New York, 1963, 1st US edition. 224 pp, 25 b/w photos, 3 maps, index. Green cloth hardcover with gold lettering on spine and no dust jacket. Spine is very lightly faded, else Fine.
Shipton's famous traverse of the southern icecap of Patagonia. A record of four expeditions made in four successive summer seasons, done partly as travel/adventure, partly as mountain climbing, and partly as scientific investigation. As well as establishing the existence of a hitherto disputed active volcano, the team also went mountaineering in the previously unclimbed peaks of the Tierra del Fuego.
Shipton gives us an intimate look at camping and climbing in Patagonia, and was an experienced climber (six Everest parties, the leader of the Sharsgam expedition to Karakoram, as well as climbs in the Pamir, Tien Shan and Kuen Lun ranges). [Neate S59.]
Eric Shipton is one of the greatest mountaineers of the twentieth century. He is closely connected with Everest. He was on all four 1930s Everest expeditions. In 1933 he accompanied Smythe in a summit bid, but had to turn back at the First Step (27,890 feet/8500 m). It was Shipton who led the 1951 reconnaissance to the south side of Everest. On this expedition he pioneered the now normal route through the Khumbu ice falls and the South Col route.
His belief in the efficacy of small expeditions meant he was sidelined for the leadership of the 1953 Everest expedition, in favor of John Hunt’s siege tactics. Nevertheless it is these small lightweight expeditions, which Shipton pioneered with his climbing partner, Bill Tilman, that have endured. They joked that “they could organize a Himalayan expedition in half an hour on the back of an envelope.”
His was a formidable record of climbing achievements. At 22 he had made the first ascent of Nelion, one of Mount Kenya’s twin summits. He climbed extensively in the Alps. In 1931 he and five companions were the first to summit 25,447-foot (7.756-meter) Mount Kamet – at that time the highest peak ever climbed. In 1933 he climbed within a thousand feet of the top of Mount Everest. Shipton and Tilman also discovered the access route to the Nanda Devi sanctuary through the Rishi Ganga gorge in 1934.
