“In some ways, this was like filming
the first moon landing. Nothing like
this had been done before.”
—Jimmy ChinTHIS WAS NOT EXACTLY an easy path for Chin, but he says he felt
destined to pursue it. The son of Chinese-born university librar-
ians, he grew up in the small city of Mankato, Minnesota. A flat-
lander, if you will. But his parents took the family on road trips to
some of the grand national parks throughout the West—places like
Glacier and Yellowstone—the likes of which inspired the youngster.
“I knew deep down that I wanted to spend my life in the moun-
tains,” says Chin.
After graduating from Carleton College in 1996 with a degree in
Asian studies, he became a sort of full-time man of the outdoors,
teaching wilderness- education classes in Wyoming, living out of a
1989 Subaru Loyale, and scaling the big walls of Yosemite. “I loved
being a dirt-bag climber,” says Chin, using the term affectionately
applied to vagabond climbers who typically live out of a tent or a
van. “I’m happy that I’ve been successful and have a family and nice
homes in Jackson and Manhattan, but a part of me still loves being
a dirt bag.” During those early days, Chin began assembling an im-
pressive CV of adventure exploits. He took up photography and
found that the years of calligraphy that his parents had mandated,
as well as Chinese paintings he’d encountered in his youth, gave
him an intuitive grasp of com-
position. It’s taken two decades
of hard work on Chin’s part, but
from an outsider’s perspective,
his ascendance seems mercu-
rial. He skied down Everest; was
sponsored by The North Face;
shot cover stories for magazines
like National Geographic and
Outside. Now, he has around
2 million Instagram followers
and has logged millions of miles
on airplanes to join expeditions
in every corner of the planet.
Part of that success comes
from his partnership with
Vasarhelyi. When they met in
2012 at a conference for cre-
atives near Lake Tahoe in▯
ABOVE: CHAI
VASARHELYI AND
JIMMY CHIN IN
GRAND TETON
NATIONAL PARK’S
ANTELOPE FLATS.
RIGHT: ALEX HON-
NOLD AND CHIN ON
SAMUEL CROSSLEY/ NATIONAL GEORGRAPHICTOP OF EL CAPITAN.