Jean cozy lionel terray biography
‘The ascent of Makalu, a happy page in the history of the Himalayas’. It was with this pithy phrase that Jean Franco, leader of the French expedition to Makalu in the spring of 1955, summed up their magnificent victory on the fifth highest peak on the planet. The ‘more than 8,000’ summits previously climbed (Annapurna, Everest, Nanga Parbat, K2, Cho Oyu) saw no more than three participants reach the summit, thanks to the logistical support of everyone involved. At Makalu, spread over three successive days, all the climbers and the sirdar, nine participants in all, set foot on the summit of one of the giants of the earth. This success was due as much to meticulous preparation and acclimatisation as to the success of the 1954 reconnaissance. And to exceptional luck with the weather. We retrace this perfect adventure for you... And we take this opportunity to introduce you to our next ascent of Makalu in April 2022, guided by Serge Bazin.
See all our climbs above 8,000 meters.
After Annapurna, Makalu
Makalu... Mahakala. The Tantric Buddhist deity probably gave his name to the mountain. The destructive/protective god will bring luck to the French.
Mahakala, Buddhist avatar of the god Shiva
After the remarkable victory on Annapurna in May 1950, the Himalaya Committee was on a roll. The next objective was Everest. The Nepalese authorities granted permits first to the Swiss (1952), then to the British (1953), and finally to the French, but for 1954. The British victory took the wind out of their sails.
The superbly isolated Makalu, barely approached by Eric Shipton and Edmund Hillary in 1951 following the attempt on Cho Oyu, and in 1952 during the reconnaissance of Everest, offered the possibility of a great discovery, or even a new coup. The Everest permit, granted for 1954, was transferred to Makalu. Two permits had already been issued to the New Zealanders and Americans for the spring. An additional permit, issued to the French for the spring of 1955
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At 3 O’clock in the morning of August 19, 1966, six men crept up the Mer de Glace, the glacier from which the Petit Dru spits upwards. In the dark they could not see the mountain before them. Rain spat down, soaking the climbers to the bone. Ropes, pitons, army rations and sleeping bags bulged out from their heavy rucksacks. They plodded up in the dark: an American, two Germans, an Englishman, two Frenchmen. Some had met for the first time the previous night, in the smoke and gloom of the Hotel de Paris, the cheapest place for an itinerant climber to cop an actual bed in Chamonix. Above the six men was a mountain face that, 15 years earlier, had not once been climbed.
But the six men were not assembled to climb the Petit Dru—they were to save two young Germans who were ensnared on a ledge, unable to retreat, and unable to continue climbing. Verglas coated the entire wall. A helicopter had flown over the mountain on the 17th, and spotted the Germans through the clouds. They were alive. Forty rescuers had been dispatched to the summit of the Dru, but massive overhangs made it nearly impossible for teams to rappel to the stranded men.
The sole American on the glacier, and part of a second rescue team, was a tall, angular man with patched climbing knickers and a scarf nearly as long as he was. His face, one journalist later wrote, “had something of the beauty of the paintings of the Christian saints.” His eyes, an impish, childlike blue, twinkled when he smiled. In a few days he would be one of the most famous people in Europe. In three years he would be found dead in a campground in Jackson, Wyoming. His name was Gary Hemming, and he carried with him a conviction that in turn carried the five other soaked climbers upwards in the gray predawn drizzle. They would save the men who were trapped, thousands of feet above, by climbing up thro Rak, Julie. "Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna". False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction, Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2021, pp. 41-86. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780228007722-004 Rak, J. (2021). Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna. In False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction (pp. 41-86). Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780228007722-004 Rak, J. 2021. Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna. False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, pp. 41-86. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780228007722-004 Rak, Julie. "Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna" In False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction, 41-86. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780228007722-004 Rak J. Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna. In: False Summit: Gender in Mountaineering Nonfiction. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press; 2021. p.41-86. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780228007722-004 Copied to clipboardConquistadors of the Useless
Prima parte con uno stile poco scorreve, ingessato, più da enciclopedia che da narrativa. Poi, dalla ripetizione della nord dell'Eiger, l'Himalaya, la Patagonia, diventa più sciolto e divertente. Non è uno scrittore e si sente, manca dell'autoironia e dell'arguzia di Simpson per esempio, che può essere piacevole e interessante anche per chi non si interessa di alpinismo; in compenso non "se la tira", non si spaccia da eroe, la conquista di una cima è una vittoria personale, fondamentalmente inutile e parla con curiosità e interesse delle culture e delle persone che incontra nei suoi viaggi. Ho poi trovato interessante il racconto del mondo dell'alpinismo della prima metà del 1900: persone, stili, amicizie e rivalità, progetti. Pochissimo parla della sua vita privata, della moglie non dice mai nemmeno il nome.
Se veramente nessuna pietra, nessun seracco, nessun crepaccio mi stanno attendendo da qualche parte del mondo per fermare la mia corsa, verrà il giorno in cui, vecchio e stanco, saprò trovare la pace tra gli animali e i fiori. Il cerchio si chiuderà e, alla fine, potrò essere il semplice pastore che sognavo di diventare da bambino.
Purtroppo non è andata così: mi ha fatto tristezza leggere delle sue imprese di grande scalatore, la sua gioia al solo essere in montagna, gli 8000 incalzato dal vento e dal gelo, i mesi della Resistenza, i suoi interventi di soccorso al limite dell'umano, sapendo che poco tempo dopo sarebbe andato a morire col suo compagno di cordata a soli 44 anni ai piedi di una non impossibile via di una falesia della Francia meridionale.
E' una passionaccia, nemmeno l'idea di poter lasciare moglie e figli soli, la placa. Vedi Nones, Unterkircher, il marito di una mia amica, che ha tirato su una figlioletta di 2 mesi da sola, spiegandole che "non è vero che il papà voleva più bene alla montagna che a te". (e il punto è che li capisco pure)Chapter 1 Leadership and Gender on Annapurna