Swiss Ops

The use of going up there ....

2011-08-16T12:16:00.000-07:00

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, a photo by Alpine Light & Structure on Flickr.

"The question 'What is the use of going up there?' has never been better answered than by Tschudi: 'It is the feeling of spiritual power that glows in him, and drives him to overcome the dead horrors of nature; it is the charm of measuring the power peculiar to man, the infinite capacity of an intelligent will, against the rough opposition of dust; it is the holy impulse to seek out, in the service of the everlasting science of the earth's life and framework, for the mysterious connection of all creation; it is perhaps the longing of the lord of the earth to place the seal on his consciousness of a relationship to the infinite, by a bold, free deed, on the last conquered height, looking round on the world lying at his feet.'"

From Chapter XXIV Alpine Summits of The Alps; or, Sketches of Life and Nature in the Mountains, by Hermann Alexander von Berlepsch, translated by Leslie Stephen (London 1861)

Climate change indicator

2010-07-16T23:52:00.001-07:00

16 April: on our way into the Gauli glacier area, on a ski-mountaineering trip, we had to cross the Bächlilücke, a rocky col between two glaciers. This involves climbing three sets of ladders on the east side (see photo) and downclimbing an even greater distance to the glacier on the western side. In 1980, the guidebook says, you could still walk over this col on snow, without taking your skis off....

Ash Saturday

2010-05-13T00:29:00.000-07:00

First photos of the Eyjafjallajökull volcanic ash in Swiss airspace? Maybe...

Saturday, 17 April: solo ski-tour to the Wildhorn (3248 m), the highest peak of the Wildhorn group in the Bernese Alps, topping out early afternoon. (OK, so we were slow.) This was the day that the volcanic ash from Eyjafjallajökull was predicted to reach Swiss airspace. Indeed, to the southwest of the peak, faint cloud bands were visible in the sky (above the low-level cumulus). Was that the ash? I sent these images to MeteoSuisse for their opinion but, so far, unfortunately, no reply ....

View from Wildhorn summit

Detail with enhanced contrast

On Monday and Tuesday the following week, Zurich was treated to smoky skies and moderately spectacular sunrises:-

References

Report on MeteoSuisse website about the ash cloud's arrival in Swiss airspace (German only)

Like a great ring

2010-05-12T22:37:00.000-07:00

From alpinist/physicist John Tyndall's "Expedition of 1856" to the Bernese Oberland:-

We descended to the glacier and proceeded towards its source. As we advanced an unusual light fell upon the mountains, and looking upwards we saw a series of coloured rings, drawn like a vivid circular rainbow quite round the sun. Between the orb and us spread a thin veil of cloud on which the circles were painted; the western side of the veil soon melted away, and with it the colours, but the eastern half remained a quarter of an hour longer, and then in its turn disappeared."

Sun haloes and sun dogs can be seen anywhere in the world, but they seem to be especially frequent in the Bernese Oberland. Often they are associated with the veil clouds that come in ahead of a warm front. Here are two from this spring.

Bächlital, April, with circumzenithal arc at the top of the picture

Wildgärst, February

References

Tyndall quotation from John Tyndall, The Glaciers of the Alps & Mountaineering in 1861, published by Everyman, 1906, reprinted 1911

Related post: Marcel Minnaert's Light and Colour in the Outdoors

Blüemberg revisited

2010-05-12T10:08:00.000-07:00

Rediscovery of a ski-touring classic in central Switzerland

February 13: Ho hum, it's Blüemberg again. You decide to tag along because your friends suggested it, but you've been there before and you couldn't remember much that was interesting about it. You got up at 5am in the grey city and you dragged your ski-touring kit down to the station to get the 6-something train. Then a little cable-car takes you above the fog deck - and what is this place? That has to be the Lidernen hut, but never did it look like this before...

Lucky you accepted the invitation, or you would have missed out on the drumlin terrain ...

... the sleeping hummocks (what's under that snow?)....

... the view opening out as you climb higher...

... that noonday climb towards the cirrus...

... the view out over forever ...

... somewhere there was a summit ...

... then skiing down past this misplaced mesa ...

... but, no, we must still be in Switzerland.

Turning down that invitation would have been a mistake. Thanks, Andreas...

The perfect mountain day

2009-02-13T11:32:00.000-08:00

Recipe for a congenial late-season ascent of the Gross Spannort

Set out from the Swiss Alpine Club's Kroenten hut before dawn ....

... be well on your way to the col before the sun comes up ...

... so that you get your first view of the mountain at sunrise.

On the way across the glacier ....

... to the start of the first pitch.

Like Everest, the Spannort has three rock steps ...

... but it's customary to climb without oxygen masks.

Summit rocks

Summit cross

Encountering the Roeti Dolomite on the way to Engelberg

Stopping for refreshment at the SAC Spannort hut

Prayer flags give a Himalayan ambience without the bother of actually going there

We overtook an elderly couple coming back from the hut - bless thee, ancient chronicles.

Fujisan-ki (富士山記)

2009-02-09T12:41:00.000-08:00

Translation from a modern Japanese version of the full original kanbun text by Miyako no Yoshika

Mt Fuji is in the province of Suruga. The peak is sculpted as if by a sword-blade and soars up until it touches the sky. Its height is immeasurable. There is no higher mountain, as you will see if look through this or that written record. This soaring peak rises out of thick forests and seems to touch the edge of heaven, towering over the ocean.

The base of this extraordinary mountain extends for thousands of leagues, so that travellers must journey for several days until they have passed it by. Even then, when they look back, they are still at the mountain’s foot.

This must be a place where hermits disport themselves. As I’ve heard, during the Shōwa era (834-848), pearls and jewels rolled down from the mountain, each jewel with a little hole through it. These were probably beautiful gems that once adorned the reed screen of a hermit’s cell.

On November 5th, in the 17th year of Jōgan (876), the officials and people were celebrating a festival in accordance with an ancient rite when, as the day wore on towards noon, the sky cleared wonderfully. Looking up towards the mountain, they saw how two beautiful maidens robed in white danced above the summit, seemingly a foot or more above it. Several local people saw it; a very old man passed on the tale.

Mt Fuji takes its name from that of the district. Its deity is the Great God Asama. As for its height, it rises so far above the clouds that nobody knows how high it is. The summit is flat and about a league across. It is sunken in the middle, in shape like a rice-steaming pot (koshiki). At the bottom of this pot, there is a mysterious lake and in the middle of the lake, a large rock. The rock is strangely shaped, just like a crouching tiger. Vapour rises incessantly from the crater. The lake’s colour is a pure and deep blue. If one looks into the crater, it’s as if the water is seething. Looking from afar, one often sees smoke and flames too.

That summit pond is ringed with bamboo, which is a lush green and pliable. The snow never melts in spring or summer. Below the middle of the mountain grow small pine trees, but there are no trees above that level, only white ash. People can climb the mountain to its middle level, but it’s impossible to go further because of the ash which is always slipping downwards. It is said that En-no-gyōja once climbed the mountain but, after that, everybody has stopped at the middle level.

A great spring issues from the lower part of the mountain, which feeds a large river. The flow of water never varies, in hot season or in cold or in drought. At the eastern foot of Mt Fuji is a small mountain, which the local people call the new mountain. Originally this was flat ground, but in March of the 21st year of Enryaku (803) black smoke and steam came churning up and, after 10 days, the new mountain was formed. Probably a god created it.

Back to main article: Journey to the centre of Mt Fuji

Foehn call

2009-01-20T12:20:00.000-08:00

18 January, Pizol: up on the summit, the foehn was blowing and you could see forever. Bernina, Palü, Roseg .. the old man pointed out the summits on the horizon, his arm sweeping through the four points of the compass … Falknis, Alvier, Gonzen … he didn’t say so, but he’d probably climbed all of them. Then he ambled off down the snow. No crampons, no ice-axe, just perfect balance, honed over a lifetime.

The foehn is a manic depressive of a wind. He blows up from the southwest ahead of an incoming front – that’s the depressive part. When he’s in a bad mood, he uproots trees and blows you off your feet. Mostly, though, he’s an artist manqué. Roll clouds, cirrus, foehn walls, these are his stock-in-trade.

Today he puts on a virtuoso performance. Like a prestigitator whipping cloths from fully laden tables, he drives the clouds across the peaks in fretwork patterns of ripples, waves, bars, vortices.

Towards evening, there’s a brief display of iridescent clouds, fragile and evanescent as memories. Tomorrow the depression will set in.

On solo mountaineering （単独行について）

2009-01-18T02:34:00.000-08:00

Full translation of the essay by Katō Buntarō in Solo Climbs (単独行)

As these thoughts on solo mountaineering are my own, and make no reference to those of other soloists, they are inevitably a personal view. But I don’t doubt that common ground will be found in places with the experience of other mountaineers.

A good number of people go to the mountains solo in our country, but most of them could be described as hikers. There’s all the difference in the world between these and the hardy solo ascensionist (I take the term from Mr Mizuno’s book on rock climbing), who, like one of those alpine “Alleingänger”, favours the avalanche-and stonefall-raked routes shunned by others, scorns to follow in other people’s dust and boldly tackles one impossible line after another.

Yet this kind of soloist starts out in much the same way as a solo hiker. He has a liking for nature, a disposition towards a sport that gets him out into it, and also a kind of self-willed yet timid streak in his character. Too timid, that is, to want to pester an expert to show him the way, and too self-willed to put up with a slower, less expert companion. In this way, he finds himself increasingly inclined to set off into the mountains alone. So that’s how he gets into soloing, but his timidity won’t let him admit there’s the slightest danger in it and keeps him prudent to a fault. There’s no saying how many humdrum hikes he’ll make or passes he’ll walk over. Then, after wandering all over the place to burn himself in, he’ll finally start climbing to summits. In other words, he’s followed the typical path of the hiker. Thus the soloist proceeds from summer to spring and autumn and finally winter mountains, making sure of every step, and never trusting himself to a flying leap. And, as long as he takes no flying leaps, you can’t say that his solitary mountaineering is in the least dangerous.

When I look back on my own winter solo mountaineering career, I began in February 1928 in the Hyōnosen mountains, then the following January I climbed Yatsugatake from Natsuzawa hot springs, then I climbed Norikura from Reisen hut (冷泉小屋) then in February I climbed Yarigatake from the Ichinomata hut, and in March, Tateyama from the Kōbō hut. In January 1930, after climbing Tateyama from Murodō, I traversed to Guntai-Tsurugi, and after climbing Yari again, went up Karesawa to the Hodaka hut and back. (The previous year, on April 1, I climbed Karesawa-dake and, on the following day, with Mr Kuwata, climbed Oku-Hodaka.) In February, I climbed Tateyama from Kōbō, then Oku-Hodaka, Karesawa-dake, and Kita-Hodaka. (On December 1, I went up Ichinosawa and climbed Jōnen-dake and Ōtensho-dake from the Jōnen hut.)

In January 1931, I started from Ōdawa and went via the hut beyond Arimine-Magawa to Ue-no-take hut and so to the summit of Yakushi-dake. Then I traversed across to Kurobegoro-dake, Mitsumata-renge, Washiba, Kuro-dake, Noguchigoro, and Mitsu-dake to the Eboshi hut and so down the Bunadate ridge. In February, I started from Kashima village and climbed Tsubetazawa Nishimata to the summit of Kashimayari. I also climbed Tsurugi from Murodō via Chōjirō-dani, then Tateyama. In January 1932, I climbed Goryū-dake from the Karamatsu-Nichiden hut, then downclimbed from a point between Karamatsu and Kaerazu-dake and returned from the first col. (After that, I also climbed Shirouma-dake from Sarukura with two friends.) In February, I climbed Yari from the hut on Yari col, then climbed Minami-dake, before returning and taking in Sugoroku-dake, Nukedo-dake (抜戸岳) and Kasa-ga-dake. Then I went up the Shirouma Great Snow Valley to Shakushi, Yari (鎗), Asahi-dake and Shirouma etc. In January 1933, I summited Fuji from Gotenba, then climbed Ontake from Kurosawa, descending to Ōtaki. In March, I went up Yarisawa, then traversed Yari, Minami-dake, Oku-Hodaka, Maehodaka, descending to Dakekawa. After that, I climbed Norikura. (In April, I went in one day along the ridge from Tateyama to Bessan; the next day from the Nokkoshi hut to climb Guntai-Tsurugi.) Unfortunately, I ran into heavy snowfall in January and had to retreat after pitching my tent at Buna hut half-way up Tateyama, much to my chagrin. (On April 3 and 4, with a friend, I climbed the North Ridge of Mae-Hodaka, then crossed to Oku-Hodaka. On the way, I got frostbite, so we abandoned our plan to traverse to Yari and went down from the Hodaka hut. Included in the above account are trips that weren’t solo (in brackets) or in winter, so that you can see how the progress was made from simple ventures to gradually more difficult ones.

Why climb mountains? I climb because I want to climb; surely it’s a good enough reason to climb if one is moved to do so by some irrepressible instinct of the spirit. And if it’s objected that this is just like drinking, even though you know it’s bad for you, because you can’t help it, then so be it. For we climb mountains because we believe climbing mountains is good. Mountain climbers may from time to time compare climbing to a boozer’s drink or a smoker’s cigarettes but this is, in reality, quite absurd. If mountaineering is about gaining knowledge and hence solace from nature, then surely the most knowledge and the highest degree of solace is gained from solo mountaineering. This is because, if you have a companion with you, you sometimes forget to look at the mountains whereas, when you wander through the hills and valleys alone, no stick or stone can fail to captivate your heart. Or, if mountaineering is about doing battle with nature and prevailing, and gaining solace that way, then surely the battle and the solace thereafter are that much more intense when you are alone, counting on nobody but yourself. Rock-climbing is entirely different when climbing alone than it is when somebody else is looking on.

In March last year, I visited the Matsudaka cave bivouac (岩小屋) in Yokoo-dani. Nakamura and his friends, who’d climbed Byōbu-iwa in January, were there and made me welcome. I sat myself down on a silver-birch bough near the entrance, facing the campfire. At which, Mr Nakamura said, “You know, mate, you’re living on borrowed time.” When I asked why, he said that just this time last year, Mr Mitsuya of Kobe turned up unexpectedly, just like you, and Mitsuya sat down right where you are now. And it was the same with Mr Kanemitsu of Kobe and his guide, Tsukada from Arimine, they were sat right where you are now. And that’s why you won’t last long either. As you’d expect from somebody who climbs Byōbu in winter, Nakamura had a direct way of speaking. Tough as he was, though, he didn’t understand much about solo mountaineering. Then he said he’d climbed Byōbu with a companion. They didn’t use a rope, but the human contact between them was reassuring. He wouldn’t have climbed Byōbu alone; in fact, he wouldn’t even go into the mountains alone. Even mountaineers with as much experience and enthusiasm as himself didn't go solo, did they? So who is he to make a judgment on soloing, whether it’s dangerous or what kind of skill level it needs? People who want to solo should solo; only people who want to are qualified to solo.

Solo mountaineers sometimes meet a party with a guide staying in the same hut. The soloist, just because he’s a soloist, is unlikely to be welcomed with open arms by the guide. And the soloist, as a man of the mountains, is a taciturn type who’s not so bothered about other people’s feelings. Even so, he is a timid sort who doesn’t want to needlessly get on the guide’s nerves. This can lead to the situation where, in iffy weather, the guide declares that they’re not going anywhere that day. As it happens, the soloist is quite confident about the weather, but now he can’t make a start for fear of making the guide lose face. Then, if he sits in a hut for two or three days, the guide can say to him that, now winter mountaineering has become so popular, there are clueless folk who just turn up at a mountain village or hut hoping to find a party with a good leader or guide and follow in their tracks up a mountain. True or not, this is totally unacceptable. I suppose you don’t mind being considered the sort of person who fobs off the responsibility for taking risks onto others … that’s the sort of thing that can be said. And, of course, there are places where mountain huts are kept locked against folk without guides. As guideless parties and soloists are particularly unwelcome at such huts, soloists who want to go out even in slightly poor conditions will be told that, if they do and the weather turns bad on them, the villagers will feel responsible and that, quite possibly, they’ll have to put themselves out tracking down the lost climbers. And even if their fears turn out to be groundless, it’s still the fault of the mountaineer for causing all the worry. In this way, their kindness is turned into a bargaining counter, to extort a tip.

Or when we’re walking on a narrow path, I’ll keep marching forward and the people coming the other direction will give way, or I’ll try to make space and the other people will march on and keep going. It can also happen that on a narrow snowy path, when your party is larger, you won’t give way yourself. Abroad, there are said to be “Alleingänger” who learned their trade climbing on terrific cliffs where nobody could possibly have stopped a falling companion on the rope. Yet, even so, there are people who’ll lecture these excellent “Alleingänger” on the dangers of solo climbing. So, I advise all soloists, pay no attention to the nay-sayers. If you do start listening to them, then you’ll have to give up soloing. That’s because you’ll already have started to have doubts about solo climbing. To solo in a state of self-doubt is a crime: you’ll just be tortured by guilt, whether it’s mountains or soloing or booze or smoking that’s bothering you. But if you solo because you know it’s the right thing to do, then you can make progress without agonizing about it. The weak will be tormented, crushed; the strong will become stronger and flourish.

So, soloists, be strong!

December 1934

Back to main article

Risk assessment

2009-01-15T11:57:00.001-08:00

Swiss researchers put some numbers on the hazards of ski-touring and off-piste skiing. Sorry, but ski-touring is more dangerous than driving

Every year in Switzerland for the last two decades, avalanches have claimed the lives of about 14 ski-mountaineers and 7 off-piste skiers – the latter being folk who use the lifts of ski-resorts but find their way downhill outside the prepared ski-pistes. But these numbers don’t actually reveal the likelihood of an avalanche accident on any given ski-tour or ski-run.

Now two Swiss researchers have attempted to answer that question. The findings of Philippe Wäger of the University of Bern and Benjamin Zweifel of the Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research at Davos are published in the 2.2008 edition of “Die Alpen”, the official magazine of the Swiss Alpine Club.

Based on a limited sampling of routes near Davos, Wäger and Zweifel estimate that fatal avalanche accidents occur on about three ski-mountaineering tours out of every 100,000. For off-piste skiers, the risk is rather higher, at 10 fatal accidents per 100,000. This reflects the fact that ski-mountaineers tend to limit themselves to one mountain route per outing, while off-piste skiers use the lifts to make many different runs every day.

There is also a difference in behaviour, note the researchers. Ski-mountaineers are less likely to undertake a tour when the avalanche risk level moves up from “moderate” (Level 2) to “considerable (Level 3). But off-piste skiers are more likely to go out when conditions are dangerous.

Extrapolating from their limited sample to probabilities for the whole of Switzerland, the authors estimate that some 9 fatal avalanche accidents occur every year per 100,000 ski-mountaineering tours and 12 per off-piste run. Of course, avalanches are not the only source of danger for skiers, who can also fall victim to crevasses, cornice collapses, and icy slopes. Including these other dangers and annoyances, the accident quota rises to 17 per 100,000 ski-mountaineering tours and 20 per off-piste run.

In sum, ski-touring and off-piste skiing appear to be less dangerous than summer alpine climbing but more dangerous than rock-climbing or hiking. Another bit of news to ponder. If you thought that driving to the mountain was the most dangerous part of the trip, think again. “The figures don’t support that conclusion,” say the researchers.

References

Das tödliche Risiko Lawinen by Philippe Wäger of the University of Bern and Benjamin Zweifel of the Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research at Davos, in the 2.2008 edition of “Die Alpen”, the official magazine of the Swiss Alpine Club.

Do you feel lucky ...

2009-01-15T11:53:00.001-08:00

... well, do you? Strange noises on a snowslope lead to Schopenhauerian reflections

"I don't like this," said Wolfie as he started up the face of a small snowbowl. But we liked what followed even less. The snow beneath my own skis trembled and settled with a soft but emphatic "Whoomph". Fortunately, the mountain left it that.

When decision-making at times like this, it can be helpful to imagine how a putative accident report will read. Like this, maybe. "On Easter Saturday, the four-person party, all foreigners, were avalanched at 2,900 metres on the Swiss side of Il Capuchin, a small peak in the Bernina massif. The two survivors admit that, twenty minutes before the accident, they heard signs of instability in the snowpack. But they decided to continue the ski-tour, putting their trust in the official avalanche forecast for the area, which stood at Grade II 'Moderate'…"

We turned back, after digging a pit to look for weak layers in the snow (inconclusive). But even before we reached the hut, we saw other people starting up our mountain, following the tracks we'd made. So far from worrying about avalanches, the members of one group were bunched tightly together. After reaching the summit unscathed, they were able to yee-haw their way down 800 metres of untracked powder snow, and all this under a flawless blue sky. Later, one of their guides reassured us that our "whoomph" just meant that the new snow was settling.

"The mountain will always be there tomorrow," said the hut warden, consoling us. True, although next morning these wise words were difficult to verify through the low cloud and snow showers. Cutting our losses, we went home. Back in town, with gear hanging up to dry over the radiators, I consulted Werner Munter about our suspect snowslope. Not in person, of course, but via his book, Avalanches 3x3: Decision-making in critical situations. An alpine guide based in Davos, Munter is an avalanche expert whose patriarchal beard reinforces his already immense authority in this part of the world. His remarks on "whoomph" noises are found in a section of his book entitled "Thirteen Deadly Errors":

Error #10: Wumm-noises are favourable signs that the snow is settling

One might just as well say that the storm is over after the first thunderclap. Wumm-noises (accompanied by a simultaneous backward settling of the snow) and cracks running through the snow when it is loaded are the most reliable indicators for a weak snowpack. In fact, they are warning signs. Wumm-noises are almost always heard immediately before a windslab avalanche is triggered. They accompany the factors that lead to the rupture within the snowpack. Each noise testifies to a further weakening of an already weakened snowpack. So these sounds should send a chill down our spines; there could not be a clearer warning!

After reading this advice, I think I'll keep turning back whenever I hear "whoomph" noises. And, by the way, that's a telling epigraph that Munter has chosen to head up his "Deadly Errors" chapter. It's not often you find a quotation from Arthur Schopenhauer in a mountaineering text book, so here it is in full: "All ignorance is dangerous, and most errors must be dearly paid for. And you need lots of luck if you plan to carry an unchastised error around in your head until the day you die."

References

Lawinen 3x3: Entscheiden in kritischen Situation by Werner Munter. To my mind, the best book ever written on avalanche avoidance. Available in German and French, but not yet in English. Maybe somebody should translate the rest of it.

Sunrise on the pines

2009-01-15T11:43:00.001-08:00

A rare optical phenomenon is analysed by a physicist and alpinist. Not that this will sell his book

As we came up a mountain path in the blast-furnace summer of 2003, the pine trees above us flared into a burst of silver brilliance.

The phenomenon did not escape the ever-observant John Tyndall (1820-1893), a physicist now remembered chiefly for his work on atmospheric optics – and also for a glittering alpinistic career that included an inspection of the Matterhorn and the first ascent of the Weisshorn. Here is the account of sunrise on the pines from Chapter IX of his "Mountaineering in 1861":-

I must here mention a beautiful effect which I observed from Randa on the morning of the 18th of August. The valley of St. Nicholas runs nearly north and south and the ridge which flanks it to the east is partially covered with pines; the trees on the summit of this ridge as you look at them from the valley being projected against the sky.

What I saw was this: as the sun was about to rise I could trace upon the meadows in the valley the outline of the ridge which concealed him, and I could walk along the valley so as to keep myself quite within the shadow of the mountain. Suppose me just immersed in the shadow: as I moved along, successive pine trees on the top of the ridge were projected on that portion of the heavens where the sun was about to appear, and every one of them assumed in this position a perfect silvery brightness. It was most interesting to observe, as I walked up and down the valley, tree after tree losing its opacity and suddenly robing itself in glory …

The cause of the phenomenon I take to be this: You have often noticed the bright illumination of the atmosphere immediately surrounding the sun; and how speedily the brightness diminishes as your eye departs from the sun’s edge. This brightness is mainly caused by the sunlight falling on the aqueous particles in the air, aided by whatever dust may be suspended in the atmosphere.

If instead of aqueous particles fine solid particles were strewn in the air, the intensity of the light reflected from them would be greater. Now the spiculae of the pine, when the tree is projected against the heavens, close to the sun’s rim, are exactly in this condition; they are flooded by a gush of the intensest light, and reflect it from their smooth surfaces to the spectator.

John Tyndall's pen was as mighty as his alpenstock yet, sadly, his alpine books are more out of print than in. By comparison, Whymper's Scrambles in the Alps continue to sell and sell. The truth is that exquisite nature observations, combined with accounts of safe and cheerful climbs – as practised by Tyndall – don't fly off the shelves. It takes a spectacular accident – Whymper on the Matterhorn, Joe Simpson on Sula Grande – to move a mountaineering book into the mass market.

Reference

The glaciers of the Alps & Mountaineering in 1861, by John Tyndall (Everyman's edition)

All that famous sky

2009-01-15T11:24:00.000-08:00

January 2. New Year ski-tour on Stotzigen Firsten, a mountain in the Gotthard region. Fast-moving jetstream clouds overwrite the sky. What are they saying?

.