Welcome to my new limited series on climbing the Seven Summits. Episode 1 is an introduction plus a brief update on the Autumn climbing activity in Nepal and Tibet. For the next eight weeks, I'll drop a new episode discussing one of the 7 Summits in detail. The Seven Summits, aka 7S, represent the highest point on each of the seven continents. However, as with most things in mountaineering, there is controversy. From a geological viewpoint, there are only six continents on Earth: Africa, Antarctica, Australia, Eurasia, South America, and North America. Europe is considered a peninsula of the Eurasia continental platform and is not an actual physical continent. However, from a political perspective, Europe is regarded as a continent; thus, Elbrus (18,513'/5642m), located on the border with Asia in southern Russia, represents Europe and not Mont Blanc (15,771’/4807m), which lies in the Alps on the border of France and Italy. The 7 Summits idea was hatched and first accomplished by American Dick Bass. He started with six summits in 1983: Aconcagua, Kilimanjaro, Elbrus, Denali, Vinson and Kosciuszko. Then, with guide David Breashears, he became the oldest person, 55 at the time, to summit Everest in 1985. Canadian Patrick Morrow became the first to summit all seven with Carstensz in addition to Kosciuszko in 1986. Italy mountaineering legend Reinhold Messner summited all the peaks without supplemental oxygen, a first, and completed the task in 1986. #7summmits Episodes will drop each week of: September 15: Introduction September 22: Mt. Kosciuszko, Australia - 7,310/2228m September 29: Mt. Blanc, France/Italy - 15,771'/4807m October 6: Vinson, Antarctica - 16,067/4897m October 13: Carstensz Pyramid (Puncak Jaya), New Guinea - 16,023/4884m October 20: Elbrus, Russia - 18,513/5642m October 27: Kilimanjaro, Africa - 19,340/5896m November 3: Denali, Alaska - 20,320/6194m November 10: Aconcagua, Argentina - 22,902/6960m November 17: Everest, Nepal/Tibet - 29,035/8850m
