Andrew Terrill's Blog, page 7

Out on September 1st: the hardback edition of The Earth Beneath My Feet.

ON SEPTEMBER 1ST I’ll be releasing a new edition of The Earth Beneath My Feet – a hardback edition. The story inside hasn’t changed, but the book will contain a few extra elements. These include thirty additional photos, crisp white paper to help all the photos and maps stand out more clearly, and a foreword by a writer and backpacker who has been an inspiration to me my entire backpacking life: Chris Townsend.

I first heard of Chris back in November 1988. I was eighteen, away from home at coll...

The Earth Beneath My Feet – A guest review by George Kitching

When Andrew Terrill’s ice axe hit a bump and flew from his hand, he lost his only hope of self-arrest. As he hurtled headlong down the precipitous slope of the Hohtürli Pass like “a rag-doll on the way to oblivion”, he realised this is how it feels to die. Yet miraculously, he didn’t. As he lay recuperating in hospital, he made a life-defining decision—to stop using mountains as an escape from work. Many might have come to a similar conclusion, but with a wholly different interpretation. You...

A Brief Update

TWO MONTHS HAVE passed since my last blog – an update is probably well overdue!

On Sacred Ground is pretty much finished. The book has been fully written, edited, typeset, proofed, and proofed again, and I finally have the first sample copies in hand. Getting this far has taken an epic amount of work, although as a labour of love ‘work’ might not be the right word! But it has certainly filled the hours, days and weeks with solid effort. Large publishers put entire teams to work preparing a book...

A Few Photos

RECENT DAYS HAVE been full. Walking, camping, running, climbing, working, playing, cooking, cleaning, chauffeuring, presenting, learning, singing, sleeping, laughing; alone and in company: with family, friends, with strangers. Yes, full. Too full to have made time to pen any well-considered blogs!

Over the last three weeks I’ve spent plenty of time on foot, several more nights out, and I’ve also been working hard, trying to carve out work time to typeset On Sacred Ground. The trouble is, my grap...

And then the snowdrift tried to eat me!

THE EVENING IN CAMP at 11,600 feet was undeniably peaceful, and deeply, deeply soothing.

From the shoulder of the mountain, I watched day transition into night. It was a gentle ‘letting go’ of brightness and urgency, almost like a sigh, or a long-held breath being released, and it was made all the more peaceful by the fierce wind that I could still hear roaring across open slopes a mere thirty feet away. I’d pushed through the wind during my approach to camp, and it had felt unpleasant and num...

‘On Sacred Ground’ has a new publication date. An apology and explanation.

Evening in the Trollheimen range, Norway. July 1998.

FOR EVERYONE WAITING for On Sacred Ground I have an announcement and a sincere apology to make: I’m pushing back the release date to October 1.

To be clear, I regret doing this. Many of you have told me how much you are looking forward to On Sacred Ground. Some of you – especially those who read The Earth Beneath My Feet last summer – have been patiently waiting a long time. I hate extending that wait.

I’ve struggled with this decision, but I’...

The winter-spring seesaw

CHANGE IS THE only guarantee, stability is but a fleeting illusion. Few things illustrate this more clearly then the annual winter-spring-winter-spring seesaw that takes place here in Colorado’s Front Range foothills.

Last week, temperatures soared. The sun shone with soul-caressing warmth. I strode across hills and open space watching the land emerge from its covering of snow. Watercourses ran with increasing volume, flushing away winter. Mule deer migrated to sunny south-facing slopes, escap...

IT’S IGLOO SEASON (Part Two)

FOLLOWING ON FROM last week’s igloo blog I thought I’d share a few extra photos from the weekend in Rocky Mountain National Park. As these images hint, it was memorably windy!
(For the full story, please see the previous blog.)

Igloo Ed pulling his Expedition pulk over a snow bridge, shortly after leaving the trailhead. Taking a break during the hike in, we looked south-east towards Glacier Knobs. Shortly after this the skies darkened and snow began to fall. Igloo Ed heading onto Lake Haiyaha. T...

IT’S IGLOO SEASON!

EARLY LAST WEEK a backpacker made a comment on a social media group page that stuck with me.

‘I can’t wait for camping season,’ they wrote. ‘Does anyone think April is too early to start?’

Of course, several people chimed straight in, boastfully claiming that there is only one season for camping – all year. I could almost hear the derision in their replies. How could anyone think otherwise?

But I got it. Even though I camp year round, it’s easy to understand why someone might consider winter a...

People Are Amazing

NORMALLY, I’M EXTREMELY organised when it camps to backpacking – especially winter backpacking. But I just demonstrated the opposite – I forgot the bloody matches, again, exactly as I forgot them last June. Ironically, I forgot them upon the same mountain.

I realised my mistake at the trailhead this time, not once I reached camp. I stepped out of the car, pulled on my backpack and thought: ‘Oh! Crap! Matches!’

I’d had the matches in mind while packing. I’d thought about them several times. Grab...