As I strain my eyes a little, I can barely make out the outline of the cable car station about 200 meters away through the thick snowstorm. I am at 3,900 metres on the mountain. The weather set in quickly and it is the end of the ski day at Saas-Fee in Switzerland. Precisely the time when most accidents in the mountains happen. The last cable car to the bottom of the mountain is in 10 minutes. I trudge back up through the snow to the casualty. Through the thick grey, I see a small, crumpled figure being covered every second by the relentless heavy downfall. The child’s leg is broken. He is slipping into shock, growing pale, cold, and unconscious.
My mind is fogged for a moment as I think back on the unsettling comment from a skier that morning as I was getting out of the cable car. “I love this colour,” he said, while touching my cheek. “You’re the only one of you out here”.
I probably was. The whole year I’d been living and working in the French and Swiss Alps I’d seen one other black person out ski mountaineering. It was a hilarious moment in itself: me trudging uphill and him whizzing downhill, both of us waving frantically at each other, clearly ecstatic to see one another. This moment in the cable car, when I was petted like an exotic beast, felt patronising and threw me off kilter, stealing my confidence.
In the last few years, I rediscovered the majesty of the outdoors. Ironically, it was when I was living in a big city when I began climbing. In the inner city bouldering gyms, I developed a taste for bigger adventures and, spending every penny I earnt from my wage as an emergency nurse, began travelling to the Alps and finding new opportunities.
Bu hikaye Adventure Magazine dergisinin August 2021 sayısından alınmıştır.
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Bu hikaye Adventure Magazine dergisinin August 2021 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
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The RELUCTANT adventurer
An eighteen-year-old princess, who paints his (yes, his) nails and dyes his hair bleach blonde, embarking on an adventure trip with his family, sounds like a plot for a bad 80s movie.
The Meaning of Tramping
What does tramping mean to you?
Keala Kennelly owns Red Bull Magnitude
The North Shore season of 1957 is recognized in the surfing world as the start of an era. When Greg Noll, a young Mickey Munoz and company went out and rode Waimea for the first time, it was a glimpse of what could be in the world of big-wave surfing.
North West Circuit Stewart Island
I found myself in limbo during the winter of 2020, in between jobs in a strained covid economy. And so, I did what any outdoors person would do with a large amount of free time on their hands. It was time to pack up my belongings and hit the road. It was time to leave behind home comforts and go adventure-seeking.
Emilie's adventure to Angelus Hut
“I want to be the leader!” Miss Six announced, pushing past me in her determination to be in front. Momentarily off-balance with my heavy pack, I narrowly avoided twisting an ankle on the sharp rocks and silently swore while cracking a bright smile.
Nancy Jiang Breaking stereotypes
I recently watched a youtube movie entitled, “Her Way” (check it out on the Adventure Website) which introduced a woman who had an overwhelming passion for running. The preface at the bottom of the clip, read as follows:
Adversity at Altitude
The wind and snow is whipping at my face. I’ve readjusted the stiff frozen fleece buff around my neck and mouth, desperately trying to protect myself from the -20 degree bitter wind. Adrenaline is still pumping through my body but I know I’ll start to get cold soon.
Last Great Mountaineering Challenge
Ground-breaking mountaineer Nirmal ‘Nims’ Purja MBE has attained an incredible new world record by submitting K2 as part of a collaborative team in the depths of winter. Until now, it was a record that was believed to be impossible to accomplish and was famously known as the ‘last great mountaineering challenge’.
