There are two much-thumbed ‘bibles’ in my house: Ken
Wilson’s ever-inspiring Classic Rock;
and the nearest thing to pornography I’ve ever put on proud display in my
living room: The Mont Blanc Massif: The
hundred finest routes by the revered Gaston Rébuffat. Sad though it may
seem, an evening with one of these on my lap, a fire roaring and half decent
red is about as good a night as I can wish for.
And if I ever get to climb even a third of the routes in both books I’ll
be a happy man.
But the Mont Blanc book is definitely becoming dated. The
latest edition required editor’s notes in places where things had changed
radically. And there have also been some great new lines/routes added since the
great Frenchman graced the rock and ice with so much style. So I was pretty damned excited to see a new book taking over
where the last had left off. And Mont
Blanc: The finest routes by Phillipe Batoux certainly sets its stall out to
do this – as if swinging leads effortlessly with an older, steadier partner.
So how does the new offering compare? Like the original it’s a fairly large hard cover, coffee
table book that will be used more for inspiration than as a guidebook. The photography is awesome – you almost need to chalk up
just to look at the front cover. And this theme continues through the whole
book. The shots, all in colour, may lack the romantic, pioneering feel of some
of the black & white masterpieces of the Rébuffat book but they instead show
the audacious nerve and vision of a more modern alpine era, all set against one
of the finest backdrops in the world.
The layout is tidy and easy to follow, and many routes have
well-drawn topos to assist in working out the complexity of the lines. As eluded to earlier, it’s not designed to be a guidebook but
an inspiration, though it certainly gives all the relevant information for each
route. It’s odd that the traditional Alpine gradings e.g. AD, PD etc. have been
dropped. They may be subjective but I always find them a good starting point. But
they are easy enough to check in other guidebooks and at least the rock
gradings, ice gradings and mixed gradings are stated as are slope angles where
relevant.
My only real disappointment with the book is more down to my
modest ability than the author’s work. And that’s the way the grades have crept
upwards.
Both books list the climbs in order of seriousness/difficulty but the
new book is definitely weighted towards much harder climbing with classic ticks
like the North Face of the Tour Ronde relegated from 35th in the
Rébuffat book to 14th in Phillipe Batoux’s; or the Frontier (Küffner) Ridge on
Mont Maudit drops from 50th to a lowly 31st.This significantly reduces the number of routes featured
that I’ll ever get to tick.
But in its favour, it also introduces some ‘new classics’
and that will be its real strength. There are plenty of routes, across the
grade range, in here that aren’t in the Rébuffat book and that will ease
traffic slightly on the established honeypots and inspire climbers to look
beyond the most heavily worn tracks.
In conclusion, this is a beautiful book and a real work of
art. If you are a sucker for books like this and love the Mont Blanc range like
I do, you’ll definitely want to add this to your worn-out original.
If you don’t own the original and your sights are modest,
the Rébuffat volume will probably give you more to aim at and at the same time do
more to immerse you in the heritage of one of the greatest alpine pioneers.
But if you don’t own either and you’re climbing to a pretty
high standard – say D or above – and plan on aiming higher, this would
definitely be the one for you and it will captivate and inspire for years to
come......Stunning.
Mont Blanc-The Finest routes available direct from Vertebrate Publishing.
Mont Blanc-The Finest routes available direct from Vertebrate Publishing.
Tom Hutton:2013
