Global Warming on eBothy Blog

global warming

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I’m being hounded by society to give up the car and walk to work, all 18 miles of it. I’m being forced to the get the bus, where there are none. All while people in other countries burn the rainforests, hunt animals to extinction in the name of cash and dubious medical claims and this government builds another runway for Heathrow. Is it their right to destroy the planet? You want ME to stop global warming? On my own? When will people realise solving climate change and human rights are mutually exclusive?

whither adventure

Mon, 28 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I used to like winters. I used to climb ice and snow. I used to revel in the wildness of spindrift avalanches on the north face of the Ben, which sucked the breath from my mouth and soaked my stinging face. Nearing the top of a steep climb, sheltered from the south westerly gale, sometimes the only sound was the dull plunk and scrape of the axe searching for purchase on iced rock. The sound of total concentration. I can still hear that sound and the muffled icy rattle of gear. When you’re not sure whether something’s plastic or metal, you give it a tap, see what sound it makes and you get a feel for the substance, it’s depth and quality. It’s the same in winter climbing. When your axe caresses rock and rivulets of powder flow from its pick you feel the huge solidity of the mountain. It reverberates down the shaft. You can suddenly imagine the other side of the mountain, storm lashed and steadfast, sheltering you from the maelstrom. Then your mind compresses back to the task in hand and you thwack into solid ice, pull up and restart the process with the other axe.

global warming and the matterhorn

Wed, 24 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000

Just discovered this superb website from Joe Simpson. I’m a great fan of his writing so looking forward to reading all the articles. Read the article on reaching 40. However, I read the article on global warming with some alarm as he mentions huge rockfalls on the Matterhorn and climbing on the mountain actually being banned. I don’t think it’s banned now, must have been a temporary precaution. When I climbed the Matterhorn there was a fair amount of maybe grade II ice on the summit block and the only rockfall occurred the night before, while we were bivvying below the hut. In fact, you read all about it <a href=“http://stravaiger.com/stravaigings/matterhorn/index.php" title=“Dial “M” For Matterhorn”>here.