Seem like everyone wants to achieve crazy feats in the European Alps at the moment.
A pair of Swiss daredevils, professional paraglider Chrigel Maurer and mountain guide Peter von Kanel have just completed a challenge to reach all 82 of the 4,000m peaks in the Alps on foot or paragliding between them in fewer than 72 days… and they did it in 51 days. The ultimate paralpinism adventure.
“When a dream comes true,” posted Maurer on Instagram (below) as the duo completed the challenge on Tuesday. “The final flight of our #XPEAKS project from Jungfrau Hochfirn to our home village Frutigen. The Aletschhorn was our summit 1 (June 11, 2024), the Jungfrau our summit 82 (July 30, 2024). Big thanks to all that have supported us during this unique project.”
“It was an unbelievable two months,” Maurer tells XCMag. “It was really intense, for sure it was a hard project. My strengths were in the paragliding part, and Peter was on the climbing parts. This was a really interesting combination, I think it was a really strong team… We got lucky with the weather and wind and had nice flights. This is finally unbelievable. For us it’s a really successful project with many good memories.”
The rules of the challenge were:
• To stand together on all 82 peaks over 4,000m in the Alps
• To get to them only by foot or via paraglider
• To start and finish in Frutigen
• To use the same equipment throughout
• Not to use a support vehicle
The pair both used new Advance Theta ULS (EN B) paragliders.
Late snowfall in the Alps meant that, “The first 30 peaks was more or less ski touring, but then it changed and the weather became really good.”
It wasn’t all plain sailing, though. “After two perfect days at Mt.Blanc, Friday 19.7.24 was a disaster,” posted Maurer on Instagram at the time. “We invest a lot but clouds and wind destroyed the thermals.” That day they only manages 30km.
But it was a blip and they finished with a flourish. Check out Maurer’s Instagram for more great images and video of their epic trek.
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