Inside Alpinist 62 are more than 114 pages of words and images that examine both historical and modern mountaineering from a wide range of perspectives. You’ll find the first part of a two-part series on the climbing history of Nanda Devi, Nanda Devi East and Nanda Kot. Within this first part, American alpinist and author Pete Takeda examines the complex interweaving of international mountaineering, local traditions and global politics that helped shape travel and exploration in the Garhwal Himalaya of India,  from centuries’ old religious pilgrimages to climbs of the 1930s. (The years 1940 to 2018 will be covered in the second part, appearing in Alpinist 63.) Paula Wright, Julia Pulwicki and Stewart Weaver also provide accounts of a few early mountaineering expeditions to the region.

In addition, you’ll get a chance to learn more about the prolific career of Japanese alpinist Yasushi Yamanoi, known for alpine-style first ascents on some of the world’s highest and most challenging peaks—as told by Indian climber and liaison officer Sartaj Ghuman. Anindya Mukherjee, another mountaineer from India, recounts some of his expeditions, often accompanied by local Lepcha residents, around the East Ridge of Kangchenjunga. Meanwhile in the US, Joe Whittle, an enrolled tribal member of the Caddo Nation and a descendent of the Delaware Nation, recounts a trip with other Native Americans to the Wal’wá·maXs (Wallowa Mountains of Oregon), as part of an exploration of ancestral connections to mountain lands. Among other articles: Lauren Smith writes of climbing and ornithology as means to seek close experiences of nature; Amanda Padoan shares stories of the great winter alpinist Muhammad Ali of Sadpara, Pakistan; Sara Aranda describes how an experience of the eclipse in the Wind River Range influenced her understanding of family, mortality and self—and much, much more….  

Features

Mountain Profile: Nanda Devi, Part I

From the nineteenth century to the 1930s, visiting climbers strove to find ways to get closer to a 7816-meter summit that gleamed beyond a ring of seemingly impassable obstacles. For many people from the Garhwal Himalaya of India, the mountain of Nanda Devi is the abode of a goddess. American alpinist Pete Takeda first became drawn to the area when he heard about a plutonium-powered device lost somewhere on the peak in the 1960s. In this first part of a two-part series on the legacies of climbing on Nanda Devi—and the nearby summits of Nanda Devi East and Nanda Kot—Takeda explores the interweaving of mountaineering, mythologies and politics that have helped shape the history of the region. Stewart Weaver, Paula Wright and Julia Pulwicki share tales of early expeditions to this ecologically fragile, sacred place.

To Look the Bear in the Eye

Among the few who have established new climbs, alone and in alpine style, on 8000-meter peaks, Yasushi Yamanoi made a rapid first ascent of a line on the southwest face of Cho Oyu in 1994—only one of many significant routes that earned him a Piolet d'Or Asia Lifetime Achievement Award. Disinclined to self-promote, the Japanese alpinist strives to climb quietly and to leave little trace. Indian liaison officier Sartaj Ghuman joins Yamanoi on an expedition in the Zanskar region of India in search of a deeper dialogue with the wild.

In Perpetual Motion

As photographer Krystle Wright considers which images to capture, she discovers that the answer often lies in the void and in the unspoken.

Departments

Sharp End

A mountain of data.

Letters

A British poet mails a letter to an American friend. One reader says that mountains aren't spiritual; another says they are.

On Belay

In Upon That Mountain, published in 1943, British mountaineer Eric Shipton wrote, "the detailed exploration of the world is very far from complete." Around seven decades later, Indian climber Anindya Mukherjee journeys through dense forests in the Sikkim Himalaya to look for uncharted places within the folds along Kangchenjunga's East Ridge.

Climbing Life

Lauren Smith searches for grace; Amanda Padoan visits with the great Pakistani winter alpinist Muhammad Ali of Sadpara; Anne Haven McDonnell finds poetry in spindrift; and Penn Newhard dreams of ghosts or angels.

Full Value

With her friend Eliza Earle, Sara Aranda heads into the Wind River Range of Wyoming to watch the solar eclipse of 2017—and finds herself journeying into the darkness beneath existence itself.

Wired

While dissecting the concept of "wilderness" and examining the history of Indigenous erasure from lands across North America, Joe Whittle also reclaims—and rejoices in— his own ancestral connection with the land during a trip in the Wal'wá·maXs (Wallowa Mountains).

Off Belay

Derek Franz commemorates the Bird.