Ordinary mountaineering

From the first great ascents to ultra-fast extreme performances, through the explosion of the ski industry in 1970, faces and peaks have seen a large number of people with diverse and varied mindsets pass by.

And what if by 2024, we were at a turning point? Just as the first conquest of Mont Blanc in 1786 launched the beginning of modern mountaineering, could our generation’s confrontation with the consequences of unsustainable mountain exploitation be the trigger for a new era? Could it be one of sobriety that does not impair performance, one of a more authentic and less consumptive relationship with our environment?

Mountaineering is intrinsically an exploratory sport that has historically led to constant escalations toward the conquest of new peaks, the opening of new faces and routes. Inscribing one’s name, planting a nation’s flag have marked the writing of an extraordinary history of mountaineering. The emergence of social networks and then their omnipresence have not only reproduced these behaviors but accelerated them among an ever-wider audience. As for the athletes, faced with the difficulty of continuing to be part of this history due to the Alpine massif being traversed on all its faces, their fields of conquest are increasingly distant and their exploits oversized. Finally, the great accessibility of high mountain environments due to the expansion of ski lifts pushes toward practices focused on the search for the extraordinary, emblematic of consumption in a society that never stops accelerating. Nevertheless, the quest for extraordinary sensations remains the very essence of mountaineering, which therefore requires rethinking the conditions of its practice.

Moreover, a new wind seems to be rising over the Alpine peaks: what if mountaineering and its associated practices are evolving? Indeed, at the time of the climate assessment, like a gentle rising breeze, a real awareness seems to be in the air. This awakening must now be linked to a different education in technical and sporting performance, as well as to our relationship with the joy of being in the mountains.

Firstly, the current concept of performance, based on achieving feats that avoid as much as possible the slow times perceived as useless and tedious, must evolve. Thus, if sports performance included in practitioners' imagination the art and manner of the approach, then part of the overconsumption problem would be solved and the rising breeze would turn into a laminar wind.

Secondly, might the end of exploiting the mountain environment take the form of a voluntary and sincere return to essentials? Each of us, from expert mountaineer to beginner, from contemplative hiker to soloist, should be convinced of the similarity of our efforts' purpose: access to happiness and the intoxication of living would be our essential goal. It would then be appropriate for everyone to get drunk on long paths and times, on light and colors, on aesthetics and balance, on summits and wide open spaces.

Charles Baudelaire exclaimed: "Get drunk, get drunk constantly! On wine, on poetry, or on virtue, as you please." While this is essential to our inner balance, there is a nuance: realizing that a state of happiness and lightness can exist outside the patterns of the extraordinary allows us to convince ourselves to slow down. Because being satisfied with less means loving what we have, feeling the details of life that emerge over the silence regained during a slowed-down practice. However, this mindset is not incompatible with undertaking technical routes and feats in the mountains. The mountaineer's sensitivity to appreciating their surroundings, the slowness of their approach to their goal, or climbing less distant routes do not diminish their purpose, nor do they harm self-transcendence or the need for exploration.

With the firm intention of undertaking a journey with different flavors, guided by the idea of a revisited performance, we can start from lower down, take the time to camp, enter the world of high mountains through the gentle evolution of the landscapes. We can also travel by bike and let ourselves be lulled by the mechanical clicking of the bearings, or explore routes closer to home. Rather than continuing to seek the extraordinary in our ascents, perhaps it is time to contemplate the infra-ordinary. As Georges Perec wrote, “Newspapers talk about everything except the daily. Newspapers bore me, they teach me nothing. [...] What really happens, what we live, the rest, all the rest, where is it?” Part of the solution is surely found in what we live every day, in what we call the banal, the ordinary. Yet there is nothing banal in our mountain adventures. If we learned to love the infra-ordinary in more detail, perhaps we would manage to intoxicate ourselves more easily, and thus better reconcile our mountain practices with respect for the environment. Limiting the multiplication of the extraordinary to appreciate the riches of the infra-ordinary.

Yet, while almost all practitioners are aware of the various problems related to mountain exploitation, many rely on the actions of the state and companies to solve them. On their side, these entities shift responsibility onto consumers whose behaviors and demands change little. In this triangle of inaction, one might think that the spearhead of this evolution would be the leading figures of mountaineering who would redefine the notion of performance. However, the real power of change lies in the hands of everyone, the everyday mountaineers, this powerful heart still invisible today that can and must take the initiative to bring mountain sports into a new era. In other words, it is the ordinary mountaineers, those we don’t talk about enough, who also hold the keys to this change.

Directed by Julien Geay and Eliott Nicot, the documentary "Désescalade" sheds light on the dangers of overcrowding in the mountains.