Category Archives: Mountains

As I bum-shuffled my way down the scree at Avalanche Peak I wished I was back in the bush | Rose Lu

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As my family were neither middle class nor white European I didn’t venture into the bush until I was an adult – I’ll never forget my first time

  • Guardian writers and readers describe their favourite place in New Zealand’s wilderness and why it’s special to them

Nothing beats the New Zealand bush. The writer Ashleigh Young once tweeted: “Sometimes NZ writers say ‘the forest’ instead of ‘the bush’ (and they definitely mean ‘the bush’) because they are nervous about saying ‘the bush’. Bring back the bush. If everyone does it, we will be fine.”

So here I am, proclaiming, “I love the bush!” Perhaps this is my opinion as an outdoor enthusiast and bisexual, but “bush” is the more accurate descriptor for the native flora of Aotearoa. Our bush is dense and scratchy, inured to the trample of boots. Our bush is thick and lush all year round, as few native plant species are deciduous. Our bush is not some wan forest: it is wild and overgrown, it does not encourage easy passage.

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It can feel like the world’s most spectacular wilderness; the savage beauty of Connemara

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Connemara has inspired film crews, writers and maharajahs with its wild mountains and endless expanses of sky and sea

When I was 20 and straight out of teacher training college I took a job in a school in Connemara for a year. My friends were heading for the bright lights of Dublin, but after a childhood of caravan holidays along Ireland’s west coast I was drawn to the “wild mountainous country” of west Galway beloved of Oscar Wilde and countless other artists and untamed spirits.

Instead of the indoor excitement of city life, I spent the year knee-high in bogs, scrambling up the Twelve Bens, island-hopping to Inishbofin and Inishark and pedalling along deserted roads to the show-stopping beaches at Glassilaun and Rossadillisk. A sign on the road for Rossadillisk beach read “Welcome to Paradise”. I learned to ride on Connemara ponies at Errislannan and on weekends I’d hitch lifts to random events in Letterfrack, involving local poets, map makers and sculptors who breathed life into this quiet corner of Ireland. With no advance planning, I’d find myself at the summit of Diamond Hill or spotting porpoises at Renvyle beach with a gang of newfound friends.

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Photos from ‘beyond the grave’: camera discovery reveals climber’s last images before fatal avalanche

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Two decades ago Richard Stiles escaped an avalanche in New Zealand, but friend Steve Robinson wasn’t so lucky. Now the mountain has given up some of its secrets

When mountaineer Chris Hill found a backpack with an old camera in it on the Hooker Glacier – an 11km chunk of ice on New Zealand’s South Island – he was intrigued and decided to get the film inside developed.

Hooker is at the base of Aoraki (Mount Cook), in a national park of icy peaks where hundreds of climbers have died, dozens of them never to be found.

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‘Mega-drought’ leaves many Andes mountains without snow cover

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Satellite images confirm snow decrease spurred by climate crisis as glaciers recede and communities reliant on mountain water face shortages

The Andes mountain range is facing historically low snowfall this year during a decade-long drought that scientists link to global heating.

Scant rain and snowfall are leaving many of the majestic mountains between Ecuador and Argentina with patchy snow cover or no snow at all as dry, brown earth lies exposed.

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Nepal reports 19 positive Covid tests at Dhaulagiri base camp

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Decision to allow expeditions to go ahead dealt blow after outbreak on world’s seventh highest mountain

Nepal’s decision to allow people to continue to climb its Himalayan peaks as a vicious Covid-19 wave sweeps the country was dealt a further blow after 19 more climbers tested positive for the virus.

Last month it was reported that the pandemic had reached Everest base camp and though officials later denied it, climbers have reported a wave of infections that were being covered up.

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Melting ice reveals first world war relics in Italian Alps

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Accelerating retreat of glaciers in Lombardy and Trentino Alto-Aldige reveals preserved history of ‘White War’

The soldiers dug the wooden barracks into a cave on the top of Mount Scorluzzo, a 3,095-metre (10,154ft) peak overlooking the Stelvio pass. For the next three-and-a-half years, the cramped, humid space was home to about 20 men from the Austro-Hungarian army as they fought against Italian troops in what became known as the White War, a battle waged across treacherous and bitterly cold Alpine terrain during the first world war.

Fought mainly in the Alps of the Lombardy region of Italy and the Dolomites in Trentino Alto-Adige, the White War was a period of history frozen in time until the 1990s, when global warming started to reveal an assortment of perfectly preserved relics – weapons, sledges, letters, diaries and, as the retreat of glaciers hastened, the bodies of soldiers.

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It’s inspiring hope and change – but what is the IUCN’s green list?

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The red list of species at risk is well-known, but the list for protected sites is quietly helping to ‘paint the planet green’

When Kawésqar national park was formed in the Chilean part of Patagonia in 2019, just one ranger was responsible for an expanse the size of Belgium. Its fjords, forests and Andean peaks are a precious wilderness – one of the few remaining ecosystems undamaged by human activity, alongside parts of the Amazon, the Sahara and eastern Siberia.

Chilean officials hope that Kawésqar will, one day, meet the high standards for protected areas laid out by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and make it on to the organisation’s “green list”.

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Terrawatch: dust is speeding up melting of Himalayan snow

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Human activities are increasing wind-blown dust, depleting crucial freshwater supply

Himalayan snow and ice is diminishing fast. Global heating is certainly playing a significant role, but now a recent study in Nature Climate Change reveals that wind-blown dust is worsening the melting effect.

Winter snowfall and spring snowmelt provide more than half of the annual freshwater needs of around 700 million people in south Asia, but over the last 30 years the overall snow mass on the high mountains of Asia, which include the Himalayas, the Hindu Kush and the Karakoram, has decreased.

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Italy reignites Mont Blanc border dispute with France

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Foreign minister makes formal complaint about ‘interference’ on the highest Alpine peak

Italy has reignited a dispute with France over Mont Blanc border rights after French authorities imposed measures that encroached on Italian territory.

Luigi Di Maio, the Italian foreign minister, who in the past has stoked tensions with France over other issues, said he had written a formal letter of complaint to the French government via the Italian embassy in Paris expressing his “strong disappointment” over the “interference” on the highest Alpine peak.

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Rewild to mitigate the climate crisis, urge leading scientists

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Restoring degraded natural lands highly effective for carbon storage and avoiding species extinctions

Restoring natural landscapes damaged by human exploitation can be one of the most effective and cheapest ways to combat the climate crisis while also boosting dwindling wildlife populations, a scientific study finds.

If a third of the planet’s most degraded areas were restored, and protection was thrown around areas still in good condition, that would store carbon equating to half of all human caused greenhouse gas emissions since the industrial revolution.

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Nepal tourism hit hard as global coronavirus fears close Everest

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The mountain’s closure is devastating for many in a Himalayan nation that relies heavily on trekkers and climbers

The tiny airport at Lukla, perched on the edge of a mountain high in Nepal’s Himalayas, usually echoes with the roar of propeller planes flying a constant stream of adventure-seekers into the small town, known as the gateway to Mount Everest.

During the peak spring tourist season, tens of thousands of trekkers and mountaineers arrive to test themselves on the popular trek to Everest base camp, and perhaps go on to climb the world’s highest peak.

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French ski resort moves snow with helicopter in order to stay open

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Local council leaders said they were forced into ‘exceptional’ move to protect jobs

A French ski resort has angered ecologists by using a helicopter to move snow from higher up the mountains after exceptionally mild weather left its slopes bare.

Officials at Luchon-Superbagnères in the Pyrenees authorised the “exceptional” emergency operation overnight on Friday.

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Grass growing around Mount Everest as global heating intensifies

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Impact of increase in shrubs and grasses not yet known but scientists say it could increase flooding in the region

Shrubs and grasses are springing up around Mount Everest and across the Himalayas, one of the most rapidly heating regions of the planet.

Related: 1.9 billion people at risk from mountain water shortages, study shows

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Mont Blanc glacier in danger of collapse, experts warn

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Italian mayor orders roads closed and homes evacuated over fears ice will break away

Italian authorities have closed off roads and evacuated homes after experts warned that a portion of a Mont Blanc glacier is at risk of collapse.

Stefano Miserocchi, the mayor of the town of Courmayeur, said “public safety is a priority” after experts from the Fondazione Montagna Sicura (Safe Mountains Foundation) in the Aosta Valley said up to 250,000 cubic metres of ice was in danger of sliding off the Planpincieux glacier on the Grandes Jorasses peak.

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The world has a third pole – and it’s melting quickly

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An IPCC report says two-thirds of glaciers on the largest ice sheet after the Arctic and Antarctic are set to disappear in 80 years

Many moons ago in Tibet, the Second Buddha transformed a fierce nyen (a malevolent mountain demon) into a neri (the holiest protective warrior god) called Khawa Karpo, who took up residence in the sacred mountain bearing his name. Khawa Karpo is the tallest of the Meili mountain range, piercing the sky at 6,740 metres (22,112ft) above sea level. Local Tibetan communities believe that conquering Khawa Karpo is an act of sacrilege and would cause the deity to abandon his mountain home. Nevertheless, there have been several failed attempts by outsiders – the best known by an international team of 17, all of whom died in an avalanche during their ascent on 3 January 1991. After much local petitioning, in 2001 Beijing passed a law banning mountaineering there.

However, Khawa Karpo continues to be affronted more insidiously. Over the past two decades, the Mingyong glacier at the foot of the mountain has dramatically receded. Villagers blame disrespectful human behaviour, including an inadequacy of prayer, greater material greed and an increase in pollution from tourism. People have started to avoid eating garlic and onions, burning meat, breaking vows or fighting for fear of unleashing the wrath of the deity. Mingyong is one of the world’s fastest shrinking glaciers, but locals cannot believe it will die because their own existence is intertwined with it. Yet its disappearance is almost inevitable.

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In the land of El Dorado, clean water has become ‘blue gold’

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The misty páramos in the Andes that supply water to tens of millions of people are under threat. Now their mystery could be solved

In the land where the legend of El Dorado began, the race is on to solve the mystery of a vital 21st-century treasure – the water that tens of millions of people rely upon across northern South America. “It’s blue gold, and we are looking for it,” says Mauricio Diazgranados, a Colombian botanist.

The misty and marshy páramo landscapes that sit above the tree line and below the snow caps of the soaring Andes peaks are known as the living factories that ensure a steady flow of clean water to the region’s growing population.

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Two-thirds of glacier ice in the Alps ‘will melt by 2100’

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If emissions continue to rise at current rate, ice will have all but disappeared from Europe’s Alpine valleys by end of century

Two-thirds of the ice in the glaciers of the Alps is doomed to melt by the end of the century as climate change forces up temperatures, a study has found.

Half of the ice in the mountain chain’s 4,000 glaciers will be gone by 2050 due to global warming already baked in by past emissions, the research shows. After that, even if carbon emissions have plummeted to zero, two-thirds of the ice will still have melted by 2100.

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A third of Himalayan ice cap doomed, finds report

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Even radical climate change action won’t save glaciers, endangering 2 billion people

At least a third of the huge ice fields in Asia’s towering mountain chain are doomed to melt due to climate change, according to a landmark report, with serious consequences for almost 2 billion people.

Even if carbon emissions are dramatically and rapidly cut and succeed in limiting global warming to 1.5C, 36% of the glaciers along in the Hindu Kush and Himalaya range will have gone by 2100. If emissions are not cut, the loss soars to two-thirds, the report found.

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Weatherwatch: how mountain winds bring warm winter weather

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A prolonged Föhn effect can result in abnormally high temperatures

The Föhn effect is characterised by dry and warm winds on the downwind side of high ground. The main warming mechanism originates from the fact that the cooling rate of moisture-laden air as it is forced to ascend over a mountain is lower than the warming rate of drier air as it descends the downslope side. Once the moisture is condensed out of the air into clouds over the mountain itself, it warms up descending the lee side – often becoming notably higher than its original temperature.

Another factor involved in the air warming is that descending air tends to be mostly clear of clouds, allowing the sun to warm the surface and the air that travels over it.

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