Yesterdays upon the Stairs

''Yesterdays upon the Stairs'' is a series of memories of walks/climbs and events undertaken by the author and/or members of his family. The memories arose as he reached particular heights in climbing the stairs at his home to a height the equivalent of Everest during the recent Covid lockdown; a task he set himself, aged 84, to delay, hopefully, the effects of Parkinson''s Disease. He and his family have found themselves in a variety of environments from burning deserts to Antarctic windswept cold and never turned down any given opportunity to climb any hill or mountain. The book presents his memories in three sections. The first section covers mountains/events in UK. His first walk up a mountain, Coniston Old Man, was aged 12 where he learned a salutary lesson; this is included along with later climbs with his wife and two young sons. Like the following sections, these records are presented in chronological order apart from the first, his most recent climb which he was forced to do, up a ladder and through his upstairs window, to gain entry to his otherwise locked house. He then describes his adventures with his wife and those of his two sons abroad. He remembers activities from North Norway to the Antarctic, from Canada and South America to Hong Kong via Europe, Africa, and the Middle East In the third section, the author recalls occasions in the Himalayas, in particular in Pakistan, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and West China. He mentions six excursions, one of which he organised and, although he himself did not reach the summit, made the first ascent of Lamjung Himal (22,911 ft, 6000m) at the eastern end of the Annapurna massif. He recounts events which happened whilst backpacking, accompanied by his wife, over 3,500 miles from Kathmandu in Nepal to Peshawar in Pakistan via Tibet and Western China. As he nears the end of his stair climb, he remembers, not for the first time, Noel Odell, to whom his wife is related, and the significant part he played in the 1924 Everest Expedition on which Mallory and Irvine disappeared. Finally, as he reaches the top of his stair climb, he again recalls the success of Hillary and Tenzing in 1953 which inspired him to make his own climb and which he records in the Introduction to the book. See more