In 1969, at the age of nine, Barry Blanchard sat on a Greyhound bus as a young woman read to him from the pages of the mountaineering classic, The White Spider. Five decades later, alpinist and mountain guide Barry Blanchard recalls how the call of the mountains transformed his life.

“How often do we, as climbers, reach out for abandonment?” Claire Carter asks. “Leave the ground to find a swinging freedom; bitter-cold, bittersweet.” In this episode, we sit down with poet, climber and creative consultant Claire Carter to discuss some of her recent projects, including her efforts to retrace some of the travels of Gwen Moffat, a legendary climber and writer who had become Britain's first female mountain guide in 1953, and which she wrote about for Issue 57 of Alpinist magazine.

In 1972, barely out of high school, Doug McCarty and Brian Leo completed the first winter ascent of the North Face of 12,799-foot Granite Peak—only to endure an icy bivy on the remote summit. In this episode, McCarty reads the story he wrote for Issue 63 of Alpinist magazine, in which he recalls the ghostly "strange music" that helped him survive more than four decades ago.

From the time he led his dad up the Diamond of Longs Peak at age fifteen, Derek Franz has long been “obsessed with all things climbing.” After graduating college with a journalism degree, Franz has worked as a freelancer while living crag-side and written an award-winning column for the Post Independent. He joined Alpinist as the digital editor in the autumn of 2016. In this episode, Franz talks with associate editor Paula Wright about the highs and lows of chronicling life in the mountains.

Since she first offered to waltz around on stilts in a purple leotard at the 2002 Summer Outdoor Retailer, brandishing Issue 0 of Alpinist, author and illustrator Tami Knight has been a friend of the magazine. Over the years, her contributions have included such cartoon classics as The Alpine Oracle (“Before ya leave on yer next climbin trip…”) and The Climbing-Lit Editor’s Nightmare (“Hey Writers! Use these moldy phrases in yer manuscripts & win me a cup of burnt coffee”), in addition to more serious fare (the Squamish Mountain Profile, spanning decades of climbing lore in British Columbia). Now, in conversation with Alpinist associate editor Paula Wright, the irrepressible Tami Knight goes beyond the page as she shares stories from her early climbing days and her funniest untold tales yet.

In June 2002, a wildfire erupted about 100 miles southwest of Denver, Colorado. What became known as the Hayman Fire burned for over a month, resulting in the death of six people. The fire blazed through nearly 140,000 acres—at the time, the largest fire in the state’s recorded history. It also consumed popular climbing areas, including Thunder Ridge. In this episode, journalist Nick Mott explores the impacts of the Hayman Fire, and what the rising rate of megafires might mean for climbing communities across the country.

“We all have emotions that eventually bring us to self-awareness, if we let them. Beneath every curmudgeonly old soul is the ability to share a passion and appreciate something that makes us feel deeply…. It’s true—climbing does not change you. But having a passion for something is what will.” Kathy Karlo is a climber, writer, and the director of the website and podcast, both titled “For the Love of Climbing.” In this episode, Karlo talks about her Alpinist 61 article, "Climbing Doesn't Change You," and how writing openly about vulnerability within the context of climbing can be a radical act.

“Mountains strip us layer by layer until our core is exposed, raw and vulnerable.” Whitney Clark is a professional climber who has established several alpine routes around the globe. She also spends a lot of time thinking about how to balance risk and ambition in the mountains. In this episode, Clark opens up about how she approaches decision making in the alpine—whether to bail or climb on—and how those moments ripple on into the future. In the second part of this episode, Clark reads her essay, "A Few Seconds," which first appeared in Issue 58 of Alpinist magazine.

In this episode, Gabriel Ellison-Scowcroft shares a story about a winter attempt of Sisnaajini (Blanca Peak) with Len Necefer, the founder of Natives Outdoors, and pro skier Brody Leven. Along the way, the climbers learn more about the Indigenous history and stories surrounding the mountain. Chris Zabriskie’s music available courtesy of https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

In 2003 Nick Bullock quit his steady job as an instructor in the Prison Service to climb and write full-time. His 2016 ascent of Nyainqentanglha Southeast (7046m) in Tibet with Paul Ramsden won the climbers a Piolet d’Or the following year. In this episode, Bullock discusses his path to climbing and the Alpinist article he wrote about the Nyainqentanglha climb, which won an award from the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival in 2017.