Ryu-Shin

All photos by Julia Cassou

It is the nature of a remote climbing expedition that there is always the possibility of not coming back. But how do you prepare for the possibility that a member of your team never makes it to the wall in the first place?

When Sean Villanueva O’Driscoll started planning his return to Greenland’s Mirror Wall after getting shut down in 2023, his expedition partners were all busy with other projects. He needed a new team. His first recruit was Pete Whittaker, whom he’d climbed with in Patagonia in the past. Then one day, while watching a climbing documentary about Japan, he saw Keita Kurakami on-screen. They’d met previously at Camp 4 in Yosemite when Keita was there to rope-solo free climb The Nose of El Capitan, and the two connected over their shared love of playing the flute. When Keita heard about the magnitude of the project and the small margins for success, he messaged Sean:

I just read your article in the Patagonia Journal. It was great! And it has added fuel to the fire of motivation for the project. It sounds like the wall that will test humans’ mental strength. I’m really looking forward to it!

Keita suggested his friend, photographer Takemi Suzuki, also join. With the addition of photographer Julia Cassou and climber Sean Warren, they had a team and started planning the trip to East Greenland.

Then, two weeks before their planned departure, Pete and Sean received a message from Takemi.

Keita passed away.

At first they thought it was a translation mistake. But the next message confirmed the worst. Keita’s heart had stopped while training for Greenland on Japan’s Mount Fuji.

I’m so sorry. He was my mentor, my best friend. I cannot go to Greenland without him. I’m so sorry.

They were heartbroken. Keita was a trad-climbing legend. “He’s aways inspired me with his philosophical approach and loyalty to style,” said Sean. “With him, it wasn’t about the performance. It was about how things were done. I was really looking forward to learning from him.” Pete and Sean took a few days to think about what to do and, in the end, decided they would go anyway. “Keita would want us to go,” Sean said.

“We set off the four of us, well, I guess you could say the five of us because we took some photos of Keita with us,” said Pete. Before leaving Iceland, the team printed a laminated portrait of Keita. It felt to all of them like the natural thing to do. “He was darn well coming with us,” Sean said.

“The climb was pretty full-on,” said Pete. “It was kind of hard. A mixture of face and crack climbing, also aid climbing and free climbing, and mixing aid climbing with free climbing and switching between the two. Definitely some scary runouts and big runouts and the question of if we were going into pretty blank terrain above us.”

They didn’t talk about Keita much, given all they had to think about in order to stay safe and carry on through the difficult, often wet conditions. But everyone felt like he was there. Sean kept the laminated photo of Keita in his pocket during difficult pitches.

The night before their summit bid, while arranging ropes at the anchor of their high point, the photo of Keita fell out of Sean’s pocket. But instead of falling, it caught a draft and floated upward. Sean grabbed it out of the air and tucked it back in his pocket. “We still need you,” he said.

The next day, the team successfully summited the wall that had seemed nearly impossible the year before. At the top, they pulled out the photo of Keita and held it up for their team picture.

While resting in their portaledges, Julia asked Sean to stick his head out for a photo. As he did, the picture of Keita slipped out, and this time, instead of falling, the laminated photo started to spin, just out of reach, Keita’s big smile suspended in midair. “Then,” said Sean, “almost to say he was no longer needed, Keita slowly flickered away from us.”

When they all returned safely to Iceland, the team messaged Takemi about the ascent. “We also told him that we wanted to honor Keita and asked if he could help with suggestions for a name for our new route.”

Takemi wrote back:

Congrats everyone! Welcome back safely from such an adventure! I believe that Keita’s spirit was there climbing with you guys.

For the name of the route, he had a shakuhachi flute player’s name called “龍心 (Ryu-Shin),” which directly translates to “heart of the dragon.” I hope it will help you to choose the name.

In Loving Memory of Keita Kurakami
14 December 1985 to 26 June 2024