A True Adventurer's Unlikely Journey
An American’s Grand Slam
“Thick with summit celebrations and run-ins with billionaires, plane hijackings (we won’t spoil too much) and mountain rescues, the book is also sprinkled with striking moments when Waters stops to consider the beauty and meaning of the landscapes into which he’s thrust himself. But Waters is at his most compelling when he dives into the logistics and mental challenges that characterize these expeditions.”
Daniel Noonan, Climbing Magazine
“This book is the classic adventure’s memoir. The first half is about the author’s early life experiences and mountain climbing. The second half of the book is largely about the two polar expeditions that complete the American Grand Slam, Ryan Waters is a badass adventurer and you deserve to read his story.”
Katie Quinn, The Sports Librarian
'“How Waters ended up standing atop the North Pole on that fateful day is a story of hope, perseverance, faith, and a fair share of dumb luck. From his youth traipsing around the Georgia hills to his time leading expeditions around the Himalayas, including five summits of Everest, Waters has always seemed to stumble into the next fortuitous step of his journey, often ending up in the most unlikely places. This is tempered by the fact that early in Waters’ outdoor career, he learned to live by a simple credo: “you have to make things happen for yourself.” At the beginning of his climbing career, he was consumed by passion for the mountains, every decision was leading to the next mountaineering challenge.
Eventually giving up a stable career as a geologist, he had a self-described “mid 20’s crisis,” left his 401K and comfortable salary for living out of his truck and 40 dollars a day as a part-time climbing instructor. Following his dream of a life of adventure in exchange for a life of obeying societal norms, he set out to build a mountain resume that would enable him to circle the Earth and work as a mountain guide in the Himalayas and beyond.
After almost two decades of hard expeditions around the planet, his experiences include being on a hijacked airplane in Russia, rescue of injured climbers in the Karakoram Himalaya of Pakistan, the Everest Base Camp earthquake disaster, narrowly missing out on the K2 2008 tragedy, near misses with avalanches, the deaths of close climbing partners, close encounters with Polar Bears on the Arctic Ocean, relationships with fellow adventurers, and much more.”