How a route gets scouted before it gets sold

A route goes on the website about two years after somebody first suggests it. In between there are three walks, two seasons of weather, and a vote that any single guide can lose.

Walk one — does it exist

One guide, no clients, usually in the shoulder season when the ground is at its worst. The question is narrow: is there a line here that eight people of mixed ability can walk in the stated number of days. Most suggestions die on this walk and that is the cheapest place for them to die.

Walk two — the bad version

Two guides, deliberately in poor conditions. We are looking for the bail-outs, the water sources that fail, and the section that becomes impassable when it rains for two days. If a route only works in good weather it is not a route, it is a photograph.

Walk three — the real one

Full length, full pack, at the pace and in the season we intend to sell. Camps get chosen here. So do the rest stops, which sounds trivial and is the difference between a good day and a long one.

The vote

Everyone who walked it votes, and it has to be unanimous. Two routes in the last four years have been vetoed by one guide each. Neither has been re-proposed, and nobody has asked why.