Nate Kauffman

Review of Rainier Mountaineering Inc (RM...

Overall the guides at RMI are extremely knowledgea...

Overall the guides at RMI are extremely knowledgeable, and as someone who is brand new to mountain climbing they were very helpful. But if they determine that at any point you are not maintaining their strenuous pace or the weather is less than ideal, they will completely discourage you from climbing.
I signed up for the 4 day summit with a fair amount of hiking/backpacking experience, and I anticipated that the more technical aspects of Mt. Ranier would be challenging. Over the first 2 days I was impressed by how quickly and easily the guides taught our entire group the necessary skills to climb Ranier safely. However, my experience was soured by the last "2"days of the climb. Days 3 and 4 are spent climbing to Camp Muir and then attempting the summit the following morning. Day 3 arrived with some rain/snow and generally crummy weather and it seemed the guides made numerous disclaimer statements about the weather shutting us down before we even started climbing. After an hour of climbing at a fairly grueling pace they decided that other members of our team were not meeting their specific pace standard and could not make Camp Muir at a reasonable time. Which I could understand, but we didn't begin climbing until after 10am, and since the guides had seen the slower members climbing the previous day it would have made more sense to begin at a earlier time (perhaps 7 or 8) to ensure every member of the team was able to at least climb to Camp Muir. After another hour of climbing (at roughly 12:30) the lead guide said the weather was too dangerous to climb further and we turned around and hiked back down to paradise. I understand that the guides at RMI have an obligation to ensure the safety of their climbers and that is one of the reasons they are hired, BUT at the same time it was extremely disappointing to pay their company thousands of dollars only to be turned around by a snowstorm on a mountain. Given the cost of their service I had hoped they would be more flexible to different climbing speeds and willing to seek input from their paying customers. Again I paid this company thousands of dollars to climb roughly 2,000 feet and be told a snowstorm prevented us from even attempting to reach Camp Muir. So the 4 day summit actually bought me about 16 hours of the guides time.
Please note that RMI did give our entire team a small percentage off another attempt in the next calendar year but as someone who lives across the country I will be unable to afford the cost of travel and the guide service again.