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Mt. Shasta Team, 2005
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| Margo Chisholm was well past her fortieth birthday when she began to pursue her dream of becoming the first woman to climb the highest peak on each of the seven continents. That dream took her on a remarkable journey from self-doubt and despair to the top of the world. | |||||||||||||
| Raised in a privileged and protected world of private schools and posh clubs, Margo was a seriously overweight alcoholic with a $1,000 a week cocaine habit when she turned her life around and got clean, sober, and fit. Early in her addictions, she became friends with Jonathan Wright, an accomplished professional photographer and dedicated adventurer and climber who invited Margo to join him on a trek into his beloved Himalayas - a feat Margo knew she was both physically and emotionally incapable of performing. Years later, Jonathan's memory would help sustain her on her quest for a seemingly impossible dream that his life had inspired: to become the first woman in history to scale the highest peak on each of the Earth's seven continents. In 1988, Margo climbed her first two mountains - summiting Mt. Kenya and the awesome, intimidating Mt. Kilimanjaro. An "ordinary" middle-aged woman with no formal mountaineering training and no previous experience, she had met and triumphed over the toughest demands and conditions that Nature could provide. But that was just the beginning. Spurred on by her newborn love affair with the world's loftiest peaks and most beautiful and inaccessible places, she pushed herself even further, taking on increasingly greater climbing challenges as she pursued more difficult and dangerous goals under the most harrowing of circumstances. And somewhere along the way - amid magnificent wildernesses of towering pinnacles and breathtaking, ice-covered vistas - Margo Chisholm realized she had reached a summit deep within herself; a place in the heart and soul where she discovered the pride, fulfillment and inner peace she had always longed for. You can read more about Margot's work as a life coach, speaker and adventure traveler at www.tothesummit.com or order her book by the same title at www.amazon.com. |
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| Veronica Jaralambides grew up in Argentina. After several years working for Katun Argentina she jumped on the opportunity to experience another culture by transferring to Katun's headquarters in St. Paul at the end of 1999. |
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| She has been involved in volunteer work with numerous charitable organizations for over 10 years. She recently assisted at the Minnesota Children's Museum helping to plan a benefit gala. Not long after that she decided to turn this passion into a full time career. Verónica now works at Hennepin County Medical Center and is also working towards a dual Masters degree in Nonprofit Management and Public Administration at Hamline University. Her adventurous spirit and her passion for traveling and nature led Verónica to try rock-climbing in the summer of 2003. She has been climbing ever since. Verónica has climbed extensively in the Midwest, from Red Wing, to Taylors Falls, Lake Superior's North Shore, Blue Mounds, and Devil's Lake, Wisconsin. In Argentina she has climbed in the Andes, as well as highest peak in the province of Córdoba, and is now training for even more challenging adventures. This spring she summited twice at Devil's Tower in Wyoming. In January 2006 she and Christine Clayburg will climb the highest mountain in the western hemisphere together: Argentina's 22,842' Aconcagua. |
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