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ARMY MOUNTAINEER!
THE JOURNAL OF
THE ARMY MOUNTAINEERING ASSOCIATION
Autumn 1995
Message from The Editor
Major PL Fish RLC
If the mountain will not come to Mohammed. Mohammed must go to the mountain. Those words were true enough prior to the days of printing and photography. Today it is true to say,
“if we cannot, through pressure of work or other ties, go to the mountain, we must make it come to us”.
One way - and it is the best - is to summon our mountain back with the help of those who have special powers of doing so, the com panions who have climbed with us. If mountains have filled hours of your life in which body and spirit were at their best, the friends who have shared those hours always bring with them something that restores the freshness, however distant your adventures seem. All sorts of memories are invisibly present when you greet them; the anxieties and discomforts endured in mist and storm and in the gathering darkness; the times of stress on steep rocks or ice and the relief of triumph that followed; for some the sudden intrusion of death. These are the best of forces that join people together, the communion in silent contemplation of things so great that the dif ferences that separate us from each other are as nothing.
If you can neither go to the mountain nor have a friend beside you whose mere presence brings them back, their remains another way, third best only, but often a pleasant and effective way, that is to read of adventures however great or small that have been under taken. With your feet before the fire, or safe in bed, you may let those who have been under the enhancement of the mountains try to describe to you the nature of their spell.
I hope that some at least of these pages may prove a magic carpet that takes you to the places where you would be, whether the local crags and mountains or the great ranges of the world.
It is a year since I became the journal editor and I do not intend to commence an editorial, however, I have to mention one specific area. Over the last year I have been fortunate to meet many mem bers and they have commented that too many articles on the greater ranges are included in the journal and few on small exer cises and local adventures. The answer I always give is simple, I can only publish the articles I receive. Therefore, you are all asked to put pen to paper about your adventures, include some slides and photographs, and send them to me.
The Army Mountaineer is published for The Army Mountaineering Association by
Crest Publications Ltd. Red House Road, Northampton NN3 1AO. Tel 01604 497565 Fax: 01604 497688
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