The patron saint of T.L.S.?

[ScotRoutes]

I'm currently reading Samuel Johnson's Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland written in 1775 and came upon this passage

We found in the course of our journey the convenience of having disencumbered ourselves, by laying aside whatever we could spare; for it is not to be imagined without experience, how in climbing crags, and treading bogs, and winding through narrow and obstructed passages, a little bulk will hinder, and a little weight will burthen; or how often a man that had placed himself at home with his own resolution, will, in the hour of darkness and fatigue, be content to leave behind him every thing but himself.

[dlovett]

My new hero!!

[PeterC]

On the other hand!

It is not my policy to rough it on the mountains unnecessarily, for hard times need no seeking; therefore in addition to much climbing equipment we were heavily laden with tent, sleeping bags, eggs, bacon- the luxuries of a comfort loving world, when hard tack and a couch on the heather might have served our turn as well. I kept remembering a certain climber who had lived in the Cairngorms on pease brose alone; at which I warned with indignation, telling myself that pseudo toughness had roots in laziness.
WH Murray. Mountaineering in Scotland Cir Mhor p139.

Edit. The chapter is of course Cir Mhor.
Just got to love " pseudo toughness had (has) roots in laziness."
P

[ScotRoutes]

#bemoresamuel

[voodoo_simon]

I take it climbers have never heard of full stops?!

[Bearbonesnorm]

242 years and people are still letting human nature get the better of them ... evolution, a slow process indeed

[Mariner]

Plus ca change

From the review of Shipton and Tilman.
The romantic alpinists who climbed mountains such as the Matterhorn and Wetterhorn gave way to larger expeditions; the British using their global status to overpower assorted peaks in Asia, Africa and South America. A group of sportsmen, usually chosen because of their skill at something like rowing or pig-sticking, would lay siege to a mountain with the help of hundreds of local porters, as if it were a military operation to establish full-spectrum dominance over the landscape, and when the summit had been stabbed by a Union flag, eat quails' eggs and pop champagne. The supplies taken on the victorious Everest ascent of 1953 "included mortars and bombs so that a feu de joie could be fired off when conquest was assured".
..........the ideal approach was the lightweight, heroic, low-impact strategy of Eric Shipton and Bill Tilman, the great climbing duo of the interwar years, and "the entire insouciant, happy-go-lucky, minimal and self-reliant style of their mountain vagabondage". Not entirely convincingly, he sees them poking the hidebound climbing establishment in the eye time and again. Although their style was cool-contemporary, living off bamboo shoots and forest mushrooms rather than tins of foie gras, they both came from the kind of background where a gentleman might take six months off to bag a peak.

[fatbikephil]

Herman Buhl's "Nanga Parbat Pilgrimage" is well worth a read and gives many insights into minimalist bivvying (usually on a narrow ledge)

[pistonbroke]

mountain vagabondage

Seems like a new apllication for gaffer tape