Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
came ill - he had a minor stroke - and Chris realised he was not acclimatised and
fit enough to move at the speed required to cover nearly a kilometre of difficult
pinnacles above 27,000 feet, Joe and Pete had gone off for one last attempt and
not returned. We all went to the memorial services. Pete and Joe were good
friends, very different in character but they had set a standard with their ascent of
Changabang and the new route they'd climbed with Doug Scott on the north-west
face of Kangchenjunga.
I talked with Sarah Richard on Alex's behaviour during the summer leading up to
Annapurna. 'The whole thing was odd before Alex left. It was as if we knew,' Sarah
recalled. 'I remember speaking to Al Rouse after he'd fallen in love with Hilary and
he said to me that falling in love was the worst thing that could happen to a
climber. It meant you couldn't face up to the climbing with the same commitment.
I had a letter from Alex from somewhere on the walk-in saying how hard it was,
how cold and miserable and how he just wanted to be back with me. And he said
“remember how much I love you”, as if he was preparing himself. I detected other
things in Alex, his wanting to speed up the process of getting known as if he were
running out of time. Do you remember that weekend with the film crew a month
before you left for Annapurna?'
Until she mentioned it, I had forgotten this rather sad and peculiar episode. I
had met Alex and Sarah on Friday evening in July at the Black Cock in Broughton-
in-Furness. We had a pint and a meal before going to our place in Millom. He was
in a strange mood: beyond excited, more dangerously ecstatic. 'Don't worry any-
more about money for the trip kid. We're about to become famous. I've got a pro-
duction company lined up who want to make a film about the climb. They're com-
ing up next week to film us here making preparations. René may come over if he's
not guiding.'
My first thought was absolutely no way; a film team accompanying us on an
alpine-style ascent of Annapurna? How could that work? It made no sense at all,
big cheque or not. They would totally disrupt the flow and concentration of the trip
however far they came with us. I had found it disruptive enough having a film
team on our winter Everest trip the year before. On that expedition, we were a big
team of eight sieging the west ridge. There were no issues with the film team itself.
We got on well enough with the crew. The cameraman was a climber and once got
himself up to the first camp on the fixed ropes on his own. But much energy was
expended bringing all the necessary film equipment up - the big 16-millimetre Ar-
riflex camera and tripod, batteries and rolls of film. I soon got fed up with this im-
position and my solution was to stay as high on the mountain as possible to keep
away from the cameras.
