Their own Everest

The ascent of Dawn Wall is thought to be the world’s hardest rock climb. So what’s next?

Two mountaineers have scaled what is said to be the hardest rock climb ever achieved, up the Dawn Wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park. Photo: Mladen Antonov / AFP

A mere 62 years has passed since mountaineers finally quashed the theory that the summit of Mount Everest was impossible to reach. It took only 25 more years for it to be scaled without the use of bottled oxygen, another apparent impossibility. Now, of course, rich people can be guided to the summit.

The impressive achievement of Kevin Jorgeson and Tommy Caldwell fits this narrative. They have just completed what many thought was impossible: the first free ascent of Dawn Wall, a 914m-high sheer cliff on El Capitan in California, after 18 days.

One can wonder what else is left to achieve in this Google-mapped and thoroughly explored world. The 19th century English mountaineer Alfred Mummery predicted this process all the way back in 1895, when he said that all mountains “appear doomed to pass through the three stages: an inaccessible peak, the most difficult ascent in the Alps and then an easy day for a lady”.