UKC

Just read this piece on Mont Blanc,

http://news.sky.com/story/mont-blanc-tourists-treating-mountain-like-theme-...

I've had the immense pleasure of looking at the mountain from the Brevent while walking the GR5 and I concur the mountain is briliant and mysterious, but the problems with in-experienced people being on the mountain must surely co-inside with the 'Tryfan effect' 1) close by the road, 2) in Mont Blancs case - a cable car can get you up there and 3) Hey, you can walk down as well and have a coffee afterwards - that's if you don't fall off on the way down !!!

L

In reply to lone:

It's not the Tryfan effect, it's the media effect where TV and films show people teleporting up mountains with no apparent effort in perfect weather. I'm embarrassed to admit that I once watched that Stallone film Cliffhanger and I thought the instant movement of characters from the base to the summit would strain the belief of even the most gullible viewer but perhaps some believed it possible.

In reply to Rigid Raider:


Are you saying that you can't?

In reply to lone:

Mate and I descended the Trois Monts after doing the Kuffner Ridge a week or so back, and we saw people un-roped, people not wearing helmets, people only carrying walking poles instead of ice axes. Loads of muppets beginning the ascent up Mt. Blanc du Tacul (heavily threatened by serac collapse and high avalanche risk) at 11/12 o'clock in the middle of the day in boiling hot weather. The bottom of the slope is littered with blocks of ice and debris - where do they think it comes from???

Utterly clueless.

In reply to Rigid Raider:

My favourite quote from Cliffhanger, just as one of the villains had made a rapid and unplanned descent - "Gravity's a bitch."
Agree with the Tryfan effect. It's spring in the valley and still winter on the tops.
Dave

In reply to lone:
This will degenerate into a slanging match.
There's always some knob who thinks he's elite and will look down his nose at people making an effort. I've seen this first hand when I started out on the hills.
The next thread will be' Everest.The Mont Blanc effect' comparing people who can safely do Mont Blanc but are a liability on Everest
Not a dig at your thread bud.