Local Estes Park Climber Featured in Latest Nat Geo Adventure Documentary

Estes Valley Voice

Story by Dawn Wilson
Screening coming to the Historic Park Theatre Nov. 1 and Nov. 2
National Geographic, along with Plimsoll Productions, has once again produced an adventure documentary that creates a narrative that is inspiring and harrowing all at the same time.

On Thursday, Oct. 17, “The Devil’s Climb” premiered on National Geographic and started streaming on Disney+ and Hulu the next day. The two men featured in the film are world-renowned climbers known even by those who do not scale rock walls – Alex Honnold, 39, and Tommy Caldwell, 46. The latter man grew up in Estes Park where he still lives and has climbed the rugged terrain of the surrounding mountains his entire life.

The two climbers, who have been friends and climbing partners since early in Honnold’s climbing career, set out on an adventure to be the first to climb 9,077-foot Devil’s Thumb and its four nearby peaks in one day. Devil’s Thumb, part of Alaska’s Stikine Icecap, rises sharply from the other surrounding jagged peaks along the Alaska-British Columbia border and can be seen from the Richardson Highway.

The Devil’s Thumb is considered by many in the climbing community to be unclimbable. Several climbers have died trying, and only about 50 have made it to the top.
Adding the additional four peaks of the Devil’s Thumb massif – the two Cat’s Ears peaks and the additional spires of the Witches’ Tits – to conquer the traverse was a unique challenge not tackled by many climbers. Honnold and Caldwell would be the first to do it in a day if they succeeded.

And just to make the whole challenge a little more of an adventure as well as an eco-friendly pursuit, they biked, kayaked, sailed, and hiked 2,600 miles from Caldwell’s home in Estes Park to the start of the climb.

This adventure was also Caldwell’s first big climb since rupturing his Achilles’ heel in 2022.

Would they make it? Would modern-day climbing celebrities, who are also fathers to young children, achieve yet another seemingly impossible feat?

National Geographic brought their cameras along for the journey, following the climbers from day one on their bikes out of Estes Park to day 55 when they start the impossible.

The film is coming to Estes Park, playing at the Historic Park Theatre at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 1 and Saturday, Nov. 2. Tickets are available at the Estes Park Mountain Shop. The tickets are free but a donation of $15 is suggested to help support the Estes Park Education Foundation.