K2, a nightclub in Wales, owned by Donald “Jock” Kane was the sister bar to Kane’s Bar. The Aberystwyth-based former semi-professional footballer and Green Legend of Aberystwyth Town had capitalised on a famous mountain’s name. Yet, around Ceredigion, no huge peaks could be seen. Snow-capped hills in winter, occasionally. It was here in the university town that I lifted a copy of Heinrich Harrer’s The White Spider. The text translated from German to English detailed the first successful attempted climb of the North Face of the Eiger, a mountain close to Bern in Switzerland. This 3,967-metre (13,015’) mountain includes a staggering 1,800-metre-high (5,900’) wall of rock and ice.  The southern face and glaciated region make for a pictureque and challenging adventure. It has long fascinated climbers, much like K2’s bar drew in students from Aberystwyth University. 

“The mountains are calling, and I must go.” – John Muir, Scottish naturalist and mountaineer, 1838-1914 

The nickname of Mordwand (a German pun based on death and the Germanic Nordwand, or North Wall) highlights how difficult and technical the Eiger’s North Wall is to aspiring climbers. Such is the beauty of the mountainous region that engineers tunneled a railway from Kleine Scheidegg in the top of nearby Jungfraujoch at 3,463 metres (11,362’). The highest altitude railway station in Europe passes through the Eiger mountain, stopping at the Southern face but sadly no longer serving the Northern face. Following The White Spider, I stumbled onto mountaineer Jon Krakauer’s Eiger Dreams. The writer had become quite popular for his outdoor-themed books Into The Wild and Into Thin Air. My fascination with climbers, adventures, and those big protrusions of alien rocks that top our planet had begun. In 2017, 2019, and 2020, I trekked on paths beaten by great mountaineers and experienced the majesty of the Himalayan peaks overhead. I dreamed and still dream of seeing K2 in Pakistan, yet feel it a tad dangerous to go for a wander. 

“Mountains have a way of dealing with overconfidence.” – Hermann Buhl, Austrian mountaineer (died aged 32, Chogolisa [乔戈里萨峰], Karakoram) 

Through videos, photographs, interviews, and books, I have been transported to the frostbitten weather-lashed 2nd peak of the Karakoram Mountain range: K2. One such award-winning and enthralling book, Buried In The Sky, was sitting neglected on my bookshelves for too long. Through journalistic writers Amanda Padoan and Peter Zuckerman, the text explores the reasoning behind the 2008 K2 disaster, the cost, the effects, and the hunger to climb. The book whisks you away, at an intense pace, through a combination of deep research and authentic accounts. It adds testimony to unsung heroes, cultures and people who otherwise shared limited voices at perilous heights and during the tragic aftermath that saw Jumik Bhote, Pasang Bhote and 9 other international climbers perish at the hands of the mountain. The book highlights the low success rate, high fatality rate, and why K2 is much more remote than the tallest mountain, Everest. Deservedly, it focuses on high altitude support crews and porters.

“We should be less afraid to be afraid.” – Emily Harrington, American professional rock climber and mountaineer (https://emilyharrington.com/) 

Having put down that book, I lifted up a fellow-neglected-book-on-the-shelf. My friend Javier Felones always said that I should read Anatoli Boukreev’s account of the 1996 Everest disaster. I have ploughed through many of the books that have arisen from that notorious disaster. There are many. The mystery of events and the disaster are unclear. The dead remain dead. The disaster and understanding of those who lived through it or contradict others and their accounts tantalises many readers. Anatoli Boukreev’s account, written with G. Weston DeWalt, now offers my next excursion in reading for pleasure. 

Recommended further reading: 

Jon Krakauer: Into Thin Air (1997) 

David Breashears: High Exposure (1999) 

Beck Weathers: Left for Dead: My Journey Home from Everest (2000) 

Jamling Tenzing Norgay: Touching My Father’s Soul: A Sherpa’s Journey to the Top of Everest (2001) 

Ed Viesturs: No Shortcuts to the Top: Climbing the World’s 14 Highest Peaks (2006) 

Graham Ratcliffe (2013): A day to die for: 1996 : Everest’s worst disaster : one survivor’s personal journey to uncover the truth (2013)