News & Blog - Recent

Now taking bookings for winter 10/11. Contact Heason Events for details if you would like to host: matt@heason.net or subscribe to be kept in touch of events.

Book all three to create your own winter series and qualify for a discounted rate.

Johnny Dawes
Johnny, arguably the most gifted British climber of all time, has finally written a book about his life. He will be touring this winter giving readings. Johnny Dawes, often referred to as a living legend, first starting climbing when he was 14 and soon established a reputation as an innovative and bold climber. In 1986 he introduced the first E8 and E9 climbs to the UK with Indian Face and Gaia, respectively. These and Quarryman (E8, 7a/b) are iconic masterpieces. For those interested, the book will be launched / premiered at the Alpine Club in London on Nov 9th. Anybody interested in advance orders should contact Johnny directly info@johnnydawes.com
Dates: November 10th to Dec 9th – other dates available on request

Ian Parnell
"Views from the Edge” - The beauty and battles of extreme mountaineering Britain's leading alpinist-photographer Ian Parnell presents his brand new show. An exploration of the limits of adventure from the remote Himalaya to the romantic north west of Scotland, coupled with his recollections of climbing with real life heroes Major Phil Packer and Sir Ranulph Fiennes. Mixing unique film footage with his world renowned photography to bring the thrills and spills of high-risk mountaineering alive. A show not to miss.
Dates: Flexible

Reel Rock Film Tour
The best in climbing films from around the world.
THE PROGRAM (total approx. running time 98 mins) - FIRST HALF: 5 Minutes: Opening introduction action montage with sponsor ads - 6 Minutes: REEL ROCK Filmmaking Competition (2) winning films - 12 Minutes: The Hardest Move — Daniel Woods and Paul Robinson compete to climb the hardest boulders ever scaled. An inside look at what it takes to push the difficulty envelope of this intense sport - 15 Minutes: Origins: The Hulk — Peter Croft and Lisa Rands attempt a wild free ascent on the Incredible Hulk Wall in the Sierras – arguably America's best (and least filmed) alpine rock wall. Peter, the most legendary of California's crack masters mentors the renowned boulderer Lisa as she pushes into alpine traditional climbing terrain - 10 Minutes: Tasmanian Devils — A once-in-a-lifetime adventure expedition for first ascents on the wild sea cliffs of outer Tasmania - 15 Minutes: Fly or Die — Dean Potter continues his extreme vertical exploration, opening new freeBASE climbs, along with highline and wingsuit jumps in some of the most mind-blowing vertical footage ever captured - INTERMISSION: (5-15 minutes) - SECOND HALF: 35 Minutes: Ueli Steck – the greatest speed alpinist the world has ever seen – tells the stories of his record-breaking ascents in the Alps, accompanied by stunning aerial footage of him racing up 8,000 foot alpine faces. Ueli also joins the likes of Alex Honnold in Yosemite to attempt speed records there. His ultimate goal: take his one-man alpine speed game to the largest, highest walls in the world.
Dates: Flexible

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AUGUST 28TH - THE GREAT CLIMB, BBC2 SCOTLAND

The Great Climb is back. Dave MacLeodand Tim Emmett will be featuring in a six hour live outside broadcast on BBC2 Scotland, BBC HD Channel and streamed live on the BBC website. They are going to attempt a hard new route on Sron Uladail on the Isle of Harris. Also in the program will be the Triple Five challenge of five new routes on five Hebridean Islands in five days, which was filmed in June. UPDATE: Broadcast starts at 1:30pm on Saturday 28th August 2010. It will be shown on BBC2 Scotland and Sky 990 1.30pm-7pm, BBC HD channel 5pm-7pm, streamed live on the BBC website and available on the BBC iplayer.

SEPTEMBER 26th - ASGARD PROJECT GETS TV BROADCAST

We've just received confirmation that The Asgard Project is scheduled for TV broadcast in the UK on Sunday the 26th Sept at 9pm on Discovery's new freeview channel Quest. Get it in your diaries, tell your mum, dad, friends, pets, family and everyone you meet....

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 Check out the brand new gallery from world renowned BASE Jumper Douggs.

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Leo Houlding and Mick Fowler will give a series of lectures this winter as part of the Berghaus Adventure Tour. Details. 

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 For some reason I'd ignored this particular book my folks had recommended for some time. I can't tell you why. Perhaps it was the cover which isn't inspiring. Perhaps its the main title which does a good job of masking the subtitle and what the book is really about. I finally picked it up a couple of weeks ago and finished it on the train back home today. 

Three Cups Of Tea is a book about an American mountaineer called Greg Mortenson. His name was familiar to me from the days I used to write the news for planetFear. I even received an email from somebody else who read the book and contacted me to see about organising a lecture tour for Greg over here in the UK. He was obviously moved by the book in a similar manner to me. Frustratingly I can't find the email to follow up on, but I will certainly be contacting Greg at some point to discuss doing some lectures here in the UK. Anyway, Greg was coming down off K2 after a failed attempt to climb the second highest mountain in the world when he ended up, quite by accident, in a very remote village way off the beaten track (he was lost). He fell in love with the place and pledged to go back to the States and raise $12,000 which was how much money he and the village elders had decided would be necessary to build a school there. Through sheer dedication, hard work, and doggedness he set up the Central Asian Institute (a strange name really given it's similarity to the CIA, a very distrusted agency in the very part of the world that it seeks to do good!) and has arguably done more for fighting the war on terror than the trillions of dollars the US and other countries have spent on their military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. How? By building schools and concentrating on educating young girls in Pakistan and, more recently, Afghanistan. 

A mind-blowing book about a truly inspirational man. I'd be interested to know how many of us Brits have heard of him and what he is doing. Read the book and make up your own mind.

Here's a recent BBC radio interview with Greg.

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