Above: Geoffry Gledhill on Where Angels Fear to Tread - a climb he and his brother Alan put up in 1970. (Photo Credit: John Morris)
I guess I have always been attracted to climbing because my earliest memories are of growing up in Cornwall on the edge of a wartime airfield next to high sea cliffs. It was also a mining area and there were plenty of open mine shafts and precarious miner's pathways leading down the cliffs to sea level. In other words, plenty of scope for adventure.
I remember seeing the famous picture of the accident following the first ascent of the Matterhorn in a book at my grandmothers. That picture both horrified and fascinated me at the same time. Also at the time of the first ascent of Everest, there were quite a few mountaineering and rock climbing films to whet one's appetite.
Fast forward to 1966 and I heard about a VCC (Victoria Climbing Club) climbing course. It was a no brainer to enroll, and I have been climbing ever since. At first it was all about doing first ascents and exploring new cliffs in the Grampians and later Mt. Buffalo, with the odd trip interstate. Later mountaineering in New Zealand took my interest, and my brother Alan and I had some great adventures there.
As I entered my 60s family commitments were less and retirement from work was not far off, so I got back into alpine rock climbing and made many trips to Europe, Western Canada, the US and the arctic. I look back very fondly to that decade, as I made several ascents that I am most proud of during that time.
Now that I have far less climbing ahead of me than I have behind me, I still get immense satisfaction from moving over rock and enjoying the company of climbing friends.
Contributions to Common Climber:
I remember seeing the famous picture of the accident following the first ascent of the Matterhorn in a book at my grandmothers. That picture both horrified and fascinated me at the same time. Also at the time of the first ascent of Everest, there were quite a few mountaineering and rock climbing films to whet one's appetite.
Fast forward to 1966 and I heard about a VCC (Victoria Climbing Club) climbing course. It was a no brainer to enroll, and I have been climbing ever since. At first it was all about doing first ascents and exploring new cliffs in the Grampians and later Mt. Buffalo, with the odd trip interstate. Later mountaineering in New Zealand took my interest, and my brother Alan and I had some great adventures there.
As I entered my 60s family commitments were less and retirement from work was not far off, so I got back into alpine rock climbing and made many trips to Europe, Western Canada, the US and the arctic. I look back very fondly to that decade, as I made several ascents that I am most proud of during that time.
Now that I have far less climbing ahead of me than I have behind me, I still get immense satisfaction from moving over rock and enjoying the company of climbing friends.
Contributions to Common Climber: