Summits of Ambition: The Quest for Every Country's Highpoint

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‘Eric, an accomplished mechanical engineer, is on a groundbreaking mission to become the first person to climb the highest mountain in every country with his twin brother Matthew. Growing up in the Appalachian foothills of Kentucky, he developed a passion for the outdoors that led him to MIT, where he refined his mountaineering skills. After summiting Denali, he expanded his ambitions to tackle highpoints globally, including the challenging peaks of the 'Stan countries. As the third American recipient of the Snow Leopard Award, Eric is making history with each ascent, pushing the limits of exploration and adventure.’

Background

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I was born and raised in Kentucky in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. Growing up I went hiking a lot with my family and I dug ginseng to make money to buy backpacking equipment. We also did family trips to the Smoky Mountains, and lots of road trips across the country.

Pico de Orizaba (18,490ft), the Mexico highpoint, on January 3, 2012.

After high school I moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts to go to school at MIT. I was there for 10 years for undergrad through PhD studying mechanical engineering. I learned a lot of mountaineering skills through the MIT Outing Club doing trips to the White Mountains of New Hampshire on the weekends.

You’re an accomplished mechanical engineer, but when you’re not working on engineering projects, you’ve taken up the hobby of climbing the highest mountain in every country on earth! Can you share with us your motivation and desire that drove this idea into fruition.

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I got into peakbagging with the MIT Outing Club doing trips in NH on weekends. The goal there for a lot of hikers was to climb all 48 4000ft peaks in the state. After finishing that list my brother Matthew and I set our sights on all the US State highpoints. Growing up we always tried to do family road trips to visit every state. Now that we had mountaineering skills we figured why not also climb the highest mountain in each state while we visit it?

We finished the state highpoints during grad school in 2012, and thought we should keep expanding our project. At that point we already had one country highpoint completed - Denali, the US highpoint.

So, we decided to make our new project climbing the highest mountain in every country on earth. Nobody has yet completed this project, and it sounded like a good lifelong goal. It would give extra motivation to visit every country in the world and would give a tangible objective to achieve in each country. I've found that trying to climb a country highpoint often ensures we visit remote, off-the-beaten-track locations in a country, which makes for interesting and rewarding trips.

Hard Mox (8,504ft), First Winter Ascent. Dec 29, 2023

Where was your first climb? Can you tell us about how that climb went and what you learnt on the first day?

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It's kind of hard to pinpoint when my first climb was. I first rock climbed, and ice climbed in the mountains in New Hampshire about 20 years ago.

My first country highpoint was Denali, which I climbed with my brother Matthew and friends from the MIT Outing Club (Darren, Dan, and Woody).

Eric and Matthew on Denali (20,310ft), the USA highpoint, on May 26, 2010.

That was also my first real expedition and my first time at altitude above about 14,000ft. I learned a lot about acclimating strategies liking climbing high and sleeping low and waiting for weather windows. I also learned there's a lot of down time on expeditions, so it's important to bring good books. It was fun climbing with my friends from the outing club, some of whom taught me the mountaineering skills I needed to climb a big peak like that.

Eric juggling five snowballs near the summit of Kebnekaise (6,909ft), the Sweden highpoint, on July 15, 2010.

What does your preparation process look like for each climb, from selecting the mountain to training?

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For selecting a country highpoint I've created a long-term plan where I've determined an optimal time of year to climb each peak (based on dry season vs wet season or other factors). Then I've put an approximate year and season when I'd like to climb each peak in the future.

Horseshoe Peak (8,480ft). First Winter Ascent. Feb 3, 2024. Southeast face, M3.

For some peaks that are currently politically unstable or currently closed to climbing I don't yet have a timeframe for them yet. In general, I'm now targeting the most difficult country highpoints remaining (high altitude, technical), and countries that have unsurveyed peaks and unknown country highpoint locations. Then later I'll go for the remaining ones that are logistically/politically/technically easier.

Rainier Liberty Cap Survey, Sept 21, 2024.

For training for a country highpoint, I find that I rarely need to do anything specific. My regular weekend trips in WA keep me in very good shape and keep me sharp with technical skills. For instance, in July 2022 I climbed K2 without oxygen, but I didn't do anything specific to train for it in advance. I just did my normal weekend routine and that was sufficient. I climbed Broad Peak first in June to acclimate, then made a quick ascent of K2 afterwards.

Mt Everest Attempt to 8500m. No supplemental oxygen and no personal Sherpa. May 22, 2022.

If a trip requires a unique new set of skills, then I will do additional training. For instance, this past summer Branden Joy and I did the first SE-NW traverse of Greenland, and that required a new skillset. We kite skied across, but I had never kite skied before, so I needed to learn that in advance. I started in January by flying down to Utah for a weekend to take kite skiing lessons.

Snowkiting Whistler-Fissile Ridge, BC. April 6, 2024.

Then in WA I tried to get in a half dozen training trips kiting. This is not easy in Washington. You need big flat open snowy areas, but low-elevation lakes don't really freeze in winter in WA, and flat fields in eastern WA often don't have enough snow coverage. So often I would go up to British Columbia and snowmobile 20-miles into the Pemberton Icecap. That's an excellent kiting training area, though difficult to access.

Also, for Greenland we needed to start logistics preparation about 6 months in advance. The permit process takes at least 3 months to get through, then there are multiple different kinds of insurances and bank guarantees that must be secured, and it's pretty complicated. That's the most logistically complicated trip I've ever done.

Greenland Traverse SE to NW Isortoq to Qaanaaq. June 27-Aug 5, 2024

How does your background in engineering influence your approach to mountaineering?

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I think there's a lot of overlap between engineering and mountaineering, so it's a good background to have. Engineering is all about problem-solving, and there are plenty of problems to solve in climbing a country highpoint.

There are often political issues in securing proper permissions or permits, logistical issues in travelling to the country and to the trailhead, logistical issues with getting a bunch of gear to the base of the mountain (using porters or donkeys, or helicopters or boats etc), then there are issues with finding the best route up the mountain (sometimes the mountain has never been climbed before).

Felo Barkere, highest peak in Senegal. Dec 25, 2021.

There is also a lot of gear to deal with. Gear could be technical climbing gear like ropes and ice tools and crampons, or it could be kite skiing gear (like in Greenland last summer when I did a 1500-mile kite traverse, the first ever SE-NW traverse).

Then there's problems with funding to solve. This requires being creative and solving the problem like an engineering problem. For instance, I climbed most of the European country highpoints as part of long distance bicycle tours.

I signed up for airline credit cards to get free flights, then biked between countries. So I didn't have to pay for transportation. I would camp in the woods every night, so I didn't have to pay to sleep. In many places in eastern europe the food was cheaper than in the US. So I could climb most of those peaks very cheaply.

How do you choose which countries and mountains to tackle next in your project?

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My general philosophy with working on a peakbagging list is to first start with the easier peaks until about halfway through the list. This allows me to build momentum and motivation to finish. Then I next try to finish the crux peaks on the list. Then I leave a few easier ones for the end. That's how I'm trying to work on country highpoints now.

Pico do Fogo (9,281ft), Cape Verde Highpoint. March 24, 2022.

I started with the easier countries, like the ones in Europe and the caribbean. Now I'm focusing on the most challenging countries. Because this is a life-long project I want to tackle these while I'm still young and fit. These are the high altitude technical peaks.

Over the past three years I've focused on the 'Stan countries, which I believe form a crux subset of the country highpoints. These are the highpoints of Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

Noshaq (24,580ft) highest mountain in Afghanistan. July 6-31, 2019

I finished the highpoints of the Stans in 2023 with my climbing partner Andreas Frydensberg, and we are the first people to climb this collection of peaks. Now I'm focusing on a few remaining high-altitude and technical peaks.

The other factor I use to decide the objective is the season. Most of the high altitude technical country highpoints are in the northern hemisphere, so I will go for those in spring or summer. Then in the winter I will go for peaks in the southern hemisphere, or in the northern hemisphere desert climate, or in a region where it is the dry season.

What has been the most memorable climbing experience during your country's highpoints project?

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I think Pik Pobeda, the Kyrgyzstan highpoint, is the most difficult country highpoint I've climbed and it was also the most memorable experience. It's more difficult than K2. Pobeda is a 7400+m peak on the Kyrgyzstan - China border and is considered the northernmost 7000m peak in the world.

Peak Pobeda (24,406ft) via Abalakov route. Highest mountain in Kyrgyzstan. Aug 9, 2021. Eric and Andreas.

This means it's extremely cold. And the weather is notoriously bad since it is on the edge of the Taklamakan Desert in China. All routes to the summit are technical and have significant objective hazards of avalanches and unavoidable cornice crossings.

Andreas and I decided to climb it via the Abalakov Route (Russian Grade 6A, US grade VI 5.6 WI3 60 deg snow). This is more technical than the standard route but also more direct so could in theory be done in a tighter weather window. We took four days to reach the summit and trailbreaking was the most difficult I've ever experienced. On the way down I got frostbite on all my fingers. We triggered a small avalanche on the descent, and another small one hit our tent one night. Another climber on the route died when a cornice collapsed.

When I got home, I submitted documentation to the Russian authorities about the climb to apply for the Snow Leopards award (this is an award for climbing all the 7000m peaks of the former Soviet Union).

However, they said I didn't reach the correct summit, and they wouldn't give me the award! I wrote a technical document compiling and analyzing all surveys of the mountain, including two new measurements of my own.

This data proved I indeed did reach the true summit. I also found the original report from the 1950s of Abalakov for his first ascent of the peak. He went to the exact same location I did. Presented with this data, the authorities agreed to give me the award. I'm now the third American to get the snow leopard award. Andreas is the first Dane.

How do you prepare physically and mentally for such demanding climbs across different environments?

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The mountains in Washington, where I live provide a great training ground for climbing bigger peaks around the world. My general fitness training is to do huge weekend trips (like 24-36hr continuous pushes covering challenging terrain, bushwhacking, breaking trail, mixed climbing, etc).

Blackcap Mtn (8,402ft), Jan 26-28, 2024. Probable FWA.

Then mid-week I mostly just rest, or maybe go for a short run or bike ride one or two days. I think this strategy is perhaps not common, but it works for me. When climbing high-altitude peaks, I find summit pushes are usually 20hr+, so doing those kinds of pushes regularly on weekends in WA is excellent training. I think those kinds of training trips are helpful for both physical and mental training.

What are some specific mountains or regions you are most excited about climbing in the future?

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I'm most excited about remote places that are difficult to access and seldom visited. So, Greenland and Antarctica are prime locations for peaks like that. I'm still missing the highpoints of Antarctica and Greenland (which is the Denmark highpoint), so I can hopefully make it to those peaks sometime soon.

Little Tahoma (11,136ft) via Frying Pan Glacier. Feb 24, 2024.

Do you have any long-term goals for the Country Highpoints Project beyond climbing every mountain?

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One of my secondary goals now is conducting surveys to determine very accurate elevations and locations of country highpoints. It's kind of surprising to learn that there are still countries in the world where it is not known for certain which peak is the country highpoint.

I've so far discovered new country highpoints in five countries (Saudi Arabia, Togo, Gambia, Guinea Bissau, and Uzbekistan). Interestingly, the new highpoint I discovered in Uzbekistan - Alpomish - had never been climbed or surveyed before! And it was a 7-pitch 5.8 rock climb 20 miles from the nearest road, so not easy.

Survey of Uzbekistan - Alpomish (4,668m, IV, 5.8, 7 pitch), true highpoint of Uzbekistan. Aug 21-26, 2023.

There are still a half dozen or so countries that need surveyed to determine the true country highpoint, and I'm hoping to bring my survey equipment to these countries soon. I have access to a differential GPS unit that is capable of measuring elevations to the nearest inch accuracy, which is often required for these surveys.