Women who show how a mountaineering expedition works

Lucy Westlake: follow a trip beyond the summit

Lucy Westlake’s own expedition page points to her YouTube climbing vlogs and Instagram journeys. It lists Denali in 2021 and Everest in 2022 among her completed expeditions, giving viewers a choice of trips to follow.

References: Lucy Westlake

In an expedition sequence, Westlake shows the group sorting food and shared equipment before departure, then returns to the camera at camp as the team checks its supplies and talks over the next day. A planned move gives way to another night at camp while the group waits for the weather to improve. The shift makes the expedition’s rhythm clear: getting there, living together and deciding when to move take up space alongside the climb.

Start with Westlake if you want the visual experience of a trip. The value is seeing what happens between the big views: how a camp becomes a temporary home and how the group adjusts when its original plan changes.

Nikki Champion: the day the plan changes

For a written account of a team’s choices, read Nikki Champion’s dispatches for RMI Expeditions. On a May 2026 McKinley expedition, Champion and her team described a rest day at camp with meals, time in tents and discussion of the days ahead. They were looking for a weather window that would allow a move up, a summit attempt and a return to camp.

References: RMI Expeditions / Nikki Champion

The next decision changed the trip. In a later dispatch, the team reported that expected high winds and cold removed the summit window and they would start down instead. Champion’s subsequent account follows the pack-up, return through lower camps and flight out from base camp. Reading the entries together shows how a forecast affects the full sequence, including the return, rather than simply explaining why one morning was lost.

References: RMI Expeditions / Nikki Champion

Champion’s dispatches complement Westlake’s videos. They let a reader follow a specific team’s meals, waiting and changing plan in its own words, while the vlogs offer the immediacy of seeing a mountain journey unfold.

Lhakpa Sherpa: work, days off and funding

In a 2021 interview, Lhakpa Sherpa described washing dishes at Whole Foods, hiking on days off and funding expeditions through retail work, talks and crowdfunding. She also invited people to follow her stories on Facebook and Instagram. Those details put a concrete working life beside her mountain goals: time and money for a trip had to be found outside the expedition itself.

References: EXTREME International

Her 2021 account is useful for someone who wants to follow a mountaineer whose climbing has had to fit around a non-climbing job. The comparison also makes the distinction clear: Champion’s mountain guiding is professional climbing work, whereas Sherpa described a separate retail job that helped fund her expeditions.

References: EXTREME International · RMI Expeditions / Nikki Champion

In her own LinkedIn post, Sherpa writes that she started a hiking business in 2025 and describes her hope to help more women and girls experience nature. It is another place to follow how she shares her relationship with the mountains.

References: Lhakpa Sherpa

Sources and attribution

1. Lucy Westlake

   ExpeditionsPublication date not listed · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

2. RMI Expeditions / Nikki Champion

   Nikki Champion on the RMI Expeditions BlogPublication date not listed · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

3. EXTREME International

   EXTREME Exclusive: Lhakpa SherpaPublished Aug 18, 2021 · Recorded Oct 29, 2026

4. Lhakpa Sherpa

   Lhakpa Sherpa’s post on hiking and communityPublication date not listed · Recorded Oct 29, 2026