What’s Inside: Issue 2 of The High Route Journal

We’re here to present more about Issue 2 of The High Route journal. First, the disclaimer. We acknowledge that we’re selling something here: subscriptions to a website and a high-quality print offering. Making it, from a business perspective, in particular media, can be tough. And we are a bit atypical. On our site, we don’t use affiliate links or run sponsored content. We do, however, if you take a quick look at our footer, you’ll see logos for brands that have come on board to support our efforts. In particular, their support helps ease the burden of producing The High Route journal. 

We should also state that these brands came on board because they believed in our readers’ first mission. The fact is, we need their support, but we don’t want to simply serve eyeballs to an all-consuming algorithm.  

Issue 2 of The High Route journal: What’s inside?

Let’s begin with the cover. We are now two-for-two featuring covers with skis on the back. Meaning, clearly, skis are not on the feet, which, we had been told, was a mistake. This is skiing after all, it must be about the down. Which, of course, is not totally true. We love the up. Issue 1 featured Adam Fabrikant on the cover during a trip when he and his partners skied Gasherbrum I and II. 

For Issue 2’s cover, we worked with photographer Blake Gordon, who was in charge of stills for documenting Christina Lustenberger and Gee Pierell and their first ski descent of Mount Robson’s South Face (which presents a looming 9,000 feet of technical skiing). We wanted an image that highlighted the face’s immense scale while contrasting small human forms. Gordon sent a series of images, but we let him take the lead in helping us choose a shot. And we think he nailed it. The cover image shows Lusti and Gee, framed in the lower right-hand third of the photo, as they enter a feature the duo named Gee’s Couloir. For perspective, Gee’s Couloir sits high on the face. 

We have two feature articles on Mount Robson in Issue 2. Fabrikant wrote about his own experiences on Robson in “Growth and Inspiration on the Mountain of the Spiral Road.” Back in his mid-20s, along with Billy Haas, when he was decidedly less experienced, he and Haas eyed the Kain Face, climbed it without crampons (which we do not recommend), then pivoted and skied down. Years later, this past spring, he ascended the classic Kain Route, summited, and skied off. But that’s not really the story. In a comical and reverential way, he weaves a story that explores the history of ski mountaineering on the mountain, focusing on the Kain Route, the North Face, and touching on the recent South Face descent.

Lusti and Gee provide a 3,000-word first-person account of their South Face experience (“Connecting the Dots on Robson’s South Face”) in a form that is both oral history and ruminative. So, lots of Mount Robson in Issue 2.

We are biased, but each piece featured in Issue 2 is a gift. Let’s run through the contents.

• Diego Saez, a Chilean mountain guide, presents a striking photo essay. We expect this photo spread might entice you down south in the years ahead, or at a minimum, to explore something unknown to you. 

• Luke Hinz (writing) and Noah Kuhns (photos) weave a fine tale about their expedition to Baffin Island, where skiing was only part of the story. The “Fiery Furnace,” the piece’s title, refers to a stalking polar bear that had the duo reflecting on their place on the Baffin Island food chain.

• Madeleine Martin-Preney, a Canadian guide, in “Rising and Falling,” writes about her experience traversing the full length of the Canadian Selkirks, a first, with a group of four guys. Thirty-six days in total, and now nearly a decade later, Martin-Preney adds some fine perspective and some wisdom, as she writes about this mighty feat.

• Andy Lewicky, some of you may know him from SierraDescents, presents a heartfelt ode to his family and the home they lost in LA’s Palisades Fire, and yes, touring. We love the title, “How the Story Ends.” Lewicky sorts through the charred remnants of a past life and finds problems to solve on the skintrack.

• We also experimented a bit in a series of four pieces under the heading “Applied Science.” We sent three splitboarders the same writing prompt and received three very distinct pieces in return. You’ll hear from Clark Henarie, Christine Feleki, and Forrest Shearer in this section.

• Of course, there are poems, and Crested Butte poet/writer, Leath Tonino delivers with “There’s Not One Tree” and “I am soaking wet.” 

• Master of the Creativity Department here at The High Route, Pete Vordenberg delves into the words and diagrams of W. Rikmer Rikmers, an old-school ski mountaineer from days long gone by, in his piece “Art of the Ski Runner.” 

• Tina Haver Currin from Colorado’s Front Range was a find for us. She writes about her time as a beginning backcountry skier, mentored by Jon Krakauer, in her story “Uphill Both Ways.” 

• Chamonix-based photographer Layla Kerley provides the shots for a playful photo essay titled “Arc of the Sun: When will we need headlamps?

• And we close out with a profile of Tom Turiano and a celebration of the Greater Yellowstone landscape in “Unlost in the Greater Yellowstone,” by Jason Albert.  

Ok, so we are a business, and our “sell,” we hope, comes off as both soft and convincing. We do not aspire to be overbearing or all-demanding of your attention. In this media moment of influencing and way-too-short-form, we would, however, appreciate your attention in a long-form way by subscribing to The High Route journal (you can gift it, too). We are certainly proud of this effort.

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