Twenty-nine-year-old John Stenderup grew up on a farm in Arvin, CA, earned a degree in international agricultural business from Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo and found a dream job with C.H. Robinson right out of college. Today he is effusive about the roads he has traveled and the opportunities they have afforded him.

But when asked about his career, he states there are a lot of mountains to climb and he’s just not sure what direction he’ll go.Kent and John Stenderup hiking up the cables of Half Dome in Yosemite. 

Stenderup, who is an ice climber and mountaineer, surely meant the response to be the pun that it was. His father, Kent Stenderup, is the person most responsible for the roads that have already been traveled.

John’s great-grandfather and his brother started the Stenderup farming operation in 1924. Kent took over from his father in the 1980s after graduating from Stanford University, and today he runs what is called Stenderup Ag Partners. The company is strictly a grower producing almonds, grapes, tomatoes and carrots, shipping through some of the more well-known produce shippers in California.

John went to college and his major clearly indicated that an ag career was in his future.

“I have always looked for a challenge and while I knew it was a possibility that I’d go back and work on the family farm, I also had the desire to go out and make it on my own,” he said.

Stenderup joined C.H. Robinson’s Monterey office just about the same time the firm was launching a transportation program in conjunction with Western Growers Association. Today, seven years later, he is the manager of that program, which includes members in seven other produce associations.Stenderup on the summit of Denali (20,320 feet) in 2014. This photo was taken around 10 p.m.

“I oversee customer relations, work with the board of directors of each group and work on larger supply chain issues with various customers,” he said.

His climbing hobby somewhat mirrors his rise at the company. “My dad got me into it,” he said. “I had no post-college hobby and he started hiking and I joined him. Each trip got bigger and bigger.”

His progression in the sport took him to serious hikes, rock climbing, ice climbing and mountaineering, which he says is technical mountain climbing of big mountains using tools. As the adventures got bigger and bigger, Kent Stenderup stayed at the serious hiking plateau but John says “my dad cheers me on. He’s like the devil on my shoulder urging me to go on to bigger and more dangerous mountains.”

This summer, Stenderup and his regular climbing group headed to South America to ice climb a Peruvian peak called Alpamayo. This climb was a mix of mountaineering and Alpine Ice climbing. Ice climbing, he said, involves scaling frozen waterfalls. The face of Alpamayo is 1,700 feet tall, starting at a 65 degree slope and topping out at 85 degree slope.Stenderup on a 210-foot waterfall called Whorehouse in Silverton, CO. 

The summit stands at 19,512 feet. Stenderup’s trip took 18 days including time in Peru preparing for the climb. The ascent took nine days and it took about three days to get back down.

Stenderup does not downplay the dangerous aspect of this sport but he said there are many things you can do to lessen the risk.

“It is dangerous,” he said. “There are human errors and bad decisions that make it more dangerous. And there is also the uncontrollable stuff like the earthquake in Nepal last year. It is like a surfer getting bitten by a shark. There are risks that are part of what I do that you just have to accept.”

On his list of mountains to climb is Mount Everest. His dad wants to hike to the base camp with him and see him off. “That is something we will do, but I know the mortality rate for Everest is 5 percent. Out of every 100 climbers, five don’t survive.”

Two days after he finished his Peruvian climb, a free climber fell to his death on the same route. And five others died a year earlier when a ledge they were on gave way. Free climbing is not something Stenderup expects to do. And while he is going to continue reaching for higher peaks, he does allow that as he gets older and gets married, he will probably be more conservative in his approach.

But for the time being he has his sights on the biggest climbs. He has done Denali (formerly Mount McKinley, which he says the climbing community has always called Denali) and he is planning to do a 20,000-foot peak in Nepal next year.

On average, Stenderup does weekend climbs in the Pacific Northwest three to five times per year and a major climb once a year. “I climb with the same group, including my mentor, who is a great climber.”

He said the routes are carefully planned and precautions are taken. But he acknowledges that if you climb you “will fall or slip at some point. You just have to make sure you have a good rope and a good anchor.”

The falls can be jarring, but if you plan properly, you can emerge bruised, not broken.

With regard to his original comment, Stenderup said it would be cool to come back to the farm and work with his dad some day, “but I don’t know what mountains I am going to climb. I love what I do right now working in global logistics. No two days are alike and I am very happy I was able to plug in to the [produce] community I grew up in.”