8-year-old boy hopes to become youngest to climb El Capitan. He’s over halfway there
Eight-year-old Sam Adventure Baker is living up to his middle name.
He set out on Tuesday, Oct. 25, to become the youngest person ever to climb El Capitan in California’s Yosemite National Park, and he’s already more than halfway there.
Sam and his dad, Joe Baker, started climbing the vertical rocky cliff on Tuesday. They expect their ascent to take four days, and they’ll camp one night on top of the peak and hike 8 miles down on the fifth day, CNN reported.
Joe Baker has been chronicling their climb on Facebook.
Just after 1 a.m. on Thursday, he wrote that they had just crawled into their sacs for the night ahead of “another big day” to make it to their next hanging camp.
“Sam showed so much courage today. I was blown away at his resilience and stamina into the night,” he wrote. “We have already crossed the halfway point. Up we go.”
“Very very courageous little boy….and dad!” one Facebook user commented.
The adventure has already been life-changing for both of them, Baker added.
The iconic El Capitan is more than 3,000 feet of rock granite — “one of the world’s ultimate challenges for climbers,” according to the Yosemite Mariposa County Tourism Bureau website.
A 9-year-old girl became the youngest to climb the summit in 2019, according to Outside magazine.
Sam’s mom, Ann Baker, told CNN he was raised in a climbing family.
He “was in a harness before he could walk,” Joe Baker told the outlet. He’s been training for their El Capitan climb “every day for the last at least 18 months,” he said.
They’re climbing in a four-person crew, meaning one person climbs first to get ropes arranged for the rest of team, CNN reported.
On Wednesday, Joe Baker wrote that they had climbed above Mammoth Ledge and were one-third of the way up. “Then we ate Mac and Cheese and watched the first half of the Lion King,” he wrote.
“He seems really happy to be up there and spirits are high,” Ann Baker told CNN.
This story was originally published October 28, 2022 at 5:57 PM with the headline "8-year-old boy hopes to become youngest to climb El Capitan. He’s over halfway there."
