Biography of Walter Bonatti: King of the Alps

Walter Bonatti was one of the greatest mountaineers of all time and although his climbing career was relatively short, his legacy lives on. His difficult high altitude climbs were out of his time and 70 years later, many of his routes still stand as prestigious climbing routes.

In Spain he received in 2008 the International Prize of the Spanish Geographical Society, and in 2009 the honorary prize of the Piolet de Oro for a race full of numerous difficult climbs in the Alps, the Himalayas and Patagonia..

Walter Bonatti was born on 22 June 1930 in Bergamo. After starting to practice all kinds of sports related to gymnastics at a very early age, and at the age of eighteen he achieved his first climbing in the Lombardy Pre-Alps.

First successes

During those years, he worked as a metalworker at Falck in Sesto San Giovanni, in his native Bergamo, and devoted himself to mountaineering and mountain climbing only on Sundays, the only day off during the week for workers at that time. In 1949, he reached the summit of, among others, the Cassin of the north face of the Grandes Jorasses.

This last achievement was made in only two days and with little accompanying material. He was 21 years old.

The following year, he tried to climb the Mont Blanc massif, but failed twice due to bad weather conditions. He would try again, however, in 1951, when for the first time, he made his way up.

The celebrations following the success, however, are marred by the news of the death of Walter's mother, Agustina, whose heart will not yield to such great joy.

He then climbed the Aiguille Noire de Peutereya mountain in the Mont Blanc massif in Italy, which forms part of the Peuterey ridge to the summit of Mont Blanc with its highest neighbour, the Aiguille Blanche de Peuterey...

Later, the Lombard mountaineer reached the summit of the Matterhorn and in the following months, he made two more first ascents: the Picco Luigi Amedeo and the Torrione di Zocca in Val Masino.

Shortly before obtaining the patent for a mountaineering guide in 1954, he climbed the canyon north of the Col du Peuterey Mont Blanc.

Bonatti is also part of the Italian expedition of Ardito Desio, Lino Lacedelli and Achille Compagnoni on K2.

This event, however, turns out to be a disappointment for Bonatti, due to reasons beyond his control: he meets with Emir Mahdi to spend a night outdoors in temperatures as low as minus 50 degrees Celsius, without sleeping bags or tents.

Walter Bonattino would not publish his own version of the events on K2 until the early 1960s, due to a contract signed before the adventure in which it was agreed not to give details of this expedition in the following years.

A rising career on the rise

In 1955, Bonatti climbed the southwest pillar of Petit Dru (Mont Blanc) alone, staying for six days on a wall. This is one of the most difficult walls on the planet, very smooth and made entirely of granite. Here Bonatti accomplished an incredible feat that no one will ever be able to repeat.

That signature is in fact his way of making up for the disappointment of the K2 ascent.

The following year he attempted the winter ascent of the Poire with his friend Silvanus Elevation: caught in a storm, the two were saved by the Alpine guides Sergio Viotto, Gigi Panei, Albino Pennard and Cesare Gex, and taken to a refuge in Gonella.

After settling in Coumayeur, in the Aosta Valley, he managed to regain his health after the mishaps of the last climb. Once Bonatti had recovered, he felt strong enough to climb the north face of the Grand Pilier d'angle, the last Lady of Mont Blanc: she has done it three times in just a few years.

Furthermore, in 1958 he went to Argentina to take part in an expedition to Patagonia organised by Fulk Doro Altan to reach the summit of Cerro Torre, untouched until then.

A few months later, they tried their luck in the Karakorum Himalayas with an expedition led by Riccardo Cassin. On 6 August 1958 he reached the 8,000 metre summit of Gasherbrum IV, without oxygen tanks, together with Carlo Mauri.

In later years, he climbed in Italy, France and Peru.

In 1961, the Bergamo climber attempted to reach the summit of the central pillar of the Freney, a challenge he had never achieved before: a snowstorm blocked him less than a hundred metres from the top, and four of his climbing companions died.

In August 1964, he climbed the north face of the Grand Jorasses Whymper for the first time. He then climbed the north face of the Matterhorn for one winter alone and in only five days: he thus managed to do the first solo ascent of this wall, opening a new route and the first winter ascent.

His retirement from mountaineering

Now retired from extreme mountaineering, Walter Bonatti has devoted himself to exploration and journalism.

He travels through Africa (leaving Tanzania at Kilimanjaro), coming into contact with the natives of the Upper Orinoco, the Waikas, the Yanoami.

Then, at the end of the 1960s, he flew to the island of Sumatra, with the intention of studying the behaviour of the local tiger at close quarters; shortly afterwards he visited the Marquesas, proving the veracity of Melville's stories in the jungle.

He then travelled solo around Cape Horn and in Australia in the 1970s. He travelled in Africa between Zaire and Congo, before New Guinea and even in Antarctica, to explore the dry valleys.

After visiting the headwaters of the Amazon, Bonatti meets the actress Rossana Podestà in Rome: After a long relationship by letter, the two fall in love and settle together in Dubino, in Valtellina.

In 2011, Walter was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died in Rome on 13 September 2011 at the age of 81.

His funeral will be held on 18 September at Villa Gomes in Lecco, before the body is cremated and the ashes buried in the cemetery of Porto Venere.

Before his death in 2008, Bonatti managed, 70 years later, to have his version considered as the official one, putting his version of the story on the map. ending one of the great controversies in the history of mountaineering, and proving him right about K2..

An event for which Bonatti fought throughout his life to bring the truth to light after being accused of having gone ahead of his colleagues Compagnoni and Lacedelli, and consumed their oxygen, to reach lacima.

He is considered one of the greatest mountaineers in the history of Italy and the world.He proved this by repeatedly crowning the most difficult mountains and peaks, and is therefore considered "King of the Alps".