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The Villain: The Life of Don Whillans

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Don was a diamond. I met him once in the Llanberis pub, and college friends of mine lived next to him in Lancashire, Loveclough or Crawshawbooth, somewhere like that, but he had already started his beer training. Every time Don Whillans tried to climb the Eiger North Face he was unsuccessful. If it was not the weather that stopped him he had to rescue others like he did with Brian Nally in the dramatic 1962 incident. On one occasion Don and Tom Patey came rushing down the Eiger with a storm in their heels. They met two Japanese climbers. "Going up?" wondered Whillans. "Yes, yes, up to the summit, the first Japanese ascent", they answered in one voice. "You may be going up, mate, but a lot 'igher than you think!" said Whillans and added " 'appy little pair, I don’t imagine we'll ever see them again." Hamish also worked on The Mission, Rob Roy and Five Days One Summer. During 2001 he actually played himself as leader of the Glencoe Mountain Rescue Team in a documentary with Michael Palin and Terry Jones called The Quest for The Holy Grail Locations. Adam, Voiland (16 December 2013). "The Eight-Thousanders". www.earthobservatory.nasa.gov. NASA. Archived from the original on 3 May 2017 . Retrieved 18 January 2020. As to marketing, obviously it depends what you mean by important. But sadly I think the commodification of climbing has been the most important trend in the last 20 years, and I think BM’s been the main man in helping with that.

We can speculate till the cows come home as to WHY Don might have felt insecure, and felt the need to adopt a confrontational stance to the world: genetics? being evacuated during the war? absent father? distant non-emotional parenting? macho tough culture? etc etc. Jim Perrin has had the luxury of having more evidence at his disposal to piece together a version of Don's persona that 'fits' his behaviour. All we can do is indulge in amateur speculation. Of course, no one is entitled to judge anyone else's life or make definitive statements as to how happy he was. However, Perrin (or anyone else) is entitled to their opinion that, given Don's talents as a mountaineer, he could have achieved even more; and, given the evidence of his behaviour to others, he did not SEEM to be a contented soul. After experimenting with various dog breeds (in particular German Shepherds) to search for avalanche victims, Hamish was responsible for the formation of the Search and Rescue Dog Association in 1965. Always ahead of his time, MacInnes recognised the serious danger posed by Scottish avalanches and worked with Fred Harper and Eric Langmuir to establish the Scottish Avalanche Project. This eventually became the Scottish Avalanche Information Service that provides such an important safety role today.I loved Don. I never saw him be mean-spirited, though I did know he drank and had his frustrations. He was especially intolerant of people who overrated themselves or simply did not know what they were talking about. I respected that quality in him, although he could have tempered his opinions, certainly, at times. I don't think I ever saw him get wrankled with someone who didn't deserve it.

correct me if I'm wrong) the Whillans harness was the first harness to raise the legs into a sitting position, It was pretty close to the modern sit harness we all use today. It's just that it had a strap that went between the legs that made it a particularly uncomfortable fall for gentlemen. < Perrin knew both men well and believes their climbing styles reflected the differences in their characters. Martin ‘Basher’ Atkinson, Andy Pollitt, Mark ‘Zippy’ Pretty, ‘Scottish’ Ben Masterson, Mark Leach, Craig Smith) A lot of stuff goes on round here (North Lakes) which is very much off the radar. There are many climbers close by, quite a few famous, some less so. A couple of years ago we had a Hesket Spiders lecture evening where there were a couple of talks about new routes, climbing in France, then Doug Scott gave an excellent talk about Don. He wanted to correct the impression that Don was (according to Perrin) "a villain". It was a generous, adulatory little talk, much enjoyed and quite touching. Clearly Don to those who really knew him was a top man, very kind, likeable, tough yes, but very fair. Doug was certainly very complimentary about Don. There are many Whillans jokes doing the rounds, one of the best being the World Cup joke when Whillans gave his response to Dyrenfurth's comments on "national sports" on the International Everest Expedition.

That's the most telling point, isn't it? Joe's upbringing, from everything I now gather, was at least as hard as Don's and, economically, more so. Yet it was happy.

The hut is leased by the BMC and administered by a volunteer team. It is situated on the Roaches Estate, which is managed by the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust.

More Posts by Dave Chick

Huts aren’t just a place to stay, they’re a place to socialise. They are communal places, with beds or bunks in dorm type rooms, so you’ll need to bring a sleeping bag or blanket, and possibly a pillow. You can expect to find separate men’s and women’s bathrooms. Depending on the size of the place there might be several rooms to sleep in, and depending on the mix of people attending, rooms might be allocated for men, women, couples, families and/or visitors. Often it’s just down to individuals to grab their preferred space on arrival - this is usually down to the meet organiser to coordinate, so just ask if you’d like to know more. And, of course, Chouinard for going into manufacturing nuts - actually, this was surely the biggest single contribution? The hut can accomodate up to 12 people, mixed, in two rooms. There are full cooking and dining facilities, a drying room and showers. Parking in lay-by approximately 400yards away. Lower down on the mountain, on 30 May, as the expedition was about to leave, Ian Clough was killed by a falling serac. Several members of the expedition rose to fame in Britain, and as a whole the expedition received international recognition in mountaineering circles on account of its innovative and extremely difficult nature.

Bonington and Clough took over the work of extending the route, reaching Camp IV on 27 April. Sometimes, they advanced only 10 feet (3.0m) in an hour. [73] At Whillans' suggestion, they arranged for Sherpas to carry all the climbers' supplies up to Camp III, so that when climbers went down to rest, they only needed to go to Camp III rather than Base Camp. [74] After a few very difficult days, and without being able to regain the crest of the Ice Ridge at a higher point, Clough went down to be replaced by Haston. On 3 May, Whillans, Frost, and Burke carried a box tent up to Camp IV while Bonington and Haston with very difficult ice climbing reached a col at 21,650 feet (6,600m) where the Ice Ridge terminated and was replaced by a snow slope leading up to the Ice Wall. [75] The next day, they carried a load of ropes to the col, and Haston ran out 500 feet (150m) of rope towards the Ice Wall. At 22,350 feet (6,810m), the slope suddenly changed from 45° to vertical, and this point was intended to become Camp V [note 11] where a 18-pound (8.2kg) hooped tent was set up, capable of sleeping three. Supplying a camp at that height was a logistical problem: it took at least five days for anything to arrive from base camp. [77] Hamish sadly passed away towards the end of 2020 so in his honour, we are reproducing this fascinating article about his life that featured previously in Climber magazine in 2019. Alan James (for putting the boot into the turgid guidebook establishment, and sending a whole generation of climbers to Spain for their winter hols) This urge to escape among the working classes expressed itself in the rambling clubs - usually politically oriented - that sprung up in many northern cities at the start of the 20th century. A similar urge first brought Whillans to the moors of Derbyshire and Staffordshire, even if he was too singular to bother with the communal appeal of a Sunday walk.

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Hamish met Chris Bonington in 1953. They shared first winter ascents of Agag’s Groove, Crowberry Ridge Direct and Raven’s Gully on Buachaille Etive Mor. During the same year, Hamish and John Cunningham set sail from New Zealand to attempt to make the first ascent of Everest. Much to their disappointment they found that they had been beaten to the summit by a team led by John Hunt. The two men set their sights on Pumori and ascended to above 22,000ft. In deteriorating weather conditions, the climbers became exhausted and had to retreat. He continued to climb into his old age and the list of his achievements grew longer with the years. His last recorded new climbs, on Welsh slate and in the Anti-Atlas of Morocco, were accomplished in his late 70s. But after those two great Himalayan ascents of the mid-1950s, his climbing involvement was more relaxed. There seems to be no secret that Don, especially in later years, drank a few pints - probably more than was healthy. The interest in alcohol could be explained by statements as "People ask me why I drink so much. It's because of a morbid fear of dehydration." Give Don Whillans a thought next time you have a pint on the terrace at the bar "Le National" in Chamonix. When Don was not sitting in his favourite place he was most certainly out climbing. One might wonder why Whillans, with so obstinately and sometimes cynical behaviour, has become so famous? Probably it is not only due to his qualities as climber and mountaineer. The question is difficult to answer but we all love heroes – and anti-heroes – don’t we? With his high-altitude career apparently over, Whillans returned to drink. He spent his final years appearing at festivals , playing up to his image as the straight-talking northerner with the ready put-down. That night at Camp III they discussed their religious beliefs – Bonington was a sceptic and Frost a Mormon. Bonington wrote to his wife, "He is a convinced and fervent Mormon, never rams it down your throat, yet his faith has given him a code of conduct that puts him way out in front of most of us." [64] The next day, it was straightforward to re-climb their fixed rope, but once again, onward climbing was extremely difficult. Whillans and Haston had been ferrying supplies from Camp II up to Camp III, and following their second climb, they started exploring the shelf which Bonington had investigated previously beside the ridge. They made such good progress that the pair on the ridge needed little persuasion to entirely abandon their efforts on the lowest part of the ridge. [65]

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