🌟 New blog post ✍️ The Dominican Republic has 5 mountain ranges, inc. the highest peak in the Caribbean 🇩🇴 I would never have travelled there had Edita not been working in Haiti, but I found a great destination for short multi-day treks 👣 But boy is it humid 😓 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/a-...

[Excessively priced outdoor clothing brand] Arc-teryx issued apologies for the event, with the company saying the display “was out of line with Arc’teryx’s values”. 🔥🛢️ Or as Groucho Marx said, if you don't like our values, we have others 🙈 www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

"Competitors approached the adjudicator, sharing their concerns over suspiciously circular skipping stones." Good grief, they didn't did they? All I can say is, what a bunch of tossers! 😳 explorersweb.com/world-stone-...

Thanks for the advice, @markhorrell.bsky.social. www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/wh...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ The handful of people who enjoy my audiobooks will be happy to learn that I’ve just released another one 📚 Islands in the Snow, about a trek through the Solu-Khumbu region of Nepal, is now available on all the main audiobook channels 🎵 🎧 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/on...

"For reference, the fastest ever mile time is 3:43.13, set by Hicham El Guerrouj of Morocco in 1999. El Guerrouj did not drink four beers during his run." 4 laps of the track with a beer to start each lap. If only I'd known earlier in life this was a thing 🍺🍺🍺🍺 www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/a...

"Selfie parks provide self-contained spaces that give visitors a curated environment in which to create content (often of themselves)." 🤔 An interesting concept. Will shepherding the selfie hunters into a warehouse help to reduce overtourism? 📷 theconversation.com/how-selfie-p...

What will drone transport on Everest mean for Sherpa mountaineers? Xenon-assisted climbing may be an unnecessary innovation but this isn’t: it means less gear-hauling and more safety, says @markhorrell.bsky.social www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/wh...

“Today is day 11 of free soloing a harder route every day until I fall,” the tousle-haired young rock climber says to the camera. Interesting form of entertainment. Presumably it all ends quite suddenly... explorersweb.com/this-free-so...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ Kongur sits between three huge mountain ranges in Central Asia. It was unexplored in 1980 when a British team set off to climb it 🗻 🇨🇳 After 18 years sitting on my bookshelf, I finally got round to reading Chris Bonington's book about it 📚 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/ch...

"The controversy shifted dramatically when Hojac and Brugger discovered that Siegrist had retroactively changed details about his 2004 climb on his website." 😮 Handbags on the Eiger. Two competing claims to a speed record as accuser becomes the accused 👜 explorersweb.com/controversy-...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ The whole of Europe is in the middle of a scorching heatwave. The thermometer has been touching 30°C 🌞 It seemed like a good time to go hill walking in the Lake District, where good weather seemed guaranteed for a change 👣 Or was it? 😮 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/we...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ Media coverage of Everest this year has focused on unusual speed ascents that have been framed as a game changer for aspiring climbers 🏃 But another technological advance will change the job description for Sherpas more significantly 🚛 🎥 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/wh...

Almost all ladders & ropes used to prepare Everest’s route [on Nepal side] were flown by drones up to Camp I. Each drone carried 30kg as high as 6,130m. 678 successful summits: 38% client, 62% staff. => Sherpas are doing less load carrying, more support climbing www.alanarnette.com/blog/2025/06...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ Standing just 1.65m and weighing 82kg, nobody would have suspected Babu Chiri of being an athlete 🏃 In the 1990s, he was one of the world's best at climbing Everest, and one night in 1999 he did something that nobody had ever done 🏅 ⛺ www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/a-...

"If you make it too hard for AI companies to access it in the UK they'll simply do it elsewhere instead." Which is like saying if I install a burglar alarm, they'll just go and burgle somebody else. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

"The SW Coast Path has over 115,000 feet of ascent and descent – the equivalent of scaling Mount Everest four times." Yes, and driving to John O'Groats and back is equivalent to walking the SW Coast Path three times 🙄 theconversation.com/the-salt-pat...

"Glaciers are good indicators of climate change because their retreat allows us to see with our own eyes how climate is changing." 👀 Indeed. I've seen glaciers shrink in my lifetime. ⌛ (By visiting them years apart, not by standing to watch, obviously.) 🙄 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ There have been many books about Sherpa mountaineers over the years, but few have been written from the perspective of Sherpas themselves ⛏️🗻 One that comes close is Sherpa by Pradeep Bashyal and Ankit Babu Adhikari, which I read recently 📚 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/12...

"Huge Congratulations to Andrew Ushakov who has just become the fastest person to go from sea-level to the summit of Everest in just 3 days, 23 hours and 7 minutes." Until further proof emerges to back it up, it's reasonable to assume this claim isn't true 🐂💩 www.alanarnette.com/blog/2025/05...

"In a bizarre turn of events, lawyers for Darwall told the supreme court that picnicking did not count as open-air recreation and was therefore trespass." 🙄 Common sense prevails in the fight between good and evil. Really great news and a big relief 😇 😈 www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

“We are used to balancing risk and pushing ourselves to the limit. We are treating this like a military operation — meticulous preparation and planning followed by bold execution.” Love 'em or hate' em, 4 days from the UK to Camp 4 on Everest is definitely a first 😲 explorersweb.com/high-winds-t...

"On Everest, the physics for the anchors and ropes holding all the climbers, have simply started to defy logic." ⚓ Great insight into the many hazards of Everest by a man who has famously attempted it 9 times by 9 different routes 🙀 www.explore7summits.com/everest-2025...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ There was forecast to be one day of glorious weather over the Easter weekend 🌞 I nabbed it to take a day trip to the Brecon Beacons in South Wales and climb its highest peak via an extended route through a quieter part of the range ⛰️🔥 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/pe...

"Bushby has two self-imposed rules: he cannot use any form of transportation on his route, and is not allowed to go home until he is finished." 😮 As epic challenges go, this one's truly jawdropping. He started in 1998 and he's still going ⏳ explorersweb.com/karl-bushby-...

"Some interesting comparisons exist between the big national teams of the 1950s and the climbers on the mountains today." 🏔️ Interesting historical look at the first ascents of Kangchenjunga and Makalu, and how the expeditions compare with today's ⛺ explorersweb.com/makalu-and-k...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ There is a moment in all our lives when we become conscious of resembling our parents 🥸 For me that happened while I was editing my wife's videos of myself trekking the GR20. My father is 83 years old 😲 ⌛ www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/co... #Corsica

"Scrambling is riskier than heart disease (0.15% annual mortality) and cancer (0.12%) for a man my age." 😮 Either the writer is a centenarian or what they call scrambling I call climbing 🧗‍♀️ boulderreportinglab.org/2025/04/10/b...

"As a developing country we don’t have the resources to create a rescue team or to enforce all the rules on the mountain." 🇳🇵 Quick calculation: 421 paying climbers x $15,000 permit fee = $6,315,000 💰 Should be enough to fund a rescue team, surely? 🤔 www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adve...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ "Some names evoke visions and inspire people from childhood – Xanadu, Samarkand and Timbuktu…" 🕌 So said my guidebook. But this hill on the Welsh border caught my attention because it's the title of a popular prog rock album of the 1970s 🎸 🎹 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/a-...

The Bakonzo consider the glaciers sacred. The ice is where the god Kithasamba lives ❄️ But the ice is melting and only Mt Stanley's glacier remains 🗻 Fab pics though, revived great memories of my visit to the Rwenzori in 2006. It was the bogs I remember best 🇺🇬 www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

"It looks like business will win out in the end... You can hear the helicopters doing mountain flights and rescue operations again." Attempts to ban helicopters from the Everest region are failing. And I'm due a plate of momos 🚁 abenteuer-berg.de/en/helicopte... via @springinsfeld.bsky.social

🌟 New blog post ✍️ In 2023 I had the pleasure of trekking the GR20, the infamous long-distance trail along the spine of Corsica. 🚶👣 A full eighteen months later, I've finally got round to editing my footage into a remarkable series of videos 🎥 😳 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/co...

"If not yourself, who would you most like to be? Reinhold Messner, because he’s an even better climber than I was." Chris Bonington, the Geoff Boycott of mountaineering 🦚😊 www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

For the audiobook / long-form-listen fan... 'Thieves, Liars and Mountaineers' by @markhorrell.bsky.social is out... #climbing #adventure #booksbooksbooks www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/my...

"In 1970, people thought that women were incapable of climbing mountains without men’s help." 😳 New book about the first all-women's expedition to Denali 📚 Obviously, everybody is still calling it Denali 🗻 www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ Strap on your headphones and listen to the sounds of a man spending two months in a tent on a glacier ⛺❄️ Thieves, Liars and Mountaineers, about my very first 8,000m peak expedition to the Gasherbrums in Pakistan, is available as an audiobook 🎧🎶 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/my...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ Where are the humorous mountaineering books? 📚 Towards the end of last year, I discovered a hidden gem of witty mountaineering literature: a collection of whimsical short stories that would have had P.G. Wodehouse chuckling appreciatively. 😆 www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/th...

Essential supplies for an ascent of Mont Blanc in 1851. Prunes are the most important item to alleviate a climber's biggest fear... 💩 (from 1865 The Golden Age of Mountaineering by Giles Modica) 📚

“With 6 rangers on staff, the situation would likely result in having to leave injured climbers on the hill to succumb to the elements or rely on the goodwill of climbers on the mountain to rescue them.” Mt McKinley looking like a more dangerous peak than Denali 💢 explorersweb.com/denali-rescu...

He founded mountain rescue teams, wrote books on mountaineering, and invented an all-metal ice axe and a rescue stretcher. No surprise that Hamish didn't die a millionaire, but fitting that what he had will go to the SMT www.bbc.com/news/article...

Born on this day, 1962.02.17; Alison Hargreaves, British climber, who ascended Everest and K2 within three months without using supplementary oxygen in 1995. She died on descent of K2, aged 33. Photo ©: Alison Hargreaves Archives.

"So our worldview is our maunga are ancestors, they're not resources but they are living beings and so the notion of legal personhood fits well with our worldview." 🗿 A great celebration, though I'm glad I wasn't there when the old volcano gave a speech 🌋 www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...

🌟 New blog post ✍️ There's been some controversy in mountaineering circles about the noble gas xenon 🧪💨 Is it safe? I don't know, but it’s appropriate that somebody has got around to using a noble gas as a mountaineering aid, for reasons I will explain ✅ www.markhorrell.com/blog/2025/wh...

"I have written a detailed refutation of Tracy’s most egregious allegations, which I will present in eight separate chapters, starting today, with a new chapter posted every day or so going forward." Kendrick vs. Drake it ain't 📣 gripped.com/profiles/jon...

Good blog posts are "evergreen". They stay relevant years after they were written. This post of mine from 2013 has stood the test of time. 🌲 There's a proposal from Nepal to promote sub-peaks to the status of 8,000ers. All the points in this post remain true 📣 🏔️ www.markhorrell.com/blog/2013/do...

"In the last two years China has launched a pressure campaign to get foreign businesses, publishers, and mapmakers to adopt the name Xizang in place of Tibet." I don't know why they don't just issue an Executive Order. blogs.soas.ac.uk/china-instit...

"Or in simple English, as my good friend Mark Horrell wrote in 2013, 'Whether they can be considered separate peaks depends on topographic prominence, the amount of re-ascent from the col separating them from their parent peak.'" Why, thank you, Alan 🙏 www.alanarnette.com/blog/2025/02...

"It’s a proven fact that we have 14 mountains above 8,000 metres. Various studies have confirmed it. We have also produced a map." 🗻 14 just in Nepal, that is; 20 worldwide. 🇳🇵 This is going to drive Reinhold Messner mad 😡 kathmandupost.com/national/202... kathmandupost.com/national/202...

Go straight to the top of Chomolungma fast without xenon... and talk like Mickey! #SuburbanMountaineer #FakeClimbingNews #Climbing #mountaineering #Everest