history of mountaineering

If you type the word Everest into the books category on Amazon.com, here’s what you get: 4 teen novels about a group of backstabbing teenagers competing to become the youngest person to climb Everest 1 worst-case scenario teen adventure book

When my mate Dan asked me if I wanted to go and see Joe Brown talk about the first ascent of Kangchenjunga, I didn’t even realise he was still alive (Joe Brown that is, not Dan). There aren’t many climbers

I’ve been fascinated by the legend of George Mallory, and whether he was the first person to climb Everest, since long before I became a mountaineer. Many years and many mountains later I finally had the chance to follow in

In 1953 Eric Shipton was controversially overlooked as leader of the British Everest expedition in favour of John Hunt. The decision was vindicated when Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first people ever to reach the summit on 29

With the news last week that Sandy Allan and Rick Allen have completed the Mazeno Ridge on Nanga Parbat (8125m), the longest continuous ridge on any 8000 metre peak, I was reminded of the colourful history of this giant mountain in Pakistan, the most westerly of the 8000ers, once considered to be a German mountain, and now at least temporarily dressed in tartan.

Some people will probably say the title of this post is tautological, but all things are relative. On Everest this year there was an elderly Italian climber who, justified or not, had a reputation for being a bit of a

Here on the north side of Everest ropes have been fixed as high as 8300m, and the remainder will likely be fixed when the winds drop on 18th and 19th. If all goes to plan then teams will begin summiting

“I was desperately anxious to see at close quarters the great Alpine summits which look so majestic from the top of our mountains.” Horace-Benedict de Saussure Modern mountaineering is said to have begun on 8 August 1786, when Michel Paccard,

Why most books about Everest are irrelevant (but not all of them)

Joe Brown provides a rare glimpse of Kangchenjunga

What climbing Everest taught me about George Mallory’s final hours

How the whim of Eric Shipton shaped the history of Everest

A short history of Nanga Parbat, the Naked German Mountain

A menagerie of mad mountaineers

Mallory and Somervell, 13 May 1922

The great great grandfather of mountaineering