar badasses, whatever anyone would like to call them, Billy Haas and Adam Fabrikant gave a slideshow titled, loosely, “Gasherbrum Ski Odyssey.”
Haas, Fabrikant, and Brendan O’Neill climbed and skied Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II with no oxygen and no sherpa/porter support above basecamp, this past July. As part of a small alpine-style group, they did not carry film gear. They did, however, come home with over 2000 photos and vivid stories—a perfect recipe for a good old-fashioned slide show. And it was.
Part of this story today has to do with reporting on such a wonderful event. It’s also a plug for others who are low-key and simply doing their thing in the mountains at a high level to help gather the community every once in a while and get us all connected around what we love.
On a personal note, many of you know we are releasing Issue 1.0 of The High Route magazine in February. Both Billy and Adam have feature stories in that issue. I spent many hours on calls with Billy and Adam editing, and I texted back and forth 1000s of words with my co-editor on these stories, Kelly. I felt like I had a pretty good grasp of their Gasherbrum trip.
Cocooned in a standing-room-only venue, listening to two low-profile yet world-class ski mountaineers was exceptional. Am I about to huff and puff up an 8000-meter peak? No. But, I am inspired. And I came away understanding that despite what I thought I knew about someone’s adventure as I did with Billy and Adam’s, I didn’t know much.
Below are the thoughts of two other attendees who have written some fine stuff for THR. If you have the bandwidth and resources, Billy, Adam, and Brendan O’Neill will present a slideshow in Jackson on December 9th.
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