Episodes

  • Mick Conefrey: Fallen – George Mallory | Podcast

    Mick Conefrey: Fallen – George Mallory | Podcast
    May 2 2024
    It is almost 100 years since climbers, George Mallory and Sandy Irvine, vanished into the clouds high on Mount Everest and were never seen alive again. Their disappearance sparked the greatest mystery in mountaineering. We will never know if they reached the summit and exactly what caused their fateful accident. Listen to Mick talking about his new book, Fallen, Mick Coneferey, as he tells his intriguing version of the story. Mick Conefrey is an award-winning writer and documentary maker. He made the landmark BBC series Mountain Men, Icemen and The Race for Everest to mark the 60th anniversary of the first ascent. His previous books include Everest 1922, Everest 1953, the winner of a LeggiMontagna award, The Last Great Mountain, the winner of the Premio Itas in 2023, and The Ghosts of K2, which won a US National Outdoor Book award in 2017. George Mallory In the years following his disappearance, Mallory was elevated into an all-British hero. Dubbed by his friends the 'Galahad' of Everest, he was lionised in the press as the greatest mountaineer of his generation who had died while taking on the ultimate challenge. Handsome, charismatic, daring, he was a skilled public speaker, an athletic and technically gifted climber, a committed Socialist and a supremely attractive figure to both men and women. His friends ranged from the gay artists and writers of the Bloomsbury group to the best mountaineers of his era. But that was only one side to him. Mallory was also a risk taker who according to his friend and biographer David Pye, could never get behind the wheel of a car without overtaking the vehicle in front, a climber who pushed himself and those around him to the limits, a chaotic technophobe who was forever losing equipment or mishandling it, the man who led his porters to their deaths in 1922 and his young partner to his uncertain end in 1924. George Mallory and Sandy Irvine So who was the real Mallory and what were the forces that made him and ultimately destroyed him? Why did the man who denounced oxygen sets as 'damnable heresy' in 1922 perish on an oxygen-powered summit attempt two years later? And above all, what made him go back to Everest for the third time? Based on diaries, letters, memoirs and thousands of contemporary documents, Fallen is both a forensic account of Mallory's last expedition to Everest in 1924 and an attempt to get under his skin and separate the man from the myth.
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  • John McLellan: Unconformity | Podcast

    John McLellan: Unconformity | Podcast
    Apr 26 2024
    Listen to John McLellan talking about his new novel, Unconformity. In his second novel, John McLellan continues his love affair with the wild landscape of the Highlands. A geologist at heart, John's books combine his deep understanding of the bones beneath the landscape with his sensitivity to its influence on the human heart. Get your copy HERE ‘Unconformity’ is a standalone novel, but readers of his debut novel ‘The Faultline’ will also enjoy some continuation of the characters and their journey. Set over four summers, initially in The Alps and then across the North West Highlands, we see the inner turmoil of the characters unfold. Life will change for some of them, as they head off on a different and unprecedented path. The novel is about friendships, affection and love, with a continual background of mountains and rocks. We discover the significance of a geological unconformity, not just as an important historical discovery but also as a metaphor for understanding a life. The characters weave their way through relationships as the story moves from the glacial terrain of Chamonix into the spectacular and ancient scenery of Loch Eriboll, Assynt and Torridon. Loch Eriboll Read my comic novel, Sky Dance, set against the challenges facing the battle for rewilding in the Highlands of Scotland. Get your copy HERE
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  • Harold Raeburn – The Steps of a Giant: Peter Biggar | Podcast

    Harold Raeburn – The Steps of a Giant: Peter Biggar | Podcast
    Apr 13 2024
    Harold Raeburn is acknowledged as the father of Scottish mountaineering. At the dawn of the twentieth century he was pushing the boundaries of what was possible on the ice wreathed cliffs of the Scottish mountains and later in the Himalayas. Listen to author, Peter Biggar, talk about his new book, Harold Raeburn- The Steps of a Giant and his quest to chronicle the life and achievements of this enigmatic figure whose name will be written forever on the face of Scottish climbing. Raeburn was not a climber who sought to publicise his achievements and only wrote about them in very modest terms. For this reason, as Peter explains in the interview, researching the book was often difficult and the author frequently had to rely on the accounts of Raeburn's contemporary's. Peter Biggar author Harold Raeburn As Scottish Mountaineering Press, the book's publishers, explains the background to the book. In feats of extraordinary vitality, he made winter ascents of Tower Ridge, North-East Buttress and Crowberry Gully in four days, cycling from Fort William to Glencoe in between. His breath taking ascent of Green Gully, cutting steps up near-vertical ice with a single axe, was doubtless the hardest ice climb anywhere at the time and was unsurpassed in difficulty in Scotland for nearly three decades. But perhaps Raeburn’s finest achievement was the first winter ascent in 1920 of Observatory Ridge, which remains one of Ben Nevis’s longest and most serious winter climbs. These routes, amongst so many others, were visionary, while beyond Scotland, he pioneered climbs in the Alps, Norway and the Caucasus, attempted Kangchenjunga and was Climbing Leader on the calamitous 1921 British Mount Everest Reconnaissance Expedition. Tragically, the latter was to be his undoing, precipitating a ‘melancholia’ that had perhaps, to some degree, dogged him all his life. With extracts from Raeburn’s own elegant writings and accounts from his friends and climbing companions, The Steps of a Giant is an intimate portrait of a master craftsman, chronicling his outstanding mountaineering record while digging beneath the surface of his modest reserve to reveal a complex, driven character upon whose shoulders subsequent generations of climbing luminaries stand. SMP This is an important book and one which rightfully holds its place in the history of Scottish Mountaineering. John D Burns
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  • Alan Hepburn: The drive to Re-wild Scotland | Podcast

    Alan Hepburn: The drive to Re-wild Scotland | Podcast
    Apr 2 2024
    Listen to Alan Hepburn talking about Scotland's rewilding journey. Alan is a life-long environmentalist, who fought for a moratorium on whale hunting in the early eighties and today faces urgent challenges to reverse biodiversity decline and combat climate change. A teacher and a trustee of SCOTLAND: The Big Picture, Scotland's rewilding charity, he works to ensure that young people have their voice heard when discussing the future of the natural environment in Scotland. SCOTLAND: The Big Picture has just released an exciting new film Why Not Scotland. The film asks an important question about the future of Scotland: - Across mainland Europe, nature is making a dramatic recovery. Wildlife is returning, forests are expanding, rivers are being set free and wetlands restored. As nature bounces back, people are returning too, finding new economic opportunities and enjoying the many benefits of a revitalised landscape. https://youtu.be/3qogJE4sqtw So, if rewilding can happen in Italy, Germany, Poland and Norway, could Scotland be next? As this new film launches I thought it would be good to ask Alan where he thinks we are in this journey. Alan Hepburn John D. Burns - If you walk in the hills of Scotland, as I do, you'll know that there are vast swathes of landscape laid waste as Driven Grouse moors or or kept as barren sporting estates for the sport of rich men who enjoy stalking deer. Sometimes I find myself losing heart when I think about the sheer scale of the task involved in re-introducing the wild into this enormous landscape. It is easy to forget what has been achieved and to overlook the big plans for Scotland's future that groups like SCOTLAND: The Big Picture are campaigning for. In all this destruction I sometimes have to make myself remember that things are changing. There are beaver living in the rivers of Scotland, something that has not happened for over three hundred years. You can go to the Island of Mull and see the great outstretched wings of a Sea Eagle sweeping across the Sound of Mull. All this could support a thriving economy based on sustainable projects that could revitalise many parts of the Highlands. WHY NOT SCOTLAND This is my novel, Sky Dance, that raises many of the issues Alan and I spoke about. Get your copy here Get your copy of this fascinating and important book here
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  • Sarah Lister: Kinder Scout | Podcast

    Sarah Lister: Kinder Scout | Podcast
    Feb 29 2024
    Kinder Scout is an iconic hill in Derbyshire. Love it or loath it you can't ignore it. Listen to Sarah Lister talking about her new book on 15 best walks on Kinder.
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  • Fort William Mountain Festival: Anna Danby | Podcast

    Fort William Mountain Festival: Anna Danby | Podcast
    Jan 18 2024
    Anna Danby talks about the huge range of activities and events available at Fort William Mountain Festival
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  • Heather Dawe: Dreams of lost Buttresses | Podcast

    Heather Dawe: Dreams of lost Buttresses | Podcast
    Dec 8 2023
    Listen to heather Dawe talking about her new book of short stories, Dreams of Lost Buttresses.
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  • Harrison Ward: Cook Out | Podcast

    Harrison Ward: Cook Out | Podcast
    Nov 21 2023
    Have you ever been on a trek and looked at your meal of highly processed dehydrated food and thought, "Is there a way I can eat better than this?" Most of us wouldn't consider eating the type of food we find in our rucksacks on a long hike when we were at home. When hiking we sacrifice taste and freshness for light weight convenience. In his new book, Cook Out, chef and hiker, Harrison Ward, proves that you can eat well in the hills. For Harrison Ward, otherwise known as Fell Foodie, the mountains are his solace, his gym and his kitchen. Harrison Ward Although a self-taught cook, Harrison’s journey to leading a life and career as an outdoor cook, hiker and mental health speaker only began in 2016 when he reached a point where he knew he needed to turn his life around. Harrison began suffering from depression and suicidal thoughts during puberty and discovered alcohol, whilst working in multiple roles in the hospitality trade, as a coping mechanism. A move to York followed for a stint at university but Harrison soon found himself back in the pub trade and subsequently ballooning in weight, drinking up to 20 pints a day and taking up smoking full time as he battled his mental illness. "I saw alcohol as an additional tool to silence my thoughts, but it ended up becoming a bit more of a poison,” says Harrison. "Things all came to a head in 2016, when my relationship at the time broke down. I vowed to get sober, remove alcohol from my life, stop smoking and really try and turn things around. So I came back to my home in Cumbria and was completely open with my story to friends and family and was really welcomed with a huge show of support.” He filled the void left by alcohol with the combination of hiking and cooking, gradually tackling more and more of the Lake District fells. “I'm completely self-taught but I have always loved cooking from a very young age. I used to cook with my grandmother and from the age of 10 I’ve studied cookbooks and cooking shows quite religiously.” Harrison began sharing his culinary adventures via social media in 2017 and soon captured people’s imaginations, using a stove and simple ingredients to create hearty but delicious meals. After being sober for two years in 2018, Harrison shared the full background to his story with his followers, including how he had lived with mental health issues and struggled with alcohol. "The outpouring of support I received was huge and I found it really empowering and I uncovered lots of other stories of people who have found the outdoors to try and recover." follow Harrison https://youtu.be/bKZSRtAx74w?si=8IO-vHqHFvN3kJ71
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