Mountain Madness interests. While leading Mountain Madness, Fischer became renowned for his ascents of the world's highest mountains made without the use of supplemental oxygen. Fischer and Wally Berg were the first Americans to summit Lhotse, the world's fourth highest mountain (27,940 feet / 8516 m), located next to Mount Everest. He and Ed Viesturs were the first Americans to summit K2, (28,251 feet / 8611m) in the Karakoram of Pakistan without supplemental oxygen. During his stewardship of Mountain Madness, Fischer led social and environmental initiatives to help people in the countries in which Mountain Madness traveled. As the leaders of the
Gilgit-Baltistan Silk Roads — Rock Carvings Along the Karakoram Highway". Many of these carvings and inscriptions will be inundated and/or destroyed when the planned Basha-Diamir dam is built and the Karakoram Highway is widened. The climate of Gilgit-Baltistan varies from region to region, surrounding mountain ranges creates sharp variations in weather. The eastern part has the moist zone of the western Himalayas, but going toward Karakoram and Hindu Kush, the climate dries considerably. There are towns like Gilgit and Chilas that are very hot during the day in summer yet cold at night and valleys like Astore, Khaplu, Yasin, Hunza, and