(CNN) – In 1986, American businessman Richard Bass entered the record books, becoming the first person to climb the “seven peaks”, the highest peaks on any continent. This list includes some of the most iconic mountains in the world: Denali in Alaska, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and of course Mount Everest.
But mountain climbers are not people who just let the records rest. For many mountaineers, the seven second peaks – also known as the second highest peak on any continent – are considered a more significant feat.
These mountains are less known, less popular among novice climbers and less commercialized. The most famous of the group is K2, located on the border of Pakistan and China in the Karakorum Range.
The others, however, are anything but nominal.
Ojos de Salado (“Salty Eyes”) on the border between Chile and Argentina is the highest volcano on the planet. Mount Tyree in Antarctica is relatively easy to climb by mountaineering standards, but the challenges of reaching the White Continent and coping with the weather mean that only about a dozen climbers have made it to the top.
Only one person has officially climbed all seven of the second peaks, but there is someone who is on his heels to complete the set. And she’s not what most people think she looks like – she’s a mother of seven who lives in Utah and didn’t start climbing until she was in her thirties.
Reject the challenge
Meet Jen Drummond. Drummond has always been athletic and she loves challenges.
With her 40th birthday on the horizon in 2020, she decided to take her tourism skills to the next level.
That same year, she hired a climbing coach to climb Ama Dablam, a mountain in Nepal.
But after finishing it, the coach presented a new challenge – the Seven Second Summits. “He said, ‘You have seven children, there are seven continents,'” she recalled.
But climbing mountains requires much more than physical training. Covid threw the whole world into disarray – suddenly Drummond had to educate his children at home, and the closure of international borders made travel impossible.
So far, she has climbed Dykh-Tau, Mount Kenya, Mount Tyree and most recently Logan Peak in Canada. K2 is planned for the summer of 2022.
Drummond’s quest to climb the seven second peaks has become a slightly longer project due to some disagreement over which peaks are considered the official seven.
If you think the continent is just the country of Australia, the second summit there is Townsend in New South Wales.
But for geographers who consider Australasia and Oceania to be part of the continent, the second summit is Sumantri in Indonesia’s West Papua province. To make sure her record is undisputed, Drummond plans to climb both.
Drummond in action, climbing Mount Kenya.
Dan Terpstra
Because it’s there
In an anecdotal story, someone once asked researcher George Mallory why he was so desperate to climb Mount Everest, the mountain that eventually took his life.
“Because he’s there,” he replied.
Although it is unclear whether Mallory actually uttered these words, they have long been a touchstone for other climbers struggling to explain why they risk their lives and bodies to climb to the top of the world’s most challenging mountains.
Drummond agrees. She loves to climb mountains in the name of the act. But she also knows that records mean something.
“If I had a Guinness World Record, my kids would actually think I was cool,” she laughs.
She also wants to tackle some of the inequalities that exist in the small, rare world of mountaineering. For years, the image of a mountain climber was someone like Reinhold Messner or Edmund Hillary – bearded, serious, white men with an ice ax from Europe or North America.
Organizations such as Full Circle, an all-black group of climbers who climbed Everest in May 2022, show the world that extreme activities such as mountain climbing are available to anyone who has the strength to try.
Mountain climbing can be extremely dangerous. People can die from altitude sickness, falls and cold. But it’s not just the mountains that create challenges.
At the heart of Sumantri, two warring tribes are fighting over who has the rights to the mine there. And the ongoing conflict in Russia has led many airlines to suspend flights to the country, making Dich-Tau a challenge to reach.
It is also expensive and time consuming.
Just getting a permit to climb Everest costs $ 11,000. This does not include airline tickets, local transport, equipment and driver fees.
It can also take weeks or even months to climb some of the world’s highest peaks due to the acclimatization process.
For Drummond, being a woman in the mountains is an advantage, not a weakness.
“There are definitely people approaching mountains like me against the mountain,” she said.
“For me, it’s much more of an experience to be with the mountain. If you go to Everest and you are in the Himalayan mountain range, I think this mountain range is very feminine. She is very loving. It is huge. Beautiful. The people are amazing. They honor life. They pray before climbing the mountain. “
Her climbs have also become a way to connect with her children, who are 9 to 15 years old. Some join it in climbs, while others prefer to hang out in lower places.
But they all watch their mother pursue her goal. Drummond used her mission as a way to motivate children in their own lives.
“We’ll take a look at Mount Everest,” she tells them during a homework session, “but you’ll do the math first.”
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