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E-BookEPUBePub WasserzeichenE-Book
300 Seiten
Englisch
Vertebrate Digitalerschienen am12.01.2015
In 1938 Anderl Heckmair made the first ascent of the North Face of the Eiger, a monumental climb that cemented his place in history. In My Life he tells the story of how he turned from a fragile child wrapped, 'quite literally, in cotton bindings,' into one of the most important mountaineers in the world. Leaving school in 1920, Heckmair dedicated himself to climbing, becoming a full-time 'mountain vagabond'. Penniless, he lived in Alpine huts and cycled from climb to climb, even riding from Germany to the High Atlas mountains of Morocco. He rapidly developed as a mountaineer, making an ascent of the Walker Spur in awful weather, and a solo ascent of the Matterhorn in walking shoes, a feat that nobody believed. But his crowning achievement, climbed in full media glare, would always be his Eiger ascent. Events did not always run smoothly - arrested after a quarrel with a farmer, he escaped through a window ('never imprison mountain climbers in towers'). When arrested again, his ice axes mistaken for deadly weapons while he slept on a park bench, Heckmair chose to stay put, preferring the cell bunk to his bench. At times, the book ventures into darker territory. As one of the great German climbers of the 1930s, Heckmair inevitably attracted the attention of the Nazi party, he found his Eiger triumph twisted to suit their ends, and he himself seated next to Hitler at a party. But at its heart My Life is a celebration of adventure. Told in joyful, engaging and relaxed style, it is as full of life and passion for the mountains as Anderl Heckmair himself.mehr

Produkt

KlappentextIn 1938 Anderl Heckmair made the first ascent of the North Face of the Eiger, a monumental climb that cemented his place in history. In My Life he tells the story of how he turned from a fragile child wrapped, 'quite literally, in cotton bindings,' into one of the most important mountaineers in the world. Leaving school in 1920, Heckmair dedicated himself to climbing, becoming a full-time 'mountain vagabond'. Penniless, he lived in Alpine huts and cycled from climb to climb, even riding from Germany to the High Atlas mountains of Morocco. He rapidly developed as a mountaineer, making an ascent of the Walker Spur in awful weather, and a solo ascent of the Matterhorn in walking shoes, a feat that nobody believed. But his crowning achievement, climbed in full media glare, would always be his Eiger ascent. Events did not always run smoothly - arrested after a quarrel with a farmer, he escaped through a window ('never imprison mountain climbers in towers'). When arrested again, his ice axes mistaken for deadly weapons while he slept on a park bench, Heckmair chose to stay put, preferring the cell bunk to his bench. At times, the book ventures into darker territory. As one of the great German climbers of the 1930s, Heckmair inevitably attracted the attention of the Nazi party, he found his Eiger triumph twisted to suit their ends, and he himself seated next to Hitler at a party. But at its heart My Life is a celebration of adventure. Told in joyful, engaging and relaxed style, it is as full of life and passion for the mountains as Anderl Heckmair himself.
Details
Weitere ISBN/GTIN9781910240304
ProduktartE-Book
EinbandartE-Book
FormatEPUB
Format HinweisePub Wasserzeichen
FormatE101
Erscheinungsjahr2015
Erscheinungsdatum12.01.2015
Seiten300 Seiten
SpracheEnglisch
Dateigrösse6743 Kbytes
Artikel-Nr.1569566
Rubriken
Genre9201

Inhalt/Kritik

Leseprobe


- Chapter 2 -
Mountain Vagabonds

The next winter, I was determined to learn to ski properly. I had had enough of ski jumping and was now keen on touring, since the whole business of climbing up, breaking trail, and running down through the deep snow - even if only in a straight line - was devilish good fun.

One day, however, it happened that there was a cross-country race, and some of my friends, knowing my powers of endurance, insisted that I take part. At least, I thought, it will be safer than jumping. A further incentive was that the start and finish were in Bayrischzell, where my brother had settled and was working as a goldsmith and photographer. He lent me his cross-country skis and, shortly before the start, took me into a field for a quick lesson in how to use them. With a warning not to tire myself out at the start he tied on my number bib. The starter announced Three, two, one ... Go! and I was off. Mindful of my brother s warning, I walked rather than ran, and was naturally overtaken by all and sundry. I thought to myself, Just you wait. When I cut loose I ll get the lot of you. It was the 18-kilometre race for the Munich championship, and when after 10 kilometres I decided that the time had come to put on a spurt, I found I was too tired and just ploughed on doggedly. I was deeply ashamed to finish last.

The Bavarian cross-country championships were held soon afterward, also at Bayrischzell. I wanted to redeem myself in my own eyes and therefore set out from the beginning to race until I dropped. Putting the plan into practice, I did not drop at all and even overtook some big name racers. Coming into the finish I passed a skier who had started ten places in front of me. He was a good sort, since he stared at me in an astonished way, shook my hand, and congratulated me. Much later I learned that this was Wiggerl Vörg, who was to play an important part in my life. This time I was satisfied with my performance and did not care what place I had obtained. But when the finishers list appeared, Vörg, whom I had overtaken, was credited with a time superior to mine by several minutes. Wiggerl could not swallow this and immediately lodged a protest, only to be shot down in flames and summarily disqualified. A judge never makes a mistake! Well, if it was like that they could stuff their races. I preferred ski touring anyway. But I never forgot Vörg s fanatical sense of justice and sportsmanship.

I wanted nothing more to do with racing. My technique had improved, but I was well aware of just how little I knew how to do. Others evidently hadn t noticed, as I was invited to join a relay race. They thought I was the ideal man for the first leg from the Rotwand to the Spitzingsee. I had strong doubts about this, but I could not let my friends down, so I duly plodded up to the Rotwandhaus and the starting line.

It was cold, with wind-driven snow, and a lot of strong racers were waiting for the sign to start. I knew this descent ⦠and now I had to race down it. I could feel the apprehension in my guts. This kind of emotion can affect your insides, and shortly before my number was due to come up I felt a powerful call of nature. The place was perched above a trench. No sooner had I sat down than there was an explosion, presumably caused by gas under the frozen crust. I was blown right off the seat and covered with stinking muck.

At least I was only plastered from behind - another person who had just opened the door to go into the next compartment got it in his face.

Once the initial fright was over there was a great roar of laughter that put me into a towering rage. I stripped off my underwear, wiped myself down with them, hurled them away, and dressed again as best I could. As soon as I reappeared, my number was called. I was happy to get away from the malicious guffaws and grinning, and also to get ahead of my own stench, so much so that on the climb up to the col I overtook two men whom I never would have caught on any other day. On the descent I hurled myself downhill with such fury that the slopes seemed flat and I lost all sense of speed. The inevitable happened. Shortly before the end of the leg, at the place where the next racers were waiting to take over the batons, an almost invisible stone stuck out of the snow. I crashed into it. On arrival at the hospital, I was given a good bath, for which I felt distinctly grateful to my broken coccyx. My craving for ski racing was entirely satisfied.

It was understandable that my employers at the city gardens regarded my mountaineering ambitions without enthusiasm, and I was not surprised to be given notice while still in the hospital. Widespread unemployment was beginning. But, by law, so long as I remained in the hospital, I could not be dismissed. I continued to receive my wages, as well as a sickness benefit and more money from an insurance policy. By the time I was let out I had saved 1,000 marks. I had never been so rich and decided to stay up in the mountains as long as the money would last. Friends were soon found to join me. Hans Brehm did not need to be asked twice, and Hans Ertl promised to follow with another companion. We fancied a trip to the Dolomites. At the Bavarian branch of the Deutscher Alpenverein (German Alpine Club) we heard a famous climber, Walter Stösser, talk about the fourth ascent of the north-west face of the Civetta. In the course of his lecture he mentioned that the number of ascents may be limited, as the hand traverse that starts the climb is crumbling away, and when it goes there will be no way to get onto the face. We believed this quite literally - presumably he did too - and suddenly we felt drawn to the Civetta.

Lacking another option, we would go there on our bicycles. To solve the problem of luggage transportation we built ourselves the gig, a little trailer that we loaded with our substantial rucksacks and towed behind a bike. Everything went well as far as the Brenner, but from there to Bolzano the roads were torn up for construction. This is where the trailer gave up on us, so we ended up carrying not only the rucksacks but the trailer as well. Days of pushing over the Karer and Pordoi passes did not worry us too much. There was hardly any motor traffic. After a few days we reached Alleghe, where for the first time we were able to take a refreshing bath in the lake before starting the climb up to the Coldai hut. The rucksacks were strapped to the gig, but we did not get far with it and soon we had to shoulder both the sacks and the damned gig again. To cap everything, we were caught by a storm on a col below the hut. But we quickly pitched the tent and crawled inside, feeling safe and secure. It was still early in the year, and the face was full of ice and snow. This did not stop us from heading up it first thing the next morning. The initial hand traverse was indeed earthy and loose, but only about half as bad as we had imagined from the description. It seemed you shouldn t believe everything you heard from these great alpinists.

The wall was tricky, but we made rapid progress until we came to another traverse. It was 10.00 a.m. by the time I got across it. Hans Brehm lobbed off after a few moves and swung at least 10 metres until he was hanging below me. Haul and tug as I might, I could not shift him, and finally had to let him down a couple of metres to a place where he could at least stand. There was no recourse but to rappel down to him. So we sat there with our heads hanging and thought of giving up.

Let s just try it again. I fixed a rope across the traverse, and finally we had it in the bag. At 2.00 p.m. we stood on the same stance that I had reached four hours earlier - and this on the biggest and hardest face we had ever tried to climb. We did not even have a bivouac bag with us. The only solution was to climb fast. We managed to keep up our speed clear to the summit, which we reached at 8.00 p.m. It was still light enough for the descent, if only we could have found it. Thick clouds had built up from the side of the ridge. There was nothing else to do but sit down behind a rock and wait for better weather. However, we were in a lively mood after our efforts on the face. Neither the wet nor the cold bothered us in the least. During the night, the cloud thinned and it started to rain. By dawn it was pouring down, but we could at least see and managed to find the way into the cirque. Here we met a track and began to argue whether we should go left or right. I got my way, though I was by no means sure. For hours we followed it to and fro from one cirque into another. Thick fog closed down again as the path vanished into a grassy pasture. Now you re in the shit, grumbled Hans mutinously. Suddenly we heard something. We were standing 20 metres from the Coldai hut.

We celebrated our success with a plate of pasta asciutta and a jug of wine, and then continued on down to our tent where Hans Ertl and Mungo Herzog, brother of the famous Otto, who was known among climbers as a Rambo, were waiting.

Every climber lives according to a personal style. When I am not actively doing something, I tend to be lazy. Here, I could not be induced to stir from our splendid campsite for eight days. Hans Ertl, who was a first-rate chef, spoiled us lavishly and kept our spirits up until we recovered some drive. Our next route was the east face of the Sass Maor. First climbed by Solleder and Kummer in 1926, it was still awaiting its second ascent. We had started to think of ourselves as the masters of the mountains, but our knees buckled at the sight of this 1,100-metre yellow wall. All our expectations and fears were duly fulfilled. Remember that, knowing nothing about etriers and other artificial aids, we had to free-climb everything. We...

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