Philip Henderson is a legendary outdoor instructor, adventurer, and mentor. With 30 years of experience leading expeditions and teaching sports like whitewater rafting, skiing, climbing, and mountaineering, Philip has made a significant impact in the outdoor community. In 2020, he was honored with the Outdoor Afro Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2022, he made history by leading the first all-Black team up Mount Everest.
Philip Henderson is a legendary outdoor instructor, adventurer, and mentor. With 30 years of experience leading expeditions and teaching sports like whitewater rafting, skiing, climbing, and mountaineering, Philip has made a significant impact in the outdoor community. In 2020, he was honored with the Outdoor Afro Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2022, he made history by leading the first all-Black team up Mount Everest.
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Philip Henderson:
Honestly, I don't really like guiding because guiding means you're doing things for people, and I don't want to do things for people. I want to help educate them so they can do things for themselves. I want people to have a good foundation, a solid foundation. You could be a very strong climber and all of these things, but how does that help someone else? Where I can actually teach them the knots that they need in a way that helps them learn and then build in transformers from that activity to their everyday life.
Shelby Stanger:
Philip Henderson is a legendary outdoor instructor, adventurer and mentor. He spent 30 years leading expeditions and teaching sports like whitewater rafting, skiing, climbing, and mountaineering. Philip doesn't just train everyday folks. He also teaches the teachers. He's worked with Sherpas and experienced guides in major mountaineering destinations like Tanzania and Nepal. In 2020, Philip received the Outdoor Afro Lifetime Achievement award. And in 2022, he became well-known for leading the first all black team up Mount Everest.
All of Philip's work circles back to the same mission, to mentor the next generation of outdoor athletes. I'm Shelby Stanger, and this is Wild Ideas Worth Living, an REI Co-op Studios production presented by Capital One and the REI Co-op MasterCard. Philip Henderson, welcome to Wild Ideas Worth Living. You've had many, many wild ideas, so we're excited to have you on.
Philip Henderson:
Thanks for having me. I'm glad to be here.
Shelby Stanger:
And you're probably one of the most recommended guests we've ever had. There's been so many people we've had who are like, "You should interview Philip. He's the man."
Philip Henderson:
Interesting.
Shelby Stanger:
Interesting.
Philip Henderson:
Interesting.
Shelby Stanger:
Okay, let's start at the beginning. How did you get into mountaineering and the outdoors?
Philip Henderson:
Oh, boy. Really, I think it's kind of inside from a long time ago. Fishing was my first passion. My uncle took me fishing when I was young, and I think that kind of opened the door of curiosity. But in my professional life, I guess you could say, it really happened by accident. Again, I like fishing and I think I had gone skiing once or twice, but I played football in college and I fractured a vertebra in my neck, and I was on disability for the next year and a half with a lot of time to think about things. And I decided I'm going to do anything and everything that I want to do in life because it's short and it could stop at any moment. And so I went back to fishing.
Shelby Stanger:
Okay. How did that happen? How did you go back to fishing?
Philip Henderson:
Right. So there was a state park that I had gone to, even just a couple of weeks before or maybe a month with a teammate, we had hiked in this state park to go fishing. And so that was the first time I had been backpacking. And so, when I could do things like, "well, what can I do that I can do by myself? I don't need other people." And I'm like, "I'm going to go back and go hiking at that lake again." And so I started doing these backpacking trips to this lake. It was about a 10-mile hike, and I found out about a volunteer program they had there doing interpretive hikes, telling people about the wildflowers and the cultural history and where springs are and things.
And that really was like, "Oh, okay." Well, that was what ranger. I was 20 something years old. That was my introduction to a state park and a ranger. And so, I would just go and volunteer a day of work just to tell people where water is or what wildflowers were or something. And so, one day I went to buy a pair of boots and I went into the North Face Store and I asked this guy, "This outdoor stuff, where do you learn more of that stuff?" And he gave me two telephone numbers, one to NOLS and one to Outward Bound, and I had to call to get the catalog sent in the mail because you couldn't just go on the internet at the time and find things.
And the NOLS catalog came in the mail first. And when I looked at it, that was how I was exposed to back country skiing or caving or mountaineering. I didn't know what those things were at that time until I looked at that. And so being where I was in life, I was like, "You know what, I'm going to do this." It's expensive. But I had worked at Costco for... Well, it was Price Club at the time, but I worked there for almost 10 years, and through these changes in life and so on, I just realized, "Man, that's not something I want to do the rest of my life. I want to do something else. And this is one of the things I'm going to do where it's going to lead, I don't know." And so I hustled a little bit, but I was like, "I'm going to do this." And I took a semester course at NOLS, and the rest is history in that sense.
Shelby Stanger:
For those who don't know, NOLS stands for National Outdoor Leadership School. It's an immersive wilderness program that teaches participants how to thrive in the wild and work together as a team. In 1992, when he was 27 years old, Philip left for a semester-long NOLS program in the Rocky Mountains. During his time there, he decided to pursue a career in the outdoors. Do you have any stories from that time that you remember wide-eyed Philip Henderson?
Philip Henderson:
There's a lot of stories.
Shelby Stanger:
First time whitewater rafting or rock climbing or any of these times.
Philip Henderson:
Okay, we'll go to the first one, the whitewater rafting. I hated it. It was no joke. See, this is where stories come out. I hated whitewater rafting, kayaking. It was the first time I ever done that. I remember I had got an ear infection while we were on the river. I spend more time in a kayak upside down than I did right side up, so that's not comfortable. But after that course, I didn't go back to work at Costco. I ended up going to work at REI.
Shelby Stanger:
Whoa, that's weird. I didn't know this.
Philip Henderson:
Right. So a long story short, I just happened to be standing at the register when a guy walked in and he was asking if he could pass out some of his brochures. And his brochures just happened to be his whitewater rafting company. And I looked at that and something told me to ask him if he needed any guides. Why? I don't know. But I asked. And this is, again, and I talk a lot about opportunities, and it's a two-way street. Someone that's able to give one and someone who's ready to receive that opportunity. They have to be on the same street going in the same direction.
And he looked at me and he gave me his telephone number and he said, "Call me." I went down the river with him. The guy said, "Okay." Jim Faust was his name, and Jim said, "Look, this is what we'll do. I'll give you a boat. You get your own people, go down the river, you'll pay for lunch. If you get three clean runs down the river, I'll hire you as a guide." So I ended up getting a couple trips down the river. And one weekend during the week, Jim called me and he said, "Hey, can you work next weekend?" I was like, "Man, yeah, I can work, but I only have two runs down the river." He said, "Oh, don't worry about that. The guy said you'll be fine." And that's how I got my first job guiding in the outdoor industry working as a whitewater guide.
Shelby Stanger:
But I thought you hated whitewater rafting.
Philip Henderson:
I did. But I worked hard to overcome that challenge. I would go out. There was a guy, a friend of mine, I've worked with at REI, and he was a kayaker, so we'd go out to the ocean and kayak two, three days a week. So I just overcome that fear. So that was my first job, and it just so happened that I just was in the right place at the right time.
Shelby Stanger:
But also, you said yes to the opportunity and you asked the right question.
Philip Henderson:
People have to do things, right? Like I say, it's a two-way street. Someone's got to be willing to give, and you have to be willing to receive and make things happen that way.
Shelby Stanger:
So you first started teaching and guiding others, I guess, at 27 whitewater rafting?
Philip Henderson:
Yep, yeah.
Shelby Stanger:
And then did that morph into something else?
Philip Henderson:
Yeah, because after my NOLS course I knew that I wanted to be an instructor. That was the goal after that.
Shelby Stanger:
What made you want to be an instructor? Was there a specific guest who told you that you changed their life, or was it just the thrill of leading other people? Or was it that you got to be on the water all day and it was super fun job?
Philip Henderson:
I was young and single at the time, just not a lot of obligations in life, and it was a different lifestyle. But if I want to work this job and work more than three months out of the year, then I need more skills. If your skillset is well-rounded, then you can work all year long and you don't get burned out of one thing or the other. So I could work a winter course in the spring, like February I'd work a winter course, and then you'd go hiking in the canyons in March, and you go climbing in April, and then you're on the river in May, and then you stay on the river June, July, and then come August you're back hiking again. September, maybe you're climbing, and then it's back to winter time again, and you can work all year long.
Shelby Stanger:
Working in the outdoor industry opened up Philip's world. He started leading trips internationally on Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya and traveled to Everest Base camp multiple times. Back in the States, he managed some of the most vigorous whitewater rafting programs in the country, and he also started speaking at schools about his experience in the outdoors. Eventually, Philip met famous mountaineer, Conrad Anker, and the two of them became friends and expedition partners. Over the years, Conrad and Philip shared many trips to Nepal, including going to Mount Everest in 2012. The two also climbed Denali together in 2013, which Philip remembers as one of the pinnacles of his career.
Philip Henderson:
Conrad got in touch with me. He's like, "Hey, I do this trip with my son and some of his friends every year. It's a ski mountaineering trip. It's just a kind of a mentorship trip, and I think it'd be great if you went." And so I was like, "Cool. I think I'll go on that trip." We try to summit a couple of times. The third time we get almost on the summit ridge and a lightning storm happens. This is a historical event that happened on Denali in 2013 where a lightning storm came and there were probably 60 to 70 people on the summit plateau at the time. It was dangerous. I mean, it was amazing.
Shelby Stanger:
Yeah, that's a terrifying trip. And people have skis and they're like metal conductors.
Philip Henderson:
Exactly. So this lightning storm happens, we run back down and some of the folks had to leave because they couldn't change their flights, they had to get back to work or whatever, blah, blah, blah. And a few of us stayed, and I just remember like, "I don't know if I have the energy to try again." This would be the fourth time trying to summit in five days or six days or something like that. But anyways, we got up a little bit earlier and there were just less people. And so I summited with some other members of our team, but that was significant. So just that experience, it's kind of like what I needed at that point in life. It wasn't the summit, it was the push.
Shelby Stanger:
That experience on Denali was an important moment in Phillip's life. He became one of the few black people to summit the mountain. More importantly, it made him wonder what else was possible. The answer to that question would lead him to his next historic expedition on Mount Everest nearly 10 years later. Outdoor expedition leader, Phillip Henderson, has dedicated his entire career to adventure. As a young adult in the '90s, he completed a semester with NOLS in the Rocky Mountains. That program was the jumping off point for a 30 year career as an outdoor athlete and educator. Phillip's work has taken him all over the world. He's taught climbers in Kenya, worked with Sherpas on Mount Everest and led rafting trips in Patagonia. Throughout his career, Phillip has noticed that he's often one of the only black people present in these outdoor spaces. It's made him reflect on the opportunities that were made available to him early on.
I feel like every time you do one of these experiences in the outdoors, get two things. One, nature helps you heal. Two, adventure, doing something outside your comfort zone builds courage. And then you take that courage that you get from doing this crazy adventure and you take it to the next thing. It seems like your whole life has been like this. You survive your football accident, you do this other thing, then you do NOLS. You get courage from NOLS, you become a whitewater rafting guide. You get courage from being a whitewater rafting guide, you end up leading trips in the Rockies. You do backpacking trips, you meet Conrad, you're leading other trips, and then you just keep going and going. You get the courage to do all these things because you keep doing these beautiful things in nature, which makes you feel good and a whole person regardless of the craziness of the world. And then you get this courage from adventure. I don't know, I could be wrong, but it's my speculation.
Philip Henderson:
But then the thing for me is I've always noticed that there's just not people that look like me doing it. And that's just people talk about the elephant in the room, all these, that's just what it is. And so I can't talk about any of these experiences and not talk about that. It's like the expectation is not what people think it is.
Shelby Stanger:
So when you were that whitewater rafting guide back when you first started, were you like the only black whitewater rafting guide around?
Philip Henderson:
I know others, but do we work together? No. In my tenure of almost 35, almost 40 years of working in the industry, I know I could count them on maybe two hands. I'm sure that there are others, but there are so few and far between, and you're going to find that when you just look at the pure numbers of any of what we call outdoor sports, skiing, climbing, mountaineering. It doesn't mean that there aren't people out there doing it. It's just that the numbers are so few that they don't shine. So I've always noticed that. I worked NOLS courses for a long time. I managed programs. I worked for other guide services, I've guided around the world. And sure, when I was in Kenya, I had students that were Kenyan, but when I was in the U.S., I never had students that were dark-skinned people.
So that's just something you notice, right? And then there was talk about it. We started talking about diversity in the '90s when I came into it. That is on my back in that sense. And so everywhere I go, that seems to be the case. But okay, I'll carry that load. I just knew I was out in front of people because of the experiences I had at a younger age and what it's done for me, the healing, those types of things that people, they couldn't understand. Even people who look like me, they didn't understand it. They're like, "No, you're crazy. You're doing what? We don't do those things." But I always knew that people were interested in doing these outdoor things. I knew it. It's just that they may not have the ability to do what I've done. And a lot of that was because of life experience.
Shelby Stanger:
In the last 10 years or so, Philip has noticed more affinity groups forming around the shared mission of getting more black and brown folks outside. He's been hoping for this kind of movement for decades. This push for increased diversity in the outdoors led Philip to another full circle moment. In 2019 he was teaching in the ice climbing clinic in Colorado when he met two other black climbers. This was the beginning of putting together an expedition to Mount Everest that would be the first of its kind, one with an all-black team. The trip was called Full Circle Everest.
Philip Henderson:
We kind of started talking about going to Everest, and it just kind of happened. And I started putting the team together and kind of act like, "Hey, you're the one to lead this." And I had to then look back at all of those things of my outdoor education career, my guiding, my working internationally, working with the Sherpa community. And that was my biggest reason for saying, "Yes, I'll take that position and lead this expedition." Because I had had so much connection. The Sherpa people in the Nepali community is my reasons for going to Everest in the first place. It's not really to climb the mountain.
It's because of the people that I've helped train who work on the mountain, that live there. It's seeing their families and knowing their families. That community building is the reason why I go to that part of the world. And I wanted to share that with other people who look like me. I've shared it with other people just like I've educated other people working at NOLS and Outward Bound and guiding and things like that. It just it wasn't people who look like me. So now I have this opportunity to be able to do that. This is where everything was leading right to here.
Shelby Stanger:
What sort of skills did you need to have to lead this trip, and how did it challenge you personally?
Philip Henderson:
Anything and everything. Again, it was like you have 10 different personalities. You're trying to keep everybody involved and giving them ownership and getting people to buy in, but you can't hold hands and you have to have trust in the team. And it was a lot of work, but it took its toll in a sense. Also, I wasn't a hundred percent health wise. I had some issues, some physical things going on that I didn't know exactly what it was. And so, after we reached base camp, I decided that the best thing for me to do was to not climb actually and play more of a managerial logistics role for the team so that other folks really could just focus on climbing.
Shelby Stanger:
Can I dive into that?
Philip Henderson:
Yeah.
Shelby Stanger:
Because that's a big leadership quality, to know your limits and not go. And for many people, Everest is this. The whole point of Everest is to get to the top and say you did Everest. But I think it's really beautiful. It's such a different Everest story that you chose to take a bunch of people to Everest, and when you realized that it wasn't going to be best for you to climb, you helped let the others climb. This is the best leadership quality you could have, but it probably wasn't an easy decision.
Philip Henderson:
No, not at all. When I look back, it's just all these little signs. You have to kind of trust your gut. And when I look back I can say it now, but at the time I didn't know what was going on. Because I came back from Everest, I've had surgery, I had two torn ligaments and a torn tendon in my ankle.
Shelby Stanger:
Well, glad you didn't climb. Wow, that's gnarly.
Philip Henderson:
So I could walk grand, but I couldn't front point. It was hard for me to stand on my toe. Not knowing what the ice fall is going to be like, what Lhotse face is going to be, all these little things like that. And so, at some point I just decided the best thing for me to do is to focus on what's happening, what needs to happen. And that's the role that I played. And it's easy for me because I had been to Everest in 2012. I didn't summit then, but again, summits, it doesn't matter to me. My goals were to be with my friends and folks that are strong in the mountain, in that community that Everest brings and that Nepal brings. And to now have that and to see them having these opportunities at a younger age and being the provider of that opportunity, just like someone had been providing an opportunity for me.
Shelby Stanger:
Do you have any quick stories or memorable moments from Everest? I realize there was a bunch of challenging times. Just not being able to go yourself and having to make the decision to stay back was a big one, but any real memorable times?
Philip Henderson:
Honestly, I think the most memorable would be the first person reaching the summit and then the second person, and then the third, and then the seventh.
Shelby Stanger:
And how are you hearing about this? Are you on walkie-talkie back at base camp?
Philip Henderson:
Yeah, so what was one of the roles that I could play in that I would get a radio message from up high in the mountain, and then I could relay that message to that person's wife or to our sponsor. I was kind of in that relay message. And that was a super proud moment. One of the other aspects of the expedition is we had the opportunity for significant others to hike into base camp, but I also remember that ultimate responsibility of looking at someone's wife and saying, "Don't worry. He'll be home." Those are memorable moments for me.
Shelby Stanger:
The Full Circle Everest expedition made international headlines and their stories even being adapted into a documentary film. The press that Full Circle received has put Philip in the spotlight in a new way, but that recognition hasn't changed his goals. He's still teaching outdoor clinics around the world and visiting grade schools to engage with the next generation of outdoor enthusiasts. What about guiding do you love the most?
Philip Henderson:
Honestly, I don't really like guiding because guiding means you're doing things for people. And I don't want to do things for people. I want to help educate them so they can do things for themselves. And this is one of the reasons why I worked at NOLS, because that's what it is. You're facilitating something. You're not guiding them. I want people to have a good foundation, a solid foundation. Because you can build everything off of that and then build in transformance from that activity to their everyday life. Which for me, it's always been that, right? They've always been connected.
Shelby Stanger:
I feel like I get it now and I'm smiling because it's coming full circle. You want to teach people like your uncle, teach them to fish. You don't want to fish for them.
Philip Henderson:
It just comes natural to me to do that. Again, it's just something that... That's what I found was my niche, was being that person. That type of leadership, being that educator, like you say, the uncle in the family. I have a child and I've been around enough young people as it is, and I have nieces and nephews, biological or not, but seeing them with their parents, sometimes they're not listening to those people, but they might listen to what I'm saying. And I've lived, I think, through this enough generations now. And like I mentioned earlier, my uncle was about the same age then as I am now. When I look at that like, "Okay, this is what you're supposed to be doing with your life experience. You're supposed to be sharing this with young people and spending time with young people."
And that is missing in our society these days. And it's not just young people that look like me. I've always seen the benefits of having different people around me, but not everybody has always had that experience and so, they're afraid of it, they're not comfortable with it. Just like the outdoors, just like going out camping, we are afraid. We've been so far removed from it that we are afraid of it. We don't want to do it. But then once you do it, you go, "Oh, wait, it's not a big deal. Matter of fact, I need this." And I think that that's what happened during the pandemic. Is that people got outside and they reconnected with this part of them that's missing.
Shelby Stanger:
What are you most excited about next? You have so many cool things in the works.
Philip Henderson:
What really keeps me going now, which is, it's hard, but I have a non-profit that I run now, but the biggest thing that we do is connect with school kids. So a lot of schools are K through 12, but K through six, I think, is really where you make connections because they're not yet into so many other things, they're still curious. And so, going into that age group and setting up a tent and letting kids that's never seen an 8,000-meter suit, put it on and get in a tent and see pictures of mountains, that keeps me going.
And then there's the other side of me that I love raising my goats and gardening and watching my daughter grow up. And I don't need to do a lot, but I'll go and... I was just at the ice park just a couple of days ago, and I'll go on an expedition here and there, but I am really, my life is good in that sense, and I want people to have that same joy. And so, I think it'll always be a Kilimanjaro trip here, a trip to Everest base camp there. And a lot of it to me is just to maintain those connections and to help other people make those connections as well.
Shelby Stanger:
When you're not on an expedition, how do you like to get outside?
Philip Henderson:
Gosh, I'm fortunate. I live in Four Corners, so gosh, I can bike almost all year unless it's too hot. Even right now, it's, what is it, February, and I can go mountain biking right now. There's no snow on the ground, but I can also go... I was just ice climbing two days ago. A lot of people would think that if you're this big outdoor person, you're a guide, you have to be doing those things every day. And a lot of people do that. I'm not one of those people. I am just as happy working in the garden, and at the end of the day, I don't go, "Shoot, I didn't do anything today." To me, it's really balance.
But if the wind blows, I'll stop what I'm doing and go fly my kite just because I can and I like it and it's fun. I don't care if it's bird watching on a park bench or Everest. Anything in between those. You get in where you fit in. If it makes you happy, do it. I'll keep doing these things until I can't do them anymore.
Shelby Stanger:
Philip's sense of adventure is something we can all aspire to. And his mission to expose more kids to the power of the great outdoors is something I really appreciate. If you want to learn more about Philip, you can follow him on Instagram @Phil_Henderson. That's P-H-I-L underscore H-E-N-D-E-R-S-O-N. You can learn more about the Full Circle Everest expedition and see what adventures are next at fullcircle-expeditions.com.
Wild Ideas Worth Living is part of the REI Podcast network. It's hosted by me, Shelby Stanger, produced by Annie Fassler, Sylvia Thomas and Sam Peers Nitzberg of Puddle Creative. Our senior producers are Jenny Barber and Hannah Boyd. Our executive producers are Paolo Motolla and Joe Crosby. As always, we love it when you follow the show, take time to rate it, and write a review wherever you listen. And remember, some of the best adventures happen when you follow your wildest ideas.