Episode Intro:

Happy Wednesday andwelcome back to the Female Guides Requested podcast, this is your host Ting Ting from Las Vegas.

Today, I’m thrilled to host Lisa Van Sciver, a renownedmountain guide based in the Tetons with nearly two decades of experience.

Lisa’s journey is one of passion, balance, and profound impact. She’ll share with us how she went from being a porter who thought guiding was "ridiculous" to one ofthe most respected figures in the industry, and how an early request for a female guide completely changed her career path.

We'll talk about her unique strategy for achieving career sustainability in a feast-or-famine industry, the power of female guide collaboration (or as her mentor, AmyBarnes, calls it, the "sisters of the rope"), and why interactingwith people, learning their stories, and witnessing their inner breakthrough is the most rewarding part of the job.

Lisa also shares with us her recent venture: an inspirational fundraising climb up Kilimanjaro.She'll walk us through her project, "Elevate Education," which is about creating an experience much "bigger than me"—using the mountains to provide educational opportunities for students in Kenya.

Get ready for an insightful conversation on climbing, career longevity, and finding purpose beyond the summit. Let's welcome Lisa Van Sciver.

Lisa's Links:

https://www.instagram.com/lisavansciver/

Kilimanjaro Climb — EducationFor All Children (EFAC)

Quotes:

"The big thing that pulled me into guiding instead ofthat was I really enjoy people. "

"We always have a lot of different things going on, butyou deep dive into one topic at a time."

"I think guiding can be a super long career, but youhave to be very dynamic with it."

"Where I've found sustainability for myself is I'vealways had a second career."

"As much as we're technical guides, were alsoentertainers. we are creating experiences for these people."

"It's shifted my own desires as far as I still have alot of desires of objectives I want to climb and things I want to accomplish in my life, but I think it just gave me more pause on a greater awareness of what people deal with in the world and how I can continue to look for ways to be compassionate and supportive."

"In some ways it's easier to get a job as a woman, butthen it's harder to get promoted. I think that's been from my own personal experience. everyone wants to add to their female roster, but then once you're there, you don't necessarily get the same treatment."

Episode Intro:

Dear listeners of the Female Guides Requested Podcast, welcome back and happy Wednesday. This is your host Ting Ting from Las Vegas. In this podcast, we spotlight the stories of women guides and guides from other underrepresented groups and see how they navigate the complex terrain of mountains and life.

Today we’re thrilled to host a true veteran of the backcountry: Natalie Brechtel.

With over two decades of professional experience, Natalie’s journey is nothing short of breathtaking. She’s gone from guiding in New Zealand to spending ten seasons working for the U.S. Antarctic Program as a Field Safety Coordinator and Mountaineer, all while contributing to the high-stakes world of Yosemite Search and Rescue.

Natalie is the founder of Gut-Z Journey, a business dedicated to building deep-seated confidence in the outdoors through a unique, holistic lens that combines wilderness medicine, strength training, and functional nutrition. As you’ll hear today, the name “Gut-Z Journey” perfectly embodies her philosophy—it’s about trusting your intuition and optimizing your health to make critical, life-saving decisions.

In this episode, Natalie shares her powerful insights on the importance of never outsourcing your decision-making in the field, why she prioritizes working with clients who are “invested in the process” of learning, and how she shows up every day as a strong female role model in male-dominated technical spaces.

If you’re looking to turn your physical and mental fortitude into unshakeable outdoor confidence, stay tuned. Let’s dive in with Natalie Brechtel.

Natalie’s Links:

• Gut-Z Journey
• WMA Instructor Bio
• My philosophy
• Gutzjourney IG
• Dirtbag diaries podcast

Quotes:

• I live in a really outdoor driven town and I actually can find it exhausting to be around so many people that are so driven in the same direction. And there’s just something to be said about when you’re in your own community sometimes behavior just changes.
• I really believe in going from the gut first and it’s a double-edged thing for me. because I also went to school for holistic nutrition later in life and microbiome health and our gut sends a lot of signals with our intuition and a lot of messaging.
• when someone feels physically stronger they’ve reconnected with their body then they frankly tend to feel more confident
• I was trying to think about what I could do back in the US that would still feel fulfilling… that gut part of my intuition was like, Natalie, you need other things.
• I didn’t have examples of women doing the things I wanted to do… I can at least represent that these things are possible.
• You outsource that decision to authority and end up in a precarious situation, even though you knew it wasn’t the right decision.
• I think that when one really wants to pursue challenges just for their own growth, then there is no end point to that.

Episode Intro:

Dear listeners of the Female Guides Requested Podcast, happy Wednesday. I’m your host Ting Ting from Las Vegas. Today, our guest is Caroline George. I’d say every active and want-to-be female guide should listen to this episode multiple times. Caroline’s voice was soft and comforting, but the words were incredibly impactful. The wisdom came from the essence she extracted from life events and decades of mountain climbing and guiding. The conversations provoked me to look into myself honestly and asked the ultimate question of “why.”

Caroline, an IFMGA mountain guide based near Verbier in the Swiss Alps, has faced many curveballs, but the mountains have always been her refuge—a place to find balance, reconnect with herself, and rekindle her inner light.

Most recently, she faced an unimaginable loss: her life and love partner, Adam George, perished in a helicopter crash in the Swiss Alps. Now, as the sole parent to their child, she is learning how to navigate the mountains in this new reality—both as a guide and as someone deeply connected to the peaks that have shaped her life.

Though the mountains remain unchanged, we experience them differently as life evolves. Caroline is discovering a new way of inhabiting this space, adapting to her shifting world while staying true to her passion. Guiding has become an anchor, offering both stability and a sense of normalcy as she forges ahead on this new path.

Now, please enjoy this episode.

Caroline’s Links:

• Into the Mountains (website): www.intothemountains.com
• Instagram: carolinewaregeorge

Quotes:

• On this journey of grief and healing and rebuilding, I can see that the mountains is a place of grounding for me.
• It’s like my life is constantly being forcing me to go deeper and deeper and to figure out the essence of my identity by stripping all the things that no longer belong.
• I think it’s a really hard place for women…it’s violent when you have to adapt so much to who you’re not just to get a certification.
• I feel like I have met that mold that whole time to really work myself into the ground…And now in my latest situation of survival, after having lost my husband and being the sole parent to my child, I’ve had to revisit how is it possible for me to be a guide.
• As guides, we can do a way better job to protect our own lives with our clients by empowering them.
• A good metaphor for that is all the technical skills you learn are a little bit like the walls and the roof and the bedrooms in a house unless they’re inhabited by people. They’re just walls, there’s no life to it.
• You can’t say no all the time just But with critical thinking and your gut feeling and your intuition, your experience and your knowledge all combined, you have to have the ability to step out of this situation and say no.
• I really want it to be a lifelong career should my body enable me…through that job, you’re forced to stay healthy, to have somewhat of a healthy lifestyle. And, it keeps you fit to be out there in the mountains. It keeps you smart and alert and not be a couch potato. So, on some form or another, I think I will always do that.
• I think in life it’s about finding passion, finding a community that feeds your soul and from there everything is possible.