Lonnie Dupre is battling deep snow as he makes his way toward the summit of Mount Denali. At 20,320, Denali is the highest peak in North America. Dupre is attempting to become the first person to solo climb Denali in January, the coldest, darkest month of the year in Alaska.
With temperatures 50 to 60 degrees warmer than last year and snow falling continuously, Grand Marais Arctic explorer Lonnie Dupre has found pulling a 150-pound sled filled with gear while carrying a 50-pound backpack through snow as deep as four feet extremely grueling and exhausting as he makes his way forward on his quest to become the first person to climb Mount Denali in January.
In one posting on his website Dupre said, “Right now it’s just me and a snow shovel.”
According to his support crew, “Lonnie has been reporting temperatures on Denali at around zero degrees Fahrenheit, a 50-60 degree difference from his climb last year.
“He’s sleeping in one layer and conserving more energy usually used to keep warm. As comforting as this sounds, it is the very thing Dupre is hoping to bring to attention through this expedition and documentary. The earth’s frozen places are its thermostat, regulating the planet’s temperature and providing a stable environment for every part of the world.”
Dupre began his quest more than a week behind schedule because he couldn’t fly to his base camp on Kahiltna Glacier due to poor visibility. A current low pressure is causing heavy snowfall on Denali while leaving Talkeetna and other areas at a much lower elevation dealing with rain and flooding. Odd weather indeed for January—the coldest, darkest month of the year in Alaska.
Dupre started his climb at 7,400 feet on January 8 and at press time Thursday, January 17 was at 9,700 feet elevation.
To keep up his energy Dupre is eating about 4,500 calories a day. A recent lunch included granola, coffee, protein bar and chocolate while supper was mac & cheese and again, a chocolate bar. Another day he ate chicken noodle soup for breakfast and chocolate for lunch. Dupre only cooks one meal a day—supper—and eats a lot of granola and chocolate to keep his energy up.
On Day 4 Dupre’s website reported, “Poor visibility and waist-deep snow forced Lonnie to use his GPS as he made his way from 7,900 feet to 8,400 foot. Overall, because of these poor conditions it was a short day, about four hours of traveling.”
“It was like traveling inside of a ping pong ball,” Dupre said of his Day 4 slog.
On Day 5 Dupre traveled to 8,800 feet in deep snow, taking two trips to transport his gear. It was another short, tough fourhour day. Day 6 was a rest day and Day 7 Dupre climbed to 9,700 feet as the sun appeared for the first time in a long time.
Travel should get both easier and harder for Dupre as he makes his way upward.
“When I get to 11,000 feet and start heading up from there, the snow should be a lot less,” Dupre said on a web cast.
But the winds will invariably pick up and the temperatures will plummet as he heads to Mount Denali’s 20,340- foot summit. In his past two attempts Dupre was stranded for a week at a time in a small snow cave while winds hit 100 mph and the temperatures fell to minus 60 below Fahrenheit. Both of those long winter storms forced Dupre to abandon his climb. Hopefully his third attempt will be the charm.
Despite the hard going Dupre said he is in good spirits and his equipment is working well.
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