Meru

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1

[Wind Howling ]

[ Fabric Flapping ]

- [Wind Continues Howling ]

- [ Snow Patters ]

[ Light Snoring ]

[ Breathes Deeply]

[ Metal Picks Hit Ice ]

[Creaking ]

[ Pulleys Ratcheting ]

- [ Man ] Mmm.

- Thank you, dear.

[Woman ]

'Cause they're extra-special, filled with-

[ Man #2 ] Brussels sprouts.

We get the surf and turf. You guys get-

- We get the full-on Brussels sprout...

- [ Man #2] Nice.

Extravaganza.

I can always...

put it back out there

a little bit if it's not-

[Woman ] When Conrad and I first got

married, he made all these promises.

Oh, I'm never gonna

go to the big mountains again.

I knew he would never quit climbing...

but it wasn't long before he was dreaming

of some other big expedition.

And I was just rolling my eyes,

going, Right, okay.

[Conrad ] High-altitude Himalayan

climbing is very risky.

It is the most dangerous

professional sport.

But I think with Meru,

that risk is worth it.

As an Alpinist,

Meru is the culmination of all I've done...

and all I've wanted to do

is this peak and this climb.

[Woman ] I knew he was

gonna continue to climb forever...

but, you know, in what aspect,

I wasn't sure.

I know that stuff can happen.

You know, and that's what I always say.

Yeah, yeah.

But stuff can happen.

[ Horns Honking ]

[ Engine Whirring ]

[Chattering In Foreign Language]

[ Honking ]

I've been super carsick

for about an hour now.

- How you doin', Jimmy?

- [ Groaning ]

We just airmailed a bunch of our stuff

off the top of our... truck...

so we're pickin' up the pieces right now.

Meru definitely had a reputation

as this impossible climb.

And I also knew, just by the way

that Conrad brought the trip up...

it was very nonchalant, so-

[ Chuckles ]

I think the more nonchalant Conrad is...

about suggesting a trip,

the more worried you oughta be. [ Laughs]

Oh, yeah.

[Scattered Chatter]

[ Groans ]

[Speaking Foreign Language]

- [Speaking Foreign Language]

- [ Man Laughing ]

[ Man ] I was blown away when Jimmy

and Conrad approached me about Meru.

They didn't build it up very much.

They didn't say, This is the mountain

that everyone's tried and failed on.

In their minds, I was probably-

Oh, here's some young, fresh blood.

He's gonna be good at-

to get the rope up on certain pitches.

[ Bell Rings ]

[Jingles]

[ Ringing Continues]

[Jimmy]

Namaste.

[Jimmy Murmurs]

H' [ Man Vocalizing]

- Woo-hoo!

- [ Jimmy] Woo-hoo!

- Look at this reveal here. Yes! Om, om.

- [Chuckles]

Whoo.

[ Man ]

The Shark's Fin on Meru central.

This climb has seen more attempts and more

failures than any route in the Himalaya.

[ Chuckles ]

Wow.

[ Man Continues]

it's the headwaters of the Ganges River...

one of the most sacred rivers on Earth.

The center of the universe.

it's this weird nexus...

that sort of is the point where heaven and

Earth and hell all come together.

The thing that gives it the name the

Shark's Fin is this 1,500-foot blade...

of this beautiful, flawless granite...

way up high, you know, 20,000 feet.

This is the test of the master climber.

You know, it's been tried by so many

great climbers- I don't know, 2O times.

Some of the best climbers in the world

have tried and failed on this route.

[Slide Projector Clicking ]

[ Krakauer Continues ]

Meru is not just hard.

It's hard in this really complicated way.

You can't just be a good ice climber.

You can't just be good at altitude. You

can't just be a good rock climber.

You gotta be able to ice climb, mix climb.

And you gotta be able to do

big-wall climbing at 20,000 feet.

It's all that stuff

wrapped in one package...

that's defeated so many good climbers...

and will probably defeat you and maybe

will defeat everybody for all time.

That, to a certain kind of mind-set...

is an irresistible appeal.

[ Renan ] When we actually got there,

and I looked up at the mountain...

I didn't know... what-

what we were getting into, 'cause I'd

never seen something that complex before.

[Conrad ] Renan's inexperience

really didn't give me any reason to pause.

I knew he was strong enough.

He knew the systems.

And as a team, you're the sum total

of all your experience.

[ Renan ] I'd been on a number

of expeditions with Conrad.

But I hadn't done any serious

climbs with him.

And I had never done a climb with Jimmy.

[Carabiners Clinking ]

I'm so adamant about

only going on expeditions...

with people that I know and that I trust.

And there's one exception to that rule...

and that's if somebody that I really,

really trust and know well, like Conrad...

says, This guy's worth bringing up.

[Conrad ] I had heard about Renan,

and I'd seen him in a climbing film...

where he was, uh, free soloing

North Six Shooter.

So I was like, Okay. Gotta meet Renan.

[ Krakauer] I saw this clip of Renan

free soloing Lighting Bolt Cracks.

You see him do that stuff,

and it looks out there.

He looks like something's

lit a fire under him.

[Jimmy] I heard about this kid

who's a super-talented climber.

And he was living on the road...

like most climbing bums...

especially climbers

that are coming into the scene.

Except for he didn't even have a car.

He was literally just

dropped off in the desert.

[ Pencil Scratching ]

When I first met Renan,

he was mostly creating art in sketchbooks.

Smaller-scale stuff.

And then he started taking

big canvases out on expeditions.

'Cause he was- At this point, he was

starting to go on more expeditions.

Every opportunity was appreciated,

and he was basically going nonstop.

Whew.

5:
30 in the evening.

Time to start the route.

It's... crisp and cold.

We're waiting for the sun to move away.

So it'll set up and will freeze.

[ Blows 1

Uh, this is the best moment-

That... moment where everything

comes down, and you're really starting.

Of course, I said that when we left

Gangotri and when we left Bozeman.

But... now we're gonna camp

on the mountain tonight.

[ Krakauer]

Conrad first tried Meru in 2003...

and got his ass kicked.

It was super-technical climbing.

This isn't Everest.

This is a whole different

kind of climbing.

'Cause on Everest, you can hire Sherpas

to carry all your stuff...

to fix the ropes for you,

to take most of the risks.

Jimmy and Conrad have climbed

Everest four or five times.

Jimmy's even skied off the top.

But Meru is the anti-Everest.

No one's gonna carry your stuff.

If you need it, you need

to carry it on your back.

And for Meru, you need

a lot of tools to do the job.

Because the climbing covers

the whole spectrum.

This upper 1,500 feet,

the Shark's Fin, is smooth.

It's clean. it's nearly featureless.

But below that is 4,000 feet of really

gnarly climbing- this fluted snow.

Dangerous, exposed.

So, time after time, guys would do that

first 4,000 feet, light and fast...

thinkin' they're really studs.

And then they get to the Fin,

and it's a big wall.

And you gotta use big wall

techniques on the upper part of Meru.

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