We are all climbing where we are and with the gear we use in no small part due to Tony Howards quest for adventure.Tony Howard rose to fame in 1965 as a member of a group of young climbers from northern England who made the first British ascent of Norways Troll Wall; a climb described by Joe Brown as, One of the greatest ever achievements by British rock climbers. Tony went on to design the modern sit harness, now used worldwide by most climbers. He founded the company Troll Climbing Equipment but never stopped exploring. Quest into the Unknown is his story.Tony has dedicated his life to travelling the world in search of unclimbed rock faces and remote trekking adventures. The scale of his travels is vast: he has visited all of the North African countries, much of the Arab land of the Middle East, the mountainous regions of Scandinavia, Canada and the rocky spine of the Americas, the Himalaya, remote Indian provinces, South East Asia, Madagascar, South Georgia and Antarctica. This book, the last word in adventure travel, takes the reader from Tonys youth spent developing the crags of the English Peak District, via whaling ships in the Southern Ocean, thousand-mile canoe trips in the Canadian Arctic, living amongst the Bedouin in the rocky mountains of Jordan, to the isolated opium tribes of Thailand.Tony Howards Quest into the Unknown is the jaw-dropping account of a life of adventure that is the very definition of true exploration.
Norway, 1965. A team of young climbers from the north of England camp at the bottom of the tallest vertical rock face in Europe - the Troll Wall. No one has dared attempt this gigantic challenge before. Some say it will never be climbed. This will be the adventure of a lifetime. Rain and snow soak them as they climb. Avalanches and loose rock threaten their lives. A Norwegian team arrives to compete for the glory as the worlds media look on. Pushed to the limits of exhaustion, the team spends days on the wall, refusing to given in, even when failure seems certain. "Troll Wall" tells the gripping story of one of the most dramatic first ascents in British climbing history. Written days after their success, almost half a century ago, and newly rediscovered, Tony Howards account is a fascinating insight into the challenges of climbing a big mountain wall.
Pluto in Libra and Scorpio is Volume 3 in a series of astrological essays from some of astrologys leading lights.In this essay, Tony Howard looks at the two astrological generations (197184 and 198495) who are transforming relationships on a personal and global level. Included are short profiles of pop culture icons Britney Spears and Lady Gaga.
Lightning hit the cliff high above us, sending a dumper-load of rocks thrumming like jagged cannonballs out of the clouds to explode around us. Bill took a direct hit on his helmet, which was smashed. He hung limply and silently on the rope. His face, which was streaming with blood from a gash in his head, was a ghastly shade of white. For a horrible moment, we thought he was dead, but he came round slowly. We suggested bivouacking until he recovered but Bill, who always thrived in adversity, was having none of it. Having bandaged his head and reversed his helmet so that the hole in it wasnt over the hole in his head, and at his insistence bunged a fag in his mouth to keep him happy, we continued into the storm up the last 300 metres of the snow covered cliff. We emerged triumphantly over the cornice into the blizzard and whiteout, another first ascent in the bag. Adventures in the Northlands is a collection of short stories written by British adventurer and mountaineer Tony Howard. From a life spent in the mountains and wilderness, Tony recalls epic tales of climbing, kayaking and adventure from Greenland, the kon and, his home-from-home, Norway. Journey with Tony into some of the most incredible wild places on earth. Vertebrate Mountain Shorts are collections of mountaineering, climbing, adventure and wilderness writing, published as ebooks and intended to be read in one go. Written by some of the worlds leading outdoor adventure authors, they include rare, previously out of print and exciting new works. Vertebrate Mountain Shorts will always be inspirational, direct and to the point.