Anybody promoting an appreciation
of the world's mountain heritage and its
problems through the media, by
teaching, by policy advice or lobbying or just an after dinner speech will
wish to draw on all kinds of resources. Facts, figures, news, anecdotes,
jokes, strange stories, legends or customs, poems, great prose and evocative
music, memorable people or animals, great feats.
There are many grists for the mill of advocacy. This section will carry a selection contributed
by helpers in the task from all parts of the world. This is all in
English but, little by little, items will be translated where resources
permit.
This section presents a sampler
to point the way ahead. The first item, from the French, is a simple day
lived by a visitor to one of Switzerland's alpine valleys
Fishing Transcendental at Autannes
Trout at 9,000 feet
The first rays of sunshine of that August morning promised a perfect
day for a walk up to the Lake of Autannes. Departure was fixed for
7 o'clock sharp outside the Tourist Office at Grimentz. With all
the impatience of the debutante fisherman I let my imagination conjure
up the joy of catches soon to come. Pure silver trout from the heights
of the Alps.
Leaving the car a few hundred feet above the dam and carrying our fishing
rods we began our plod up the marked path whilst the cowherd led his beasts
along their uphill track parallel to ours. For half an hour, the
path to the Col de Torrent which ultimately leads on over to Evolene, led
us to the top of the alpage. It was just up there that the Lake first
appeared nestling in a slight depression.
The temperature had gone down several degrees which was no surprise
given that we had climbed more than 3,000 feet up from Grimentz.
A snow field of impressive dimensions covered the opposite shore of the
lake. We put our rucksacks on a sort of little peninsula, set up our
fishing rods and made our first casts.
The contemplative waiting could begin. A long slow regard at the
place itself. Then a slow inspection of the Col de Torrent further up.
Keep an eye open for the appearance of a marmot or hope to hear the sharp
cry of a golden eagle high above. Or some other nondescript noise
that comes through the calm of nature round about to reveal some new wonder.
Then a great, creaking crump as a fissure appears and a raft of the snow
bank slips into the limpid still waters of the lake.
The sudden wave splashes water over the ankles of my companion standing
surprised on the other bank.
The moment for coffee and refreshment has come. And the moment
to see two marmots stop frisking about and turn their attention to a small
"tomme" of local cheese from the Anniviers Valley which they share with
my two companions. The fish are there, almost visible, but quite
contemptuous of our bait and lines.
One of my friends decides to try the other side of the lake from the
snow bank. With success!
By one o'clock our rucksacks were repacked and slowly the Lake of
Autannes receded from our sight. On the way down, the afternoon sun
was reflected from the waters of Lake of Moiry so the greenish serpentine
hue of the silt was transformed into turquoise as if it were a tropical
lagoon. A colour that shimmered with an air of the surreal.
A last halt in a tsijere - patois for a shepherd's stone dwelling where
cheese is made, and it was time to go back home. With two salmon
trout that my more successful friend kindly gave me as a souvenir of fishing
high in the Lake of Autannes. A lake near to heaven.
by Karim di Matteo
Translated and adapted from page 9, 26 August 1999 edition of Le Nouvelliste
of the Canton of Valais, CH
Mallory´s
body found, Knoydart
rescued, Himalayan
glaciers-alarm grows, Everest
Forests-a Sherpa's view,
The
epic of Mt. Everest, The state of the world mountains, My first summer in Sierra
Poems
and Belles letters, The Yellow brick Road
- Polemic, Paradise fishing at Autannes, Traditional
Solar Science,Dogs
on high, Obituary, Esme Percy,
Web-sites for browsing
Prince
Sadruddin Aga Khan on sustainable mountain tourism
P.B.
Stone on mountains under pressure (general overeview of so-called Mountain
problematique
Return
to the Mountain-Portal