Charlie Houston(and his own book zbout K2) is outstanding. I'll send a quote or two later-
here it is
" How can I phrase what seems to be the most important question of all? It is the chance to be briefly free of the small concerns of our common lives, to strip off nonessentials, to come down to the core of life itself. …On great mountains all purpose is concentrated on the single job at hand, yet the summit is but a token of success, and the attempt is worthy in itself."
Charles Houston in Houston and Bates,
K2 the Savage Mountain, page 24
Charlie Houston was famous for being part of the reconnaisance seeing the Western Cwm before Hillary and crew went up in 1953, for being one of the grandfathers of high altitude medicine - reporting HACE in the NEJM as a separate entity different from congestive heart failure, performing Operation Everest in hypobaric chambers for high altitude research and training of pilots to recognize hypoxia, and lastly, in his book reporting so eloquently how it felt on K2 during one of mountaineering's most famous accidents (and the belay by Pete Schoening holding the whole team) and the ill-fated attempt to rescue the dying Art Gilkey.
