ALPENGLOW

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There is something about mountains…Perhaps it is the clean air, the high viewpoint or the endless romance of challenging the elements that cause people to truly love the alpine environment regardless of its difficulties and perils. But I think that the famous Kazakh mountaineer Anatoli Boukreev said it best when he wrote these immortal words…

“Mountains are not stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve, they are the cathedrals where I practice my religion…I go to them as humans go to worship. From their lofty summits I view my past, dream of thefuture and, with an unusual acuity, am allowed to experience the present moment…my vision cleared, my strength renewed. In the mountains I celebrate creation. On each journey I am reborn.”

The Snowy Mountains region in Australia may not be as notable in height as its alpine counterparts that Boukreev surmounted in his career but it has significant importance across the world as a wilderness area which hosts a unique range of flora and fauna. Most of its vast alpine area is controlled by Kosciuszko National Park and it is host to one of the largest hydro electric schemes in the world. Cold climate farmers have cleared vast areas of the mountain plateaus and some parts of the ‘Snowies’ ranges slopes have been designated as ski resorts.

Human incursion into the once pristine areas of the Snowy Mountains has changed the environment irrevocably. Traces of man and his endeavours are writ large in such a fragile and challenging terrain. Yet somehow I suspect all people who tread mountain paths all over the world are aware of their own small place…their insignificance in the face of the might of nature…mother earth will always seek to regain balance regardless of our attempts to distort, fence, abstract, construct, separate and divide…

Anatoli Boukreev made his final journey in 1997…He was killed in an avalanche off Anapurna….