At the Rising of the Moon. Dermot Somers. Baton Wicks, London. 208 pages. Paperback.Most climbing literature comes from climbers who write. Dermot Somers, however, sounds like a writer who also happens to climb. The distinction turns on two factor...
The Tenth Mountain DivisionA Successful ExperimentAlbert H. JackmanTHE 10th Mt. Division was a good division, but many others with inferior training and equipment suffered more casualties, fought more campaigns, and killed or captured more Germans...
Notchtop area, Special K; and Forbidden Peak, Garmar. On June 24 Krista Javoronok and I climbed a new route on the smaller spire to the right of Notchtop. Special K (600', III 5.10b) climbs this spire in six pitches. The route starts in the middle...
Changabang, South Ridge. Our expedition consisted of Renato Lingua, leader, Ugo Manera, Lino Castiglia, Isidoro Meneghin, Alessandro Zuccon, Roberto Bonis, Pietro Crivellaro, Dr. Giuseppe Rocca and me. Starting on September 23 we took a week to pr...
FALL ON ROCK, INADEQUATE PROTECTION, EXCEEDING ABILITIESWashington, North Cascades, Cutthroat PeakAt 6:00 a.m. on July 17, five climbers started on the South Buttress of Cutthroat Peak. It was clear and warm. The climb started across a snow basin ...
Brotherhood of the Rope: the Biography of Charlie Houston. Bernadette McDonald. Seattle: The Mountaineers Books, 2007. Hardcover $34.95; paperback $18.95.Most contemporary climbers know the name Charles Houston, but many aren’t sure where or when ...
Mustagh Tower, Northwest Ridge, Attempt. This summer a team of four attempted the Northwest Ridge of Mustagh Tower and reached a high point of about 21,100 feet. Conditions were characterized by abnormally deep snow cover and frequent stormy weath...
Tatina Spire, Groundhog Day, and Mt. Haffner, attempt. British climbers Mark Reeves and Steve Sinfield visited the Tatina Glacier for a short stay in late May and June. Having waited five days in Talkeetna for the weather to improve enough to risk...
HIKER DISAPPEAREDOregon, Broken TopOn August 10, Danny Curran (24) left his younger brother at their Green Lakes pack-in campsite late in the day, saying he was going to climb Broken Top, the snow capped mountain summit just one and a half miles d...
Milton Mount McKinley Range ExpeditionGlaciological Research on the North Fork of the Eldridge GlacierH. Adams Carter and David L. Atherton"Science be hanged!" I stated flatly, expressing in one terse sentence the sentiments of the Non-Scientists....
Cordillera Blanca, Various Ascents, and Observations on Glaciation. From July 20 until August 20, Jimmy Surette and I climbed in the Cordillera Blanca and found conditions utterly unlike anything we expected. For years the glaciers have been reced...
Kun Lun, Exploratory Mountaineering. In June, Mark Newcomb, Hans Johnstone and Kent McBride traveled to the Kun Lun Shan Mountains in western China to climb and explore this vast and little-known range. A full account of their expedition appears e...
OVERDUE CLIMBERS, UNDERESTIMATED DIFFICULTY OF CLIMBAlaska, Mount Huntington and Mount McKinleyOn May 16, 1984, Jim Haberl (26) and Rob Rohn (26) flew into the West Fork of the Ruth Glacier to climb the West Face of Mount Huntington and Reality Ri...
Peaks East of Gongga Shan (Minya Konka). On April 15 ten members of the Academic Alpine Club Zürich left Switzerland for China and reached Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province, within five days. There, a ton of food and gear awaited us. Thanks...
The Life of a Teton GuideWilli UnsoeldSince American climbers have always been inclined towards the "lead-it-yourself” school of mountaineering, professional guides have never acquired the vogue in this country that they have in Europe. In fact, t...
WHEN we set out from Britain, we were very aware of just how much we were taking on. The team numbered only eight, but because of the scale and technical difficulty of the west ridge of K2 particularly in its upper part, it was obvious that we sho...
“Sometimes you just gotta go out there,” said Gloria, answering our query about the ugly weather. Having no time to sit around Jasper waiting for the weather to improve, Gloria took our bags to the horses for the approach to Mt. Postern.Fifteen mo...
Sandstone Towers near Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu. There are numerous sandstone towers near my home in northern New Mexico and until February they were all unclimbed. When I set out to ascend them, little did I know that I’d be pushing the limits of “sof...
WILLIAM F. GERBER1915-1996Bill Gerber of Denver died in October, 1996. He had suffered a stroke the year before, not long after a rock climbing 80th birthday party. His family and friends were distressed to see the decline of a man who had always ...
AMSAlaska, Denali National Park, Mount McKinley, West ButtressMasamichi Kobayashi (65) was a part of the Tokyo-JAC expedition comprised of four Japanese men. They flew onto the mountain on June 14 and progressed to the 17,200-foot camp in average ...