Why We Climb - The Harsh Reality of Modern Day Mountaineering

Why We Climb - The Harsh Reality Of Modern
Expedition Mountaineering

by Robert Charles Alexander & Dan Mazur

About the Book

Why We Climb - The Harsh Reality Of Modern Expedition Mountaineering

Like many people I watched in awe and wonder at the discovery in the summer of 1999 of the body of George Herbert Leigh-Mallory on Mount Everest some 75 years after he had ‘vanished’ during an attempt on the summit in June 1924 with his climbing partner Sandy Irvine.

Fascinated by the passion that could drive humans to such extreme feats, I contemplated the possibility of such an effort by myself. I proceeded to devour every book, article and documentary on the subject that I could find over the next four years, while slowly, quietly, and away from the knowledge of my family and friends, I fostered a growing desire to go and see for myself with my own eyes the allure of Everest itself.

The call to the mountains for the novice is a dangerous thing. Imagination and ignorance are a powerful blend, and by 2003 I had all but convinced myself that I could not only get myself fit enough again to attempt such an undertaking, but that I too could maybe, possibly, stand on the highest peak on earth.

Armed with the overwhelming and intoxicating desire to achieve this goal one which, despite the fact that it has eluded some of the world’s greatest mountaineers, I truly believed that I had what it took to challenge myself at the end of my thirties, and to hone my body into something like the fitness level I had been some fifteen years earlier.

Undeterred by all placed before me I set upon a path that would indeed eventually lead me to the slopes of Mount Everest itself.

Along the way I travelled a journey of enormous self-discovery, and came to appreciate exactly what it is that drives people to this god-forsaken place where pain and discomfort go hand in hand with the business of just trying to stay alive on a daily basis. Needless to say, in so doing I also came to realise why some do not return home again.

This book is not meant to discourage anybody from mountaineering – in fact quite the opposite. But it is intended to offer the knowledge that I sought – and could not find – before I left for Tibet.

Knowledge that I believe, and have subsequently found many others to believe, should be available to any would-be mountaineers or Everest-challengers lest they be aware of what they are letting themselves in for!

It is therefore a ‘no-holds-barred’ insight into the world of expedition mountaineering, one of the last real adventure challenges that we as 21^st century modern people can undertake. In places it will undoubtedly shock and disgust, and that is exactly as it was intended. But what emerges from the whole, I hope, is a text that will enlighten, maybe even encourage some, probably inform many more, and truthfully explain just how hard life at 7,000m (and higher) above sea-level, really is.

This is that story.