Anchorage Daily News

Every year brings mind-boggling treks in Alaska and 2008 has been no different. While Erin McKittrick’s and Hig Higman’s trek from Seattle to the tip of the Alaska Peninsula commanded attention, it wasn’t the only noteworthy feat.

Here are a few others. Know of others? Let us know at www.adn.com/outdoors.

Japan’s Giri-Giri climbers

Two Japanese teams named Giri-Giri pursuing mountaineering firsts around the globe took on exceptionally hard and technical Alaska Range routes in April and May. Giri-Giri No. 1 included Fumitaka Ichimura, Yusuke Sato and Katsutaka Yokoyama. The Giri Giri No. 2 team of Tatsuro Yamada and Yuto Inoue perished on McKinley.

Giri-Giri means “barely” in Japanese. Yokoyama told Denali south district ranger Daryl Miller that the phrase described the team perfectly. “We barely had enough money, experience or technique, but we want to face the mountain with overflowing motivation, and we want to climb to our bare limit,” he said.

Yamada and Inoue spent about a month on McKinley before their disappearance. They climbed Mount Wake in the Ruth Gorge before joining Ichimura, Sato and Katsutaka Yokoyama on the West Buttress route. Yamada and Inoue pursued the summit via the Cassin Ridge.

The other three men went on an Alaska Range climbing spree that left Miller, a veteran climber, shaking his head in amazement.

• A new route on Buckskin Glacier to the Bear Tooth;

• The Moonflower route on Mount Hunter;

• The Isis Face on McKinley’s south side;

• After descending the South Buttress — something rarely done — they climbed the Czech Direct route, also called Slovak Direct, to about 16,000 feet before traversing to the Cassin Ridge route on their way to the summit.

“What they did this season is so impressive, it’s just hard to imagine. It’s one of the all-time Alaska adventures,” Miller said. “To do it in the style they did — very fast, efficient, matter-of-fact — is very ambitious.”

Roger Robinson, a ranger who spent time with all five men at the 7,200-foot Kahiltna base camp, said the two teams planned to rendezvous near the summit.

Yokoyama’s team made it to the top, descended safely and returned to Talkeetna. Yamada and Inoue didn’t.

Kayaking around Kenai Peninsula

Matt Nelson, Djuna Mascall and Mathew Wendell completed a kayak expedition around Kenai Peninsula that doubled as a fundraiser for Cook Inlet Keeper. The roughly 500-mile long journey began May 24 in Turnagain Arm in Cook Inlet and concluded in Whittier on June 22. The trip was divided into three legs of about 10 days each, with resupplies between — Portage to Homer, Homer to Seward, and Seward into Whittier.

Nelson went to high school in Anchorage and Mascall, his wife, worked as a guide in Kachemak Bay. They now live in Washington state, as does Wendell.

Lost Coast by bike, foot, packraft

Dylan Kentch and Eric Parsons did a 200-mile-plus wilderness bike ride and float of the Lost Coast from Yakutat to Cordova, using packrafts to cross several big bays en route. The beautiful and wild Lost Coast is bordered on one side by open ocean with the glacier-dotted Chugach and St. Elias mountain ranges on the other. Weather systems roll off the Gulf of Alaska and slam into the mountains to the north.

Kentch and Parson began Aug. 18.

Near Yakutat, they crossed Hubbard Gap — a big tidewater glacier bordered by steep, rocky shoreline. Farther north, the Sitkagi Bluffs and the Malaspina Glacier posed problems.

One of the bigger challenges was a three-mile crossing of iceberg-choked Icy Bay.

After miles of beach, Kentch and Parsons reached the barrier islands outside the Copper River Delta, which they crossed before finishing in Cordova.

Traversing the Tordrillo Mountains

Over nine days in May, Andrew Wexler of Canada, Dylan Taylor of Bellingham, Wash., and Joe Stock of Anchorage made a 100-mile, full-length ski traverse of the Tordrillo Mountains in Alaska.

The traverse traveled south to north, climbing 38,000 vertical feet and making ski descents off the four highest peaks, including Mount Spurr (11,069 feet), Mount Torbert (11,413 feet), Mount Talachulitna (11,150 feet) and Mount Gerdine (11,258 feet).

The team began by take a Super Cub across Cook Inlet from Kenai to a 2,400-foot bench on the south slopes of Mount Spurr. They finished in the north end of the Tordrillos, descending to the Skwentna River at its confluence with the Happy River.

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