Intro

This should be easy, right? Pick a rating system and it’ll tell you what’s hard: double black diamond ski runs, 5.14 climbing routes, Class V whitewater. Except, not really. I’ve skied plenty of double-expert-only runs that were for me, in those conditions, easy. In my not-very-illustrious climbing career, I never got near 5.12, making 5.14 functionally impossible. And as for big whitewater, I’ll happily jump in a boat with an oarsman who knows what they’re doing, but me, by myself? Yeah no.

Degree of difficulty is highly subjective. It’s ever-changing. In outdoor adventure, relative hardness is determined by a sweeping set of conditions, from the weather to the state of the snow, ice, water, air, dirt, or rock. There’s also the preparedness, experience, fitness, and mental fortitude of you and your party. And not just that—you also have to weigh the interpersonal dynamics of your team. On a trip to Greenland, I spent two weeks in close quarters in a very small boat,