With climbing experience in the Lake District of England, the Alps, and the Himalaya, Arnold Mumm first visited the Canadian Rockies in 1909. Guide Moritz Inderbinen accompanied Mumm, as he did on all of Mumm's climbing trips. They were joined by Geoffrey Hastings and Leopold Amery. Initially they had hopes of completing the first ascent of Mount Robson. Mumm's party visited the Alpine Club of Canada's camp at Lake O'Hara and was then proceeding up the Athabasca River when they met George Kinney who advised that he and Curly Phillips had just climbed Mount Robson. The party carried on to the Mount Robson area reaching it after a twenty-nine day approach, where they travelled around the mountain and made an attempt to climb it, reaching a point high on the peak before turning back just before an avalanche of ice and rock swept across the route they had planned on taking. The following year Mumm joined Norman Collie for another journey to the Mount Robson area. They waited from August 9 until the 26th but because of weather and conditions on the mountain were unable to make an attempt to climb the mountain. While in the area they completed first ascents of Mumm Peak and Mount Phillips. The party then headed up the Smoky River and crossed over a pass to the Snake Indian River and descended to Brule Lake. Along the way Mumm and Collie were very impressed with a peak named Mount Bess. Mumm and Collie returned the following year (1913), completing first ascents of Mount Bess and Monte Cristo Mountain. Following Avery L. Mumm's death at sea, Arthur Wheeler wrote: "It is such protracted explorations and climbs amidst the unbridled forces of Nature, where patience, unselfishness and endurance are in great demand, that bring out the real character of the man, and it is this acid test that has established the memory of our dear comarade as one so well loved by all who knew him. His wide experience, his gentle ways and his ever ready and sympathetic interest have done much to teach us the true devoir of the mountain knight-errant."