Mountains of the Mind. Robert Macfarlane. New York: Pantheon Books, 2003.320 pages. Hardcover. $24.00Imperial Ascent: Mountaineering, Masculinity, and Empire. Peter L. Bayers. Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2003.174 pages. Hardcover. $29.9...
Cho Oyu ContradictionsEscaping harsh realities on a single-push new route in the Himalaya.Pavle KozjekI first climbed in the Himalaya more than 20 years ago. In the early 1980s I was a member of large expeditions organized by the Slovenian Mountai...
The Ascent. Jeff Long. William Morrow, New York, NY, 1992. 284 pages. $20.00. Jeff Long’s second novel describes an attempt on the north side of Everest. The route, the “Kore Wall,” is “an imaginary monster,” but it often feels very real indeed. O...
Washington, Mt. Johannesberg—On August 30, Don Grimlund (24) and five companions, all experienced climbers, had reached the summit of Mt. Johannesberg. The approach had been from Cascade Pass by a circuit around Mixup via Gunsight Pass and a conto...
PULMONARY EDEMA, CLIMBING ALONEColorado, Longs PeakStephen Weiswell (20) arrived in Boulder, Colorado, from Massachusetts. He climbed for a number of days in the Boulder area (5000 to 6000 feet in elevation), then went directly to the Longs Peak A...
INEXPERIENCE, FAILURE TO TURN BACKAlaska, Mount McKinley, West ButtressMike McCarthy (32) faxed his Mount McKinley climbing registration form to the Talkeetna Ranger Station on March 16. His climbing experience consisted of three hikes up Long’s P...
Panch Chuli II and Panch Chuli III, Attempt. An expedition of the Explorers and Adventurers, Bombay, India, led by Divyesh Muni, attempted Panch Chuli II (6904 m) and Panch Chuli III (6312 m) in the Pyunshani Valley in the month of May. Divyesh Mu...
Washington, summary of activity. [Note: this summary supplements individual reports, mostly of bigger routes, below—Ed.] Previously unreported were two ascents of Poster Peak, by probable new routes, in the summer of 2003. Poster Peak is shown on ...
Learning to Breathe. Andy Cave. London: Hutchinson, 2005.276 pages. £18.99. $44.95.This remarkable debut memoir, co-winner of the 2005 Board- man-Tasker Award and winner of the best-book prize for Adventure Travel in the 2005 Banff Mountain Book F...
Mt. Langley, S-Wall. Technically Langley has been the most ignored of the Sierra’s 14,000' peaks. Then in 1999 a fine line went up the big north face. In September Michael Thomas and I thought we’d have a look, but we never got there. A high roadh...
Lindeman, North Couloir, British Columbia Cascade Range. On November 14, Rob Freeman, Tim Hudson, John Petroske and I climbed a four-pitch snow-and-ice couloir on the north face of the north peak of Mount Lindeman. The prominent couloir parallels ...
Altitude Illness: Prevention and Treatment. Stephen Bezruchka, M.D. Edited by Maureen O’Neill. The Mountaineers, Seattle, Washington. 93 pages. $6.95.This compact primer has been designed to substitute for the smattering of information and notes o...
Demavend and Ararat, 1951OLIVER S. CROSBYAS we drove down the dusty road from Tabriz to Tehran, Hermann Dietrich and I became more and more excited at the thought of the climbing which lay ahead. For months we had discussed with Les Rood plans for...
Edmund Percival Hillary 1919–2008“Sir Edmund described himself as a person of modest ability; in reality he was a colossus.... He was our hero,” New Zealand’s Prime Minister Helen Clark said in her tribute to him at his state funeral in Auckland. ...
Slick-Johnson Nepal Snowman Expedition. In the spring of 1957 Tom Slick, of San Antonio, Texas, and Peter Byrne made a three-weeks reconnaissance up the Arun River. Between the Chhoyang and the Iswa Kholas at about 12,000 feet they discovered what...
In mid-October, Craig Pope and I made the quasi-annual pilgrimage from Bozeman to Pinedale with hopes held high for favorable mixed climbing conditions in the northern Wind River Range. The weather gods were on our side: We had just enou...
FALL ON ROCK, UNROPED, HYPOTHERMIAWyoming, TetonsAt 0400 on the morning of July 11, 1982, Dan McKay (26), a noted local skier, left the Lower Saddle in an attempt to ski down the Grand Teton on cross-country skis. He was not an experienced mountai...
Exploring in the KarakoramHENRY S. FRANCIS, JR.American Himalayan expeditions that are not set upon climbing a single major peak of the range are still a novelty in the Karakorams of Pakistan. In fact, an expedition from any country that is not la...
USA-USSR Pamirs ExpeditionJohn Roskelley, Peter Lev,J.E. Williamson, Jocelyn C. GliddenAs a result of an invitation from the Soviet Sports Federation to the American Alpine Club, a nineteen-member expedition, led by Pete Schoening, participated in...
Cholatse and Taweche Attempts. A five-man British expedition led by William Dark failed to climb the southeast ridge of Cholatse and the northeast ridge of Taweche in the pre-monsoon period. They established a high camp in the col between their tw...