2025 Judges Speech

Good evening, ladies, and gentlemen. Or as I like to call it, the part of the day where I try to sound brighter than I actually am. My name is Rehan Siddiqui, I am the Chair of Judges for the 2025 Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature.

Conventional wisdom is to surround yourself with good and clever people. I certainly had that with Nandini Purandare & Brian Hall, my co-judges, both of whom have been previous worthy winners of the Boardman Tasker Award. Judged to judge. I offer my thanks or blame to them.

I would also like to acknowledge the support provided by Janet & Steve Dean, The Trustees and The Patron of The Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature. The judges extend our thanks to them all.

Every book written requires a huge effort and commitment by the authors. Usually with little financial reward. The variety of topics within the “Mountain Environment” is a wide brief and this enhances the status of the Boardman Tasker Award and attracts a diverse array of worthyentries. It makes for a far more interesting and enjoyable experience being a judge. However….it makes it difficult to judge empirically. 

The judges are not comparing like with like. The winning book decisionis a point of view that is open to heartache and criticism for those not awarded the prize, at the same time elation and surprise by the winner.

In short, many of the books entered are worthy of an award. And of course, the first among equals are the books we shortlisted. All of these are worthy of accolades.

This year there were 28 books (32 in 2024), from ten countries. We decided on seven books for the short list.

In Douglas Adams' "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," the number 42 is presented as the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. We are in the 42nd year of the Boardman Tasker Award. What will this year’s award bring? Let’s find out.

There were several books that nearly made the shortlist. The problem was that there were some differences of opinion from the judges on who should make the shortlist. During the judging process, each one of the judges had their favourites, often different ones. Friendly but robust debate ensued. Zoom meetings were scheduled to take into account the local time in India, New Zealand, and the UK. Over time and several meetings, a consensus on the shortlist developed. 

There was one book that is probably a first for The Boardman Tasker Prize – A fashion book?

Although the book did not make the shortlist, all three judges agreed that “Mountain Style: British Outdoor Clothing 1953-2000” was worthy of a Commendation. It is a unique piece of work. It captures the spirit of pioneers who built Britain’s outdoor industry from the ground up and is far more than a fashion book, it is a valuable record. Indeed, the judges requested that a letter of commendation was issued to the authors. 

I am told that the shortlist finalists are to be listed in alphabetical order by author surname. For a change I thought we would do it in reversealphabetical order, Z – A!

The Corridor by Iain Peters: In his memoir, Iain Peters recounts his life as a climber and teacher, revealing how his passion for wild places and adventure served as a means of survival and a form of recovery from childhood sexual abuse. He candidly explores the long-term impact of this trauma on his psyche and relationships, finding strength in the mountains in the emotional journey of healing. The book is a powerful story of hope, resilience, and the creation of a life fulfilled despite an early, horrific trauma.

Moving the Needle by Dave MacLeod is a memoir focussed on the author’s journey from an average climber to an elite, world- renowned athlete. MacLeod tells his story of using trainable skills and behavioural traits to achieve his goals that can be replicated. Simple really, anyone can do it!

Breathe  - Life Lessons from the Edge of the World by Mollie Hughes: An inspiring account by Mollie Hughes of exploring some of the Earth's wildest environments. She shares her view on how self-belief and lessons learnt from epic challenges enabled her to become the youngest woman to climb Everest from the south and north sides. Then, aged 29, she describes her battle through freezing storm-force winds to achieve the distinction of being the youngest woman to ski solo to the South Pole.

The Beast in The Clouds – The Rosevelt Brothers Deadly Quest toFind The Mythical Giant Panda by Nathalia Holt: In 1928 Theodore and Kermit Roosevelt, the two eldest sons of President Theodore Roosevelt, embark on a dangerous expedition to the Chinese Himalayas. Their objective is to find and capture a live specimen of the giant panda, a creature so rare it was believed to be mythical. The book details their harrowing journey, filled with hardships as they chase their dream to introduce the panda to the western world.

The Search – The Life of a Mountain Rescue Search Dog Team by Paul Besley: Paul Besley’s life journey was transformed following a mountain rescue team saving his life from a serious hillwalking accident. Inspired by his rescue he joined a mountain rescue team and trains his Border Collie puppy, Scout, to become a search dog. The book details rigorous training and rescue missions, while exploring Besley’s personal struggles and how his bond with Scout helps him confront his past and find purpose.

There Will Be Headwinds – Kayaking the Northwest Passage by Mark Agnew: Mark Agnew recounts his journey as part of the first team to kayak the Northwest Passage. The book is an account of the physical hardships and mental health struggles he faced after previous expedition failures. I t is a story about teamwork, perseverance, personal growth in an epic adventure.

Tobin, The Stonemasters, And Me 1970 – 1980 by Rick Accomazzo: The book chronicles the life of the author’s friend and climbing partner, Tobin Sorenson, a member of the legendary 1970s climbing collective known as the Stonemasters. The book details their adventures and the evolution of modern climbing through the lens of Sorenson’s exceptional talent, which some considered the best in the world. It is a powerful tribute to Sorenson, who died tragically at a young age and a vivid portrait of a golden era of climbing.

 

In the end it is the quality of the writing, how the books impact on the reader, and how long they remained in our minds that formed the judges’ decision. 

Our final choice is not a conventionally good-looking book. It feels self-published. At first sight, without much thought to design. But the cover photo shows a corridor of darkness leading to light the relevance of which only comes clear after reading the book. The writing of this bookwas an immensely brave undertaking.

Our decision was unanimous – This year’s Boardman Tasker Award is awarded to The Corridor by Iain Peters.

A Letter from K2 - Maria Coffey writes...

Joe Tasker on British K2 Expedition 1978 | Image © Vertebrate

In the late 1970s I was on the periphery of the British climbing world, drawn to its wild social scene. My eldest brother Mick was a climber; through him I’d got to know some of the main characters living in North Wales, where I often spent weekends. Back then, climbing and hard partying went hand in hand. After a Friday night in the pub, climbers – at that time mostly male - and their partners would pack into a small cottage for more booze, marijuana, magic mushrooms and hours of dancing. The following day, hangover cures consisted of greasy breakfasts and endless cups of tea before heading to a crag. Then back to the pub. 

Through this scene I met a rising star in the mountaineering world, Alex Mcintyre,who was moving to Manchester and needed a place to live. He rented a room in my house, and as it was close to the airport it soon became a base for his climbing mates. Sometimes I had a whole Himalayan expedition dossing on my living room floor. I didn’t climb, but I was accepted into this tribe of free-spiritednomads. They dazzled me. They were like knights heading off to slay dragons in remote, high places, returning with stories of walking a fine line between life and death. I was drawn to their aura of risk, their reckless zest, their charged energy. 

But I vowed not to get involved with a mountaineer. My brother had barely escaped with his life after falling into a crevasse in Patagonia. I’d befriended a Manchester climber, Nick Estcourt, and was devastated when I learned that hehad died on K2. I felt terrible for Nick’s wife, and I pitied all the women left at home while their men set off on long, dangerous expeditions. 

Then, at a party in North Wales, I met Joe Tasker. Classic: eye contact across a crowded kitchen and over a table filled with beer and wine bottles. The next day he gave me a lift back to Manchester. He was the most interesting and engaging man I’d ever met. He had a sharp, enquiring mind, honed by the classical education he had received at a Jesuit seminary. He was witty and wry, a raconteur with many compelling stories. There was a strong mutual attraction.However, he was also a mountaineer who climbed some of the world’s highest mountains by their most difficult routes without supplementary oxygen.  Initially I tried to resist him, but it didn’t take long for my vow to go out of the window. 

I fell in love fast and deeply. He was more cautious.  He made it clear from the beginning that I’d need to accept his long absences, and his preoccupations with work and expedition planning when he was home. But when he did turn his focus onto me, he was fully there, and full of tenderness. He fascinated me, and with him I felt calm and content in way I never had before. 

In early May 1980, six weeks after the start of our love affair, he left to climb K2.  This was his second attempt. Two years earlier, he’d been on the expedition that had claimed Nick Estcourt. We had our first row about this, after Joe told me he had not wanted to abandon the expedition after Nick died but was outvoted by other team members. When I questioned him on why he would carry on after such a tragedy, he became angry. Of course this should have told me everything, but our time together was limited, so I quickly made up with him and brushed it aside. 

Our first parting was a bewildered one. It would be three months at least before we would see each other again, and deep down I acknowledged the possibility of him not returning. During the previous few days he had withdrawn from me emotionally, and, with no understanding back then of how he prepared himself for an expedition, I took his detachment personally. I clung to him and my defences fell away.  

“Will we be together when you get back?” 

He paused before answering and chewed his lip. 

“Let’s see what happens,” he replied. 

I cried all the way back to Manchester. 

 

Then started the first of the long and uncertain periods I was to become more used to, when I was the person I once pitied: a climber’s girlfriend, left at home, watching for mail that took weeks to arrive. 

‘Emotionally I am in a bit of a limbo,’ he wrote in his first letter. “I know it must be awful for you, and I can see that my whole behaviour must seem weird. On a trip like this, when all outside stimulus is removed, I find I am very detached. If I do think about what I am doing, I am puzzled and bewildered but thinking about things that are so far away in space and time can be a torture, so I just drift.’

He wrote regularly, sounding off his frustrations over the progress of the expedition and saying little in the way of romance, but at least reassuring me that he hoped I would be there when he returned. 

At that time I was teaching at a Manchester reception centre for Vietnamese refugees. As lessons were held year-round, I had the luxurious perk of choosing when to take my holidays. I decided that travelling for part of the time Joe was away would help me to cope with the separation. A few weeks before he was due back I flew to the States and drove cross country with some friends, which helped take my mind off the worry. But on my return a letter arrived from Joe which brought me horribly back to reality. It had been written at K2 base camp and dated 17-08-80; in his confusion he had been a month ahead of himself. 

‘I don’t quite know how to start this letter,’ he wrote. ‘It’s not any romantic, emotional reason, it’s just that I feel plain and simply wiped out. I couldn’t have written yesterday and as it is I have to suppress a lot and not look back at the events of the past few days directly in order to get by. 

Yesterday, Pete, Dick and I arrived back here after what will probably, I hope, be one of  the most profound experiences ever for us. It affects us all differently, but I know that I haven’t come to terms with its implications and last night I went to sleep twitching at the slightest rustle of the tent, or rattle of a stone outside, imagining rocks plying away from ice, and slipping into dreams of hospital wards and personal Apocalypses. 

On the night of July 11, Pete, Dick and I were hit twice, at 26,500 ft,  by avalanches. We were lucky to be alive, but I think it was the next three days struggling to survive that induced this state of shock. The weather, in spite of forecasts, was bad, and having decided to retreat, though only about six hours from the summit, we found our retreat barred by thigh deep, avalanche prone slopes. We hadn’t the food or fuel to stay put so we had to try to get down. For three days, growing more and more exhausted, we struggled down in appalling weather – the mountain was totally in control. 

When we stumbled into Basecamp yesterday some American friends were there who had joined our Base Camp, and so was George Bettembourg from our Kanch expedition, and I was glad, as we stumbled into this welcome committee (they had followed our painful progress by walkie-talkie without being able to help) of my reflective sunglasses, so no one could see the tears of relief and gratitude in my eyes.’ 

The blue aerogram had been lying on my hallway carpet when I came home from work. I had ripped it open on the way through to the living room. Standing stock still by the table, I rested a steadying hand on the brown chenille cloth, trembling as I read. 

“Avalanches.” 

The word brought a chill of horror. As a child I had imagined an avalanche to be a rush of hissing snow that swept its captive over some unseen edge. Now I knew a little more. I knew that the snow was more often like wet concrete, and held huge blocks of ice, that death was usually by suffocation, and that it was a terror for those who gambled in the mountains. Nick Estcourt had pitted himself against K2 and lost. An avalanche took him away as he carried supplies up to where Joe and Pete were camped. He crossed a slope at the wrong time; he decided to take the lead only minutes before; it could so easily have been someone else or no one at all. The stakes were high. And those at home, all the families and the lovers, they had their futures hanging in the balance too. Ah, but Joe had not been claimed this time – he was alive. 

There was nothing, no previous experience or foreknowledge, to prepare me for his last paragraph. 


‘We decided on the way down not to discuss going back up until we reached Base Camp. We should all be home for one reason or another and our visas run out on July 31st, but we were so close we will probably have one more go. We will be all right this time.  Tara for now. Love, Joe.’

One more go? It was the beginning of August; Dick’s baby was almost due to be born; how could they even consider going back up the mountain after escaping death so narrowly? The fact that he had written from Base Camp and that, before the closing sentences, I presumed he was out of danger, had allowed me to fully open to the reality of the danger he faced, moment to moment, while climbing K2. But the letter was two and a half weeks old. It was too late to close my channels of imagination; all the possibilities generated by the slip of paper in my hand took hold. There was no way of knowing if Joe or any of the others were dead or alive. 

Desperation and anger hit me in turn. I paced through the house clutching the letter, re- reading  it until I almost knew the words by heart, asking myself why, why would they go back up the mountain and risk so much, why did they climb at all, why had my life led me to this moment of rising, anchorless panic? It was hard to know what to do, who to turn to. The need to share the worry grew strong, but my neighbour registered incomprehension at what I told her. Alex was away on an expedition, so I phoned a couple of other climbers. 

“Nothing to be done, love,” said the one I reached. “But no news is good news.” 

For nine days I hung onto that well used cliched, until Joe rang me from Islamabad. 

“We didn’t make it on the second try, but we’re all fine. I’ll be home on the twelfth.” 

I was wordless on the end of the telephone, aware of nothing except overwhelming relief. 

***

 

Maria Coffey has written about her relationship with Joe Tasker in four books: Fragile Edge, Where The Mountain Casts Its Shadow, Explorers of the Infinite and her recent memoir, Instead.

Maria is Chair of the Boardman Tasker Charitable Trust.

2025 Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature Shortlist Announced

The Boardman Tasker Award continues to enhance its international reputation. This year it attracted 28 entries from ten different countries: England, Scotland, Canada, France, Finland, India, Ireland, New Zealand, USA, and South Korea.

The Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature will be awarded to the winner(s) at the Boardman Tasker Award Shortlisted Authors event at Kendal Mountain Festival on Friday November 21st, 2025. 

The Judges for 2025 were Rehan Siddiqui (Chair), Brian Hall and, Nandini Purandare. They have selected the following seven books for the 2025 Shortlist:

Rick Accomazzo

Tobin, The Stonemasters, and Me 1970-1980

Remembering Tobin Sorenson, the Best Climber in the World

Stonemasters Books

The book chronicles the life of the author’s friend and climbing partner, Tobin Sorenson, a member of the legendary 1970s climbing collective known as The Stonemasters.  The book details their adventures and the evolution of modern climbing through the lens of Sorenson’s exceptional talent, which some considered the best in the world. It is a powerful tribute to Sorenson, who died tragically at a young age and a vivid portrait of a golden era of climbing.

Rick Accomazzo has been a climber for over 50 years and is credited with first ascents and first free ascents in the US, Canada, Mexico, Britain, France, and Italy. One of the original Southern California Stonemasters, he spent several seasons in Yosemite’s Camp 4 during the 1970s, where he was a member of its search-and-rescue team. Most importantly, it was in Camp 4 that Rick met his future wife, Gerry.

Rick is a co-founder of The Access Fund, the climber advocacy and conservation organization, having served on its original board of directors and as its second president. In 2021, he was a recipient, with Armando Menocal and Randy Vogel, of the American Alpine Club’s highest award, Honorary Membership, for their work with the Access Fund. His writing has been previously published in climbing magazines; in 2015 he was a finalist for the Mountaineering Article prize at the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival.

Mark Agnew

There Will be Headwinds

Kayaking the Northwest Passage

Icon Books

The author recounts his journey as part of the first team to kayak the Northwest Passage. The book is an account of physical hardships and mental health struggles he faced after previous expedition failures. It is a story about teamwork, perseverance, and personal growth in an epic adventure.

Mark Agnew is an adventurer, motivational keynote speaker and first time author. He grew up in Scotland, with two explorer parents, who both inspired him to live an interesting, fulfilled life. After university, he moved to Hong Kong, where he founded the Outdoor & Extreme Sports section of the South China Morning Post. During this time, he tried and failed to row the Atlantic twice. With the harsh lessons he learned, he joined three fellow adventurers (calling themselves The Arctic Cowboys) to kayak the Northwest Passage. The 103-day expedition is the subject of his book There Will Be Headwinds, and their success earned him the title European Adventurer of the Year. He now lives in London and travels the world sharing his story and lessons in resilience with his signature keynote talk Find Your Polar Bear.

Paul Besley

The Search

The life of a mountain rescue search dog team

Vertebrate Publishing

The author’s life journey was transformed following a mountain rescue team saving his life from a serious hillwalking accident. Inspired by his rescue he joined a mountain rescue team and trains his Border Collie puppy, Scout, to become a search dog. The book details rigorous training and rescue missions, while exploring Besley’s personal struggles and how his bond with Scout helps him confront his past and find purpose.

Paul Besley is a writer who began exploring the British landscape while at school in the 1970s. His focus of work is the interaction between humans and the land. His work has evolved into the study of how the physical environment imprints itself on humans and how we as a race respond. His belief that walking is a simple activity has led him to support the effort of many just starting out on a lifetime of pleasure. He has a desire to show people that walking does not just have to be in the hills and mountains of national parks or rely on expensive equipment but can be enjoyed from the front door of home through our urban landscape and out in our local countryside. His books, Day Walks in the South Pennines and 1001 Walking Tips for Vertebrate Publishing, and the three Peak District guidebooks for Cicerone Press, are well respected by walkers and explorers of all ages. He lives close to the Peak District in The Outdoor City of Sheffield with his partner, metalsmith Alison Counsell, and their two dogs Olly and Scout.

 Nathalia Holt

The Beast in the Clouds

The Roosevelt Brothers’ Deadly Quest to find the Mythical Giant Panda

One Signal Publishers

In 1928 Theodore and Kermit Roosevelt, the two eldest sons of President Theodore Roosevelt, embark on a dangerous expedition to the Chinese Himalayas. Their objective is to find and capture a live specimen of the giant panda, a creature so rare it was believed to be mythical. The book details their harrowing journey, filled with hardships as they chase their dream to introduce the panda to the western world.

Nathalia Holt, Ph.D. is the New York Times bestselling author of The Beast in the Clouds, Wise Gals, Rise of the Rocket Girls, The Queens of Animation, and Cured. She has written for numerous publications including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Atlantic, Popular Science, PBS, and Time. She is a former fellow at the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard University. She lives with her husband and their two daughters in Pacific Grove, CA.

Mollie Hughes

Breathe

Life Lessons from the Edge of the World

Birlinn Ltd

An inspiring account by Mollie Hughes of exploring some of the Earth’s wildest environments. She shares her view on how self-belief and lessons learnt from epic challenges enabled her to become the youngest woman to climb Everest from the south and north sides. Then, aged 29, she describes her battle through freezing storm-force winds to achieve the distinction of being the youngest woman to ski solo to the South Pole.

Mollie Hughes is a world record-breaking adventurer, mountaineer, polar explorer and international motivational speaker. In 2017 she broke the world record for becoming the youngest woman to climb both sides of Mount Everest and in 2020 became the youngest woman to ski solo to the South Pole. In December 2020 she was the first woman to become president of Scouts Scotland.

Dave Macleod

Moving the Needle

How an Average Climber can do the Hardest Route in the World

Rare Breed Productions

This is a memoir focussed on the author’s journey from an average climber to an elite, world-renowned athlete. The author tells his story of using trainable skills and behavioural traits to achieve his goals that can be replicated. Simple really, anyone can do it!

Dave MacLeod is a professional rock climber and coach based in the Highlands of Scotland. He has been climbing for 30 years and is recognised as one of the best all-round climbers in the world, having climbed the world’s first E11 trad route, as well as some of the hardest ice routes and free solos. He is best known for his hardest trad climbs, Rhapsody (E11) on Dumbarton Rock and Echo Wall (E11) on Ben Nevis but has also made hundreds of first ascents across Scotland and the greater ranges of the world, including the Dolomites, Norway and Patagonia. Dave is also a respected climbing coach, writing a popular blog since 2006, hosting a successful YouTube channel and has written three books. Dave has an undergraduate degree in Physiology and Sports Science, a master’s degree in Medicine and Science in Sport and Exercise, and a master’s degree in Human Nutrition.

Iain Peters

The Corridor

Bed and Bolster

In his memoir, the author recounts his life as a climber and teacher, revealing how his passion for wild places and adventure served as a means of survival and a form of recovery from childhood sexual abuse. He candidly explores the long-term impact of this trauma on his psyche and relationships, finding strength in the mountains in the emotional journey of healing. The book is a powerful story of hope, resilience and the creation of a life fulfilled despite an early, horrific trauma.

Iain was introduced to climbing, aged 4 by his grandfather on the granite tors of Dartmoor and the sea cliffs of Land’s End. He’s been climbing ever since, as an instructor, pioneer of hundreds of new routes in the Southwest over five decades and mountaineering in the Cordillera Darwin of Tierra del Fuego.

His first published work was The Climbers’ Club Guide to North Devon and Cornwall in 1988. Iain then lived with his wife and children in Cumbria, working as the Lake District National Park Authority’s freelance writer where he created and wrote Rocky Rambler’s Wild Walks, in collaboration with the cartoonist and illustrator Colin Shelbourn, the first walking guide to the Lake District for children, which won the Hunter Davies Prize at The Lake District Book of The Year Awards in 1992.

The comments are by courtesy of Rehan Siddiqui, Chair of 2025 Judges.

Tickets for the Boardman Tasker Award Shortlisted Authors event at Kendal Mountain Festival on Friday November 21st, 2025 are available now.

BUY TICKETS

2025 entries are now closed!

Submission for the 2025 Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature is now closed. There were 28 entries. The shortlist will be announced in early September.

Tickets for the Boardman Tasker Award for Mountain Literature taking place at Kendal Mountain Festival on Friday 21 Nov are on sale now - tickets here.

K2 Expedition 1980

Catherine Moorehead reads two extracts regarding the expedition, undertaken by Pete Boardman, Joe Tasker, Doug Scott and Dick Renshaw.

The first, from her biography of Doug Scott, ‘Mountain Guru’, gives an overall account of the trip.

The second is taken from Joe Tasker’s ’Savage Arena’ and describes in vivid detail, how in a later attempt on the mountain, after Doug had departed, the three of them were avalanched during the night in their tent.  An epic from which they were lucky to survive.

Simon Mawer, 2003 BT Award winner has died aged 76

“I was very sorry to read of the death of Simon Mawer (born 1947). Simon won the Boardman Tasker Award in 2003, with his book The Fall.  Simon was an accomplished author, and his novel The Glass Room was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Simon was an enthusiastic climber, and The Fall is a very elegant novel, set mostly in Snowdonia.”
Steve Dean
Secretary, Boardman Tasker Charitable Trust

Read Simon’s obituary in The Bookseller here.

Steve Dean reflects on 1975 - Fifty Years On

© Chris Bonington Picture Library
L-R:  Joe Tasker, Pete Boardman & Dick Renshaw at base camp on K2 in 1980

1975 was a particularly significant year for both Pete and Joe.  They already both had established reputations as alpinists of the top rank, but events that year were to have significant impact on both their lives, and on the relationship between themselves.  Pete was selected for Chris Bonington’s large scale expedition to climb Everest’s South West Face, as part of a team that included Martin Boysen, Tut Braithwaite, Nick Estcourt, Mick Burke, Doug Scott, and Dougal Haston.  It was a reflection of Pete’s ability, despite being only 24, that he was included in such esteemed company.

The expedition proceeded well, and after Paul Braithwaite and Nick Estcourt made a huge effort to force the route through the rock band, Doug Scott and Dougal Haston became the first British climbers to reach the summit of Everest on September 24th. Pete was chosen to make the second summit attempt along with Martin Boysen, Pertemba and Mick Burke. Chris Bonington described the events of the day:

“The second summit team reached Camp Six and set off the following morning for the summit.  Martin turned back with malfunctioning oxygen equipment but Pete and Pertemba reached the summit at one o’clock.  They assumed that Mick had returned to Camp Six with Martin so were amazed to meet up with him just above the Hillary Step as they descended.  Mick even tried to persuade them to come back to the top so that he could film them.  They agreed instead that Pete and Pertemba would wait at the South Summit.  I’m sure that Mick reached the summit, but by four-thirty he still hadn’t returned.  A storm was brewing, growing stronger by the minute.  Daylight would soon begin to fade.  Pete and Pertemba were dangerously exposed.  If they had waited any longer they would most likely have perished.   It seems likely that Mick stepped through a cornice on his way down from the top.”

Pete and Pertemba had an appalling time getting down to Camp Six, and it was a mark of Pete’s strength and ability that he got them both down safely, albeit utterly exhausted.  Martin Boysen described to me the awful night the three of them spent in the tent at Camp Six, as he produced endless brews to help Pete and Pertemba recover as the storm raged on into the next day.  This horrible experience and the death of Mick, had a profound effect on Pete, and it was heart-breaking for Martin, as Mick was an old friend from way back.

During that autumn of 1975, Joe Tasker was also out in the Himalayas, making his first visit there with Dick Renshaw.  Driving out there in a badly beat up Ford Escort van, they made an audacious lightweight ascent of Dunagiri by its south-east ridge and spending ten days in ascent and descent of the mountain.  The ascent went well, but during the descent they became separated and once back at Base Camp it was clear that Dick had suffered quite serious frost-bite, which required extensive treatment into the next year.  Their ascent of Dunagiri was a superb achievement that brought Joe and Dick to the attention of the world’s mountaineering elite.

For some time, Joe had harboured a desire to climb Changabang and in the latter part of 1975, he approached Pete with a mind to attempting to climb the mountain’s unclimbed West Face.  Joe and Pete had first met back in 1971 on a route at Chamonix.  Joe was climbing with Dick; Pete was partnered by Martin Wragg.  By 1975 they really only knew each other in passing and by reputation, but in the absence of Dick, Joe felt that Pete would be the ideal partner to attempt the route with on Changabang.  Thus was the partnership of Pete and Joe formed in the last weeks of 1975.  They would go on to have an enormous influence on the development of High Altitude climbing over the next seven years. 

© Doug Scott’s Photography Collection
L to R: Dick Renshaw, Doug Scott, Pete Boardman & Joe Tasker

2025 is also the 45th Anniversary of Pete and Joe’s visit to K2 with Doug Scott and Dick Renshaw.  It was Pete and Joe’s second visit to the mountain following the ill-fated 1978 Expedition when Nick Estcourt was killed.  In 1980 the team was again attempting to climb the mountain by its West Ridge.  Doug Scott’s biographer Catherine Moorhead takes up the story:

“The Expedition reached 7000m before biting hard winds then running out of time as the technical difficulties mounted.  Scott proposed an Alpine-style ascent of the remaining 1,600m, but the others disagreed (Renshaw was anxious about frostbite, after a bad experience on Dunagiri).  Scott had to return home, just 9n time to lead an expedition to Makalu.  The others tried a switch to the Abruzzi Spur route, resulting in a near-fatal three-night epic in a storm just below 6000m.”

The epic Catherine mentions came very close to claiming the lives of Pete, Joe, and Dick.  The team was avalanched at night in their tent only 1500ft below the summit.  Joe’s description in Savage Arena (pages 282-304) tells a truly gripping story.  The boys were very lucky to come home after that one, and they never did return to K2.

 

References:

‘Savage Arena’ by Joe Tasker

‘Ascent’ by Sir Chris Bonington

‘Mountain Guru’ by Catherine Moorehead


Steve Dean  
April 2025

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