Reinhold Messner - King Of The Mountains
The fearless Italian has scaled the world’s highest peaks, crossed Antarctica and the Gobi Desert and lost six toes in the process. The greatest explorer of the modern age? If the cap fits...
When it comes to derring-do, Reinhold Messner is in a league of his own. The first man to climb Everest solo, the first man to climb Everest without bottled Oxygen, the first man to climb all 14 of the planet’s highest peaks – the Italian’s Himalayan heroics alone are feats for the ages. Then there’s crossing Antarctica on foot, walking the breadth of the Gobi Desert, traversing Greenland without dog sleds or snow mobiles, not to mention the small matter of summiting the highest mountain on each of the seven continents. If anyone merits the title of the greatest modern-day adventurer, it’s the hirsute man with the German accent who scaled his first 3,000m peak at the ripe old age of five.
Born in 1944 in the South Tyrolean town of Brixen, Reinhold Messner took to climbing in large part because it was the only activity available to him. As he explained to filmmaker Andreas Nickel, “There was no football pitch; there wasn’t a swimming pool. All we had were the mountains.” So it was that the young Reinhold, together with his father Josef and his younger brother Gunther, took to exploring the Alps and the Eastern Dolomites.
Quick to embrace the alpine approach to mountaineering – little in the way of equipment, even less in the manner of support – the brothers Messner were among the finest climbers in Europe come the late 1960s. The next logical step was to see how they’d fare when faced with the greatest challenge available to mountaineers – the Himalayas. Their 1970 expedition to the region saw them summit Nanga Parabat (8,125m). It was an extraordinary feat for men on their first visit to the roof of the world. Tragically, it would be the brothers’ last shared success. While making their descent, Josef Messner was swept down the mountains by an avalanche. Thirty-five years would pass before his remains were found on the Diamir Face of Nanga Parabat.
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