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Article in the SMH 25-Dec-2008 At 11:19:50 AM Epic Steve

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I was at Mt Cook, in the hut with the Vinars and knew them for a few days. Yes they made a fatal error in their choice of route, considering the current conditions, their knowledge of the area and their current experience/fitness level...Shite happens and they paid the price for it...the fact that they were climbing UNGUIDED has nothing to do with the accident. No guide has taken clients up Zurbriggen's for years...for it (Zurbriggen's) to be climbed fast it has to be soloed for much of its length...so a bit hard walking the dog on a leash on a 50 - 55 degree snow slope for 1000 metres...

As for Kelly, and his blatant pushing of his equally shite book (yeh, I read about 40 pages before donating it to the local lifeline bin...!), a couple of the guys in Plateau Hut spent time with KK in the Upper Tasman Glacier area of Cook, and noted he was the biggest loser that they had ever met...continually hosing off about his abilities and his book and how everyone in the hut should buy it as they would all be better off for it...vomit!!! Guides are great and they do an awesome job...but anyone who tells me they conquered Aoraki or Tititea with a guide, is pulling your chain. They won't tell you a guide dragged them up the hill...will they??? No...it'll be I did this and I did that... Most guides are trained to drag people to the top of a mountain who probably shouldn't really be there in the first place (aka Everest!!!)...given enough time and pre trip training, anyone can be dragged up a big hill, even Mt Cook...many Japanese pay for two guides (NZ$10,000...!!!) to do this...cause they usually trip over on the footpath outside the Hermitage Hotel at Mount Cook Village!!!

Climbing alone in the hills with just your climbing partner and the bond that comes with that is also priceless...the decision making, trust and dependence that you have with each other could only be likened to the comaraderie of battle...you need to use your skills, judgement, experience, fitness and throw in a small dash of good luck (even renowned guides die in the hills...sometimes with their clients!!!). The guys made their choice (after receiving sound advise from others in the hut who were not guides but had done the route in question...) and it went bad for them. That's life...I bet they don't write a book about it!!! I can't wait to read KK's thrilling account of climbing Mt Kosciosko (guided of course...) and all the perils that it entails...will be riveting stuff!!! NOT!!!

Go and climb, yes get skilled up, get experience, get instruction...but sooner or later you will have to let the guides hand go and just climb for yourself...start out easy and build your experience up...then you will know WHY!!!

Steve