Santa Barbara-based climber Greg Crouch was featured, along with his three Swiss partners, in the March 2000 issue of National Geographic in a story covering the breathtaking climb of the Argentine mountain widely considered by climbers to be the world’s most perfect alpine obelisk. In the public lecture Enduring Patagonia: The First Winter Ascent of the West Face of Cerro Torre on Monday, October 23 at 8 p.m. in UCSB Campbell Hall, Crouch will show slides of the adventure as photographed by Thomas Ulrich, whose work appeared in the National Geographic article. He will recount tales of the groundbreaking climb which rises a vertical mile above Patagonia’s ice cap, the largest non-polar expanse of ice in the world. Courtesy of the UCSB Bookstore, copies of books by Crouch will be available for purchase and signing at the event.

Crouch fell in love with the Andes of Patagonia when he saw them for the first time in January 1994. Since then, he has reached nine Patagonian summits—Fitz Roy, Poincenot, Pollone and Cerro Torre among them—a number of them via new routes. He has climbed Cerro Torre twice, once ascending Maestri’s notorious Compressor Route, and most recently, the winter West Face ascent.

Crouch’s writing, which is as compelling and candid when he’s describing his failures as when he’s recounting his amazing triumphs, has appeared in Rock & Ice and Climbing magazines. His contribution to the 14th issue of the mountaineering journal Ascent, the story of a season in Patagonia, is credited with “being worth the price of the book by itself” by Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air, the best-selling book about a tragic climb of Mount Everest. Between 1967, when it first appeared, and 1984, 12 editions of Ascent have been published by the Sierra Club. Crouch’s story was a lead in Ascent 1999, the first new volume of the journal since 1984, which was distributed by The Mountaineers Books.

Crouch is currently at work on a book to be published by Random House in fall of 2001, tentatively titled Enduring Patagonia.

This event is presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures. Tickets are $5 for students and $6 for the general public and are available in advance at the Arts & Lectures Ticket Office and at the door if still available.

For more information,
call UCSB Arts & Lectures at (805) 893-3535.

Editor: For photos, please call
Roman Baratiak at (805) 893-2080.