The best mountain climbing in the world, Steve Swenson will tell you, is in
\nthe Karakoram. Swenson has been climbing in these mountains since 1980 and has
\na perspective on the land and its people like few others. A complex place, the
\nKarakoram Range is located in Kashmir, a western Himalaya border region that
\nhas a long history of tension and conflict between China, India, and Pakistan,
\ntensions that have only been magnified since 9\/11. Over the course of more
\nthan thirty years climbing there, Swenson\u2019s experiences have been laced with
\ndaunting challenges, exhilarating successes, and terrifying moments\u2014caused by
\nthe risks inherent in alpine environments, as well as politics below spilling
\ninto the peaks above.<\/p>\n
Swenson writes evocatively of his naivet\u00e9 on his first visit to Pakistan for
\nan attempt on Gasherbrum IV, during which he faced the teeming, bewildering
\nstreets of Islamabad and new challenges of dealing with a confusing array of
\nbureaucrats, hiring hundreds of porters desperate for work, as well as the
\nbusiness of attempting to climb a towering peak just shy of 8,000 meters. By
\n2015 when he invited climbers to join him on an attempt of K6, Swenson had
\nbecome the old-hand; it was his familiarity with the region that got them
\nthrough the planning, the trek, and the climb.<\/p>\n
Even as he managed a busy career and family at home, Swenson returned to the
\nregion more than a dozen times, making attempts on well known giants such as
\nK2, Everest, and Nanga Parbat, as well as other, less familiar, peaks. While
\nhe often succeeded, he was often turned back, forced from the mountains by
\nweather, failed logistics, fractured team dynamics, or unexpected skirmishes
\nin the region. What drew him, again and again, was that he always learned
\nsomething new and forged strong bonds with his climbing partners, including
\nDoug Scott, Alex Lowe, Steve House, and others. Stronger still became his
\nfriendship with Haji Ghulam Rasool, a local Balti man whom he first met as a
\nyoung cook in 1984. Rasool and other Pakistanis have served as Swenson\u2019s
\nwindow on this restive region, revealing how territorial conflicts can affect
\nnot just international climbing expeditions, but also the day-to-day
\nlivelihood of the local people.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The best mountain climbing in the world, Steve Swenson will tell you, is in the Karakoram. Swenson has been climbing in these mountains since 1980 and has a perspective on the land and its people like few others. A complex place, the Karakoram Range is located in Kashmir, a western Himalaya border region that has […]\n","protected":false},"featured_media":27351,"template":"","meta":[],"product_brand":[],"product_cat":[21542],"product_tag":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-149094","1":"product","2":"type-product","3":"status-publish","4":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"product_cat-sachbuecher-dokumentationen","7":"pa_autor-swenson","8":"pa_erscheinungsjahr-21574","9":"pa_region-asien","10":"pa_sprache-en","12":"first","13":"instock","14":"taxable","15":"shipping-taxable","16":"purchasable","17":"product-type-simple"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product\/149094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/product"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"product_brand","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_brand?post=149094"},{"taxonomy":"product_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_cat?post=149094"},{"taxonomy":"product_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pizbube.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_tag?post=149094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}