Johanna Garton - Edge of the Map: The Mountain Life of Christine Boskoff

Chris and Charlie on Touchstone Wall in Zion National Park (Photo by Joel Coniglio)

JOHANNA GARTON

EDGE
OF THE
MAP

THE MOUNTAIN LIFE OF
CHRISTINE BOSKOFF

MOUNT AINEERS BOOKS is dedicated to the exploration, preservation, and enjoyment of outdoor and wilderness areas.

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Copyright 2020 by Johanna Garton

8000-Meter Specialist Bruce Barcott

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form, or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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Printed in the United States of America

Distributed in the United Kingdom by Cordee, www.cordee.co.uk

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Copyeditor: Amy Smith Bell

Cover and book design: Jen Grable

Cartographer: Martha Bostwick

Cover photograph: Tibetan prayer flags on a mountain pass ( guenterguni) Back cover photograph: Christine Boskoff at Everest Base Camp (Mountain Madness Collection)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file for this title at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019047353 LC (paper); https://lccn.loc.gov/2019047354 (ebook)

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Printed on recycled paper

ISBN (paperback): 978-1-68051-288-5

ISBN (ebook): 978-1-68051-289-2

For Mom and Joyce

by Bruce Barcott

This is a work of creative nonfiction, based on hundreds of hours of interviews and research. The details contained within are true to the best of the authors knowledge. All scenes with dialogue have been re-created based on the accounts of living participants in those conversations. In the few cases where all parties are deceased, the author relied on the accounts of persons still alive to whom those conversations were described shortly thereafter, as well as on selected books, newspaper and magazine articles, photos, and audio/video recordings.

Bruce Barcott, writing for Outside magazine in 2001

WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO become one of the worlds premier high-altitude mountaineers? If Christine Boskoff is any example (and she certainly is), the answer is speed, stamina, brains, experience, and the ability to persevere with a smile. Christine takes pain very well, says Peter Habeler, the legendary Austrian climber who guided with Boskoff on Everest in 1999. She can suffer without moaning, which few Westerners can or want to do anymore. Her ability to endure in the Death Zone has led the 34-year-old Wisconsin native to the top of the worlds highest mountains. In the past six years shes ticked off six of the fourteen peaks above 8,000 meters (Everest, Cho Oyu, Gasherbrum II, Lhotse, Shishapangma, and Broad Peak), in addition to becoming the only female expedition leader among the elite guide services operating on Everest. Shes got great inner confidence and experience, says American climber Charlie Fowler, who scaled Tibets 26,291-foot Shishapangma with Boskoff last fall. I havent seen anybody stronger.