‘because it’s there’: the mallory and irvine mystery

As an occultist, novelist, painter, poet and magician, Aleister Crowley was notorious as a master of the dark arts. He’s less well known for his short but pioneering climbing career.

Sometimes, whether down to judgement or pure bad luck, things go wrong. We gathered a team of experts and asked them to tell us about a time the proverbial hit the fan – and how they escaped.

The Cuillin Ridge is often regarded as Britain’s most sustained and technical mountaineering excursion. Co-editor David Lintern attempted a ‘walker’s traverse’ of this infamous challenge, supporting a friend’s Munro round. In an environment now largely professionalised, theirs was an adventure by amateurs in the classic sense

For most of the 58 years prior to the 1985 Ryder Cup, the event had been an overwhelmingly one-sided affair. But three days at The Belfry that September changed the momentum of the event forever

Some things are just funny, and when it comes to innuendo Wales has one mountain to rule them all: LORD HEREFORD’S KNOB . It seems rude not to spend a wild night on it.

You only get one chance to live your life but until you find yourself fighting just to stay alive, you don’t realise quite how precious that life is. Now, though, I remind myself how lucky I am every