Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
CHAPTER 25
WISH YOU WERE HERE
My afternoon with Maria Coffey was almost over. She had a flight to catch back to
Vancouver. As we finished our coffee, she said, 'After Joe died, my life was a blur
and I can't remember much about how Alex reacted. Everyone was devastated. Of
all the young climbers around, Pete and Joe were seen as the invincible duo.'
For the first time Maria looked sombre as her memories took shape. 'I do re-
member Alex coming around the night before I set off to go to Everest base camp.
He tried hard to talk me out of going, saying it was ghoulish and sentimental. He
displayed his usual 'get over it' attitude. But it was a really tense meeting, because
Alex was about to leave for Annapurna and I said to him be really careful. He was
just dismissive, saying, “don't be stupid, and don't lecture me.” He was really quite
harsh and angry with me. Maybe it was his own concern about what he was doing,
or maybe he was worried going to Everest would hurt me more. Or maybe he was
just in denial.'
During the summer of 1982, Alex was focussed on our plans for Annapurna and
behaving with his usual pragmatism. But now he seemed to me to be caught in two
minds - confident, even arrogant one moment, but then ever so slightly uncertain
about the speed at which things were happening. Back to back successes on
Dhaulagiri and Shisha Pangma had convinced him that more success was inevit-
able if he stuck to the plan.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the realisation that the next trip might be fatal was
something mountaineers accepted. Subconsciously they prepared for the possibil-
ity each time they discovered an unclimbed project. We knew the risks, but never
thought it might be our friends who were killed. Increasingly, we all became aware
of the emotional consequences experienced by their relatives and partners when
they fell into the dark abyss of grief and loss. The climbing community who stuck
to their tasks inevitably felt survivor's guilt and the knowledge that somehow we
were all accessories before and after the fact.
That summer the realisation that Pete Boardman and Joe Tasker were gone put a
dampener on our climbing. The Everest attempt was the first lightweight expedi-
tion Chris Bonington had led to an 8,000-metre peak. This ridge was seen, along
with the Kangshung Face, as the last great problem on Everest. There were only
four climbers on the trip. Pete and Joe, Chris and Dick Renshaw. After Dick be-
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