When Ryan Mitchell reached the summit of Mount Everest last week, the 19-year-old from Rutland was all out of tears to shed. Instead he stood at “the top of the world” and took it all in.
“It was funny because I started tearing up about an hour away from the summit since I saw it, felt really good and was confident we were going to make it,” Mitchell said in an email interview with the Telegram & Gazette.
“But anything can happen while you’re up there, so I wanted to hold back any of the emotions for when I actually got to the top. Unfortunately, by the time we got there, I was now over my emotions, so I didn’t have any tears to shed, but rather just took in the moment with my Sherpa and waited to share the summit with the rest of my team.”
His three teammates were his guide, Garret Madison, and a Sherpa team including a personal Sherpa to assist Mitchell in his climb.
Mitchell reached the summit on day-40 of his climb, documenting the entire journey on his YouTube channel. He said one of the first things he noticed at the summit was the amount of trash strewn about, left by previous climbers.
The dream to reach the summit didn’t start out traditionally, he said — instead Mitchell said it was born out of boredom in December 2022.
The teenager had built up a Minecraft channel on YouTube with more than two million subscribers, but decided he wanted to make something that was more inspirational, educational and held more “value.”
“I was writing down any ideas that came to mind for videos I could put on this channel,” he said. “And I thought of, ‘I climbed Mount Everest.’ To me it just stuck out because a mountain has a perfect progression and a story to tell.”
Mitchell said it didn’t take long before he had fallen “further down the rabbit hole,” of not just climbing Mount Everest but mountaineering as a whole.
“I had never climbed a mountain besides some hikes near my house prior to this and had no idea what I needed to do to accomplish this goal,” he said.
So he turned to his successful YouTube channel and began raising money through the advertisements that play on his videos. In total, he raised roughly $120,000 for the expedition, mostly through his gaming.
Breaking down the costs, Mitchell explained climbing with Madision Mountaineering was $75,000 and that doesn’t include tipping the guides and the Sherpas that costs another $15,000. Also, factor in another $15,000 for gear and round up to another $5,000 for flights and travel accommodations.
“The down suit on summit day you wear is an astounding $2,000,” Mitchell said. “But this gear is what saves your life.”
For Mitchell the hardest part wasn’t necessarily the physical but the emotional toll.
“Definitely the hardest part of this for me was the duration. We got to the top on day 40, but with travelling and going back down I was away for around 50 days,” he said. “My dog was very happy to see me once I got home.”
As for the future, he said he has been bitten by the mountaineering bug and is already planning his next adventure.
“As soon as you leave one mountain, you are already thinking about the next. And usually that next one is a level up from the last,” Mitchell said, adding he’ll need some time to recover from “the top of the world” before he gets back out there.
“I’m very interested in doing K2 at one point, the world’s second tallest mountain and regarded as more difficult than Everest,” he said. “It’s a bit more risky but when you’re with the right team and prepare properly, make the right decisions, a lot of that risk is mitigated.”
