Fossil Alpinism

Call it nostalgia. Call it great alpine climbing. However there is a movement building for a 30 year reunion in Chamonix ... oh and maybe ...

I just checked my log ... 50 days on snow since November ... How is everyone else doing?

A scanned copy of his weekly movie review ... click to enlarge the image.

Still only a modest collection however it includes: over 100 climbing magazines dating back to 1972, the collected works of Frank Smythe, a ...

It is still winter - not time to put the skis away - but soon we will be pulling on little edges. So, start training. (The picture is a youn...

Over 20 years ago when I skied for a factory marathon team.(Click on the slide to enlarge the photo.)

This picture was taken as I skied back to the cabin from olympic biathlon trails. Bring a sleeping bag, everything else is there ... a wood...

DANNY? MARK? ARE YOU GUYS IN?

Just published, an op-ed piece by Jon about the Bush Years and the end of his adolescence. Click on the link to read this 1,000 word essay.

Larry's students do a snow physics unit in the winter of their 8th grade year. The curriculum involves frequent snow pit analysis, aval...

Fantastic, your arms will get pumped just watching this guy solo this steep ice route. Click on this link for the video.

A new movie just out starring Ginger Rodgers, Gary, and Hock. 48 hours ago it was -20, today it was 50 degrees although as we hiked out fr...

After an arduous selection process the Fossil Coffee Mugs have been chosen. The Lake Placid Pub is proud to be a sponsor of "Team Foss...

Gary and Hock climbed a few pitches on Sunday afternoon at Cascade Lakes.

One of my 9th graders gearing up for his first biathlon race ... In the Nor-Ams with the big boys.

For big, 6000 meter peaks, it doesn't get any easier ... a van ride to your horse-packers, then a casual 3-4 hour hike to base camp with...

More than 25 years ago I snapped this photo of Michael Franklin approaching the Black Dike on Cannon. (Click to enlarge this photo.)

How many more years have you got? When was your last expedition? Will it be easier to do when you are 60? 65? Or 70? Three day weekends are...

The NCS tradition is that everyone dresses up in red-white-pink ... Hock and his famous bow tie! Sitting next to him is Min Kyu, a fourth ...

Hock - who in his other life - is the headmaster of a small farm school, was the Sunday evening speaker this past weekend. His 15 minute pr...

The West Face is about 10 pitches of 60 degree ice before you join the south ridge for the final 3-4 rope lengths ... an awesome high qualit...

That "El Presidente" and the "Silverfox" have been logging on to Travelocity.com and checking out airfare to Peru. Is th...

Posing at the finish at the one kilometer, 12 and under race held just before the loppet wax clinic.

Gary skied an impressive 50K race in 3:51, the demanding Olympic course had 3700' of climbing. Admiring fans thronged him for autogra...

Click on this link details about the 'World Tour." I just saw it this past weekend and it was fabulous. The "King Line"...

Two fossils to ski in the big race this weekend. Gary will do the 50K classical while Hock chaperones some of the kids in the picture around...

Forget sunscreen on your last 6000 meter peak? Focus in on those juicy lips! We all know that sometimes, even on a successful route you get...

As he was solo this was not a true "fossil" trip, however fossil friend Greg just finished a field report: 2 feet of snow in Yosem...

First climbed over a century ago, it is still a challenging route. Hock, Jon Waterman, and Jim Balog spent all day on this classic, climbing...

Jim Balog, an old Outward Bound instructor, has won this prestigious award for his photography. Back in the late 1970s Hock, Jon Waterman, a...

Click on this link to read a chapter from his most recent book.

Click on this link to play the seven minute video from "60 Minutes."

In the Tetons in the late 1970s. We climbed Baxter's Pinnacle, Guides Wall, one of the south face routes on Symmetry Spire, and an attem...

South face, -35 degrees, no stove or tent, cramped lumpy ledge at 12,000,' as Mike Brochu and Mark Ewing get ready to "rise and shi...

Mark and Hock fresh from their first shower in five weeks, and hour after being flown off the Kahiltna Glacier. (Click on the picture to en...

Michael at the base of the first pitch of "Dracula" (NEI IV+) which Hock dispatched with his chouinard piolet and north wall hamme...

Hock clearing the A2 pitch 100 feet off the bivvy at Dinner Ledge ... first time he ever placed a Friend!

So, what is your favorite mountain memory of Michael Franklin? And what is the next route that we will have a quorum on to spread some of hi...

"The Fat Boys Come Back Skinny Expedition." Hock and Mark moments after unloading their gear from the plane. Notice the feed bag ...

Friend of fossils taking NCS kids climbing in our own backyard. Hock also got a few laps in too.

Katika had a little baby that we named Hope. In another 3-4 days Selden will be back milking her and skimming off the cream. So, fossils it ...

Several weeks ago Larry R. - friend of fossils - took a bunch of 8th and 9th graders ice climbing on their "invitational only" tr...

Here is Gary at 18,500' at the base of the West Face, as we stalled out -- trying to forgo the advance basecamp -- and do a one-day blas...

Multiplication Gully (NEI III) will be our warm up ... how does mid-February sound?

Click here to read a draft of Jon's first movie review for the Lake Placid News

The final rappel getting off the "Eye of the Needle" NEI 3+ on the backside of Pitchoff.

If this doesn't get you energized nothing will. (Click on this link.)

Kind of like us fossils. The original guidebook is pretty worn and well thumbed ... When we going back?

On top of the Aiguille de Argentiere outside of Chamonix in the summer of 1977. Notice a few period pieces, the puffy Gerry down jacket whic...

While skiing around campus yesterday I came upon this scene, one of my students pulling out a 13 inch lake trout while ice fishing. Hello Fo...