Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Maurice Herzog Dead at 93: "Maurice Your Hands"

Just read that Maurice Herzog died. For those of you not familiar with his name, he was the leader of the French climbing team that successfully climbed Annapurna in 1950. This was the lst climb of an 8,000 meter peak and was 3 years prior to the Everest climb. His book Annapurna is an exciting read and follows Herzog and Louis Lachenal as they summit and are saved on the descent by fellow climbers Lionel Terray and Gaston Rebuffat when all are forced to spend the night high on the peak. I highly recommend the book as it is a classic and was a Book of the Month Club Selection. The quote refers to Terray's horror in seeing that Herzog's hands are frozen solid. Herzog lost all his toes and most of his fingers.

Read about that expedition many times.
It influenced many a young climber.
Sorry to hear that he has passed on...

"Annapurna, to which we had gone empty-handed, was a treasure on which we should live the rest of our days," Herzog

I read his book many years ago when I was fourteen. Yes, I was one influenced by Maurice Herzog and his climbing created new facets in my fascination with the mountains.


http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obitua...na-8418156.html

He was great guy.
Here is the interesting list with age in parentheses):

Guido Magnone 1917 - 2012 (95)
Roger Frison Roche 1906 - 1999 (93)
Maurice Herzog 1919 - 2012 (93)
Anderl Heckmair 1906 - 2005 (99)
Edmund Hillary 1919 - 2008 (89)
Heinrich Harrer 1912 - 2006 (94)
Ardito Desio 1897 - 2001 (104), one of the people who lived in 19., 20. in 21. century!
Brad Washburn 1910 - 2007 (97)
Charlie Houston 1913 - 2009 (96)
Bob Bates - 1911 - 2007 (96)
Riccardo Cassin 1909 - 2009 (100)
Arne Naess 1912 - 2009 (97)
Leni Riefenstahl 1901-2003 (102)
Rafael Carless - 1908 - 2000 (92)
Walter Bonatti 1930 - 2011 (81)
Georges Livanos 1922 - 2004 (82)
Gino Solda 1907 - 1989 (82)
Bruno Detassis 1910 - 2008 (98)

Japanese alpinist Yuchiro Miura (80) is getting ready to try Everest again ...

wow- some famous names there.
wonder how many youth's deaths there are to balance that?

but what is living? here is a thought-provoking quote:

But no journalist wrote about the banality of city life or how easy it is to become another automaton paying bills and working nine to five and being so removed from the primary necessities of life and so far from real fear and natural beauty and human instinct that when death finally approaches in some antiseptic white room, just as you have been waiting for it, you sense that you have already been dead for years.
Jonathan Waterman, In The Shadow of Denali, page 246

Harvey

A great book written by Mr. Herzog about that adventure.