Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

Topic Date User

Passing of Dot Butler 5-Apr-2008 At 4:02:02 AM LGJ

Message

When I moved to Armidale two years ago I was out climbing with a bunch of people when one guy, Leo, started leading the next pitch in barefeet. Upon hearing comments from the others, I asked them "have you ever heard of Dot Butler?", after having been to the Bungles a couple of times and reading about her. Leo turned around and said "She's my Grandmother!". I went canyoning with Leo and two of his brothers recently and two out of three of them were in bare feet!

Also in Armidale, I stumbled across a bunch of old Thrutch mags in the UNEMC shed. One article that caught my eyes was one of Dot's, and after emailing it to a few friends and family I finally got around to emailing it to Leo a month ago - and was sad to hear him reply that she'd only just passed away. Anyway - hear it is, it's only the start of the article, from Thrutch April 1965:

" I am lying on my sleeping bag in the sun in a flower strewn meadow
above the beautiful valley of Chamonix in the French Alps. Over the
range lies Italy. Like tiny dolls' houses the chalets and church
spires dot the valley floor. On either side dark green fir trees
clothe the foothills. Above the tree line are the treeless high
pastures, rock strewn and cut by clear cold streams which arise in the
snowfields above. The high pastures give way to stark rugged peaks
scarred with scree runnels and above these rise the eternal snows of
Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in Europe (15,781 ft), Aiguille de
Midi, Aiguille du Blatiere, Aiguille du Grepon and Grand Chamonix.
They look so close you would think a half hour's walk would bring you
to them. High up here within this magic circle of mountains, arched
over by a crystal blue sky, my nose among the daisies and buttercups
and ethereal blue gentians, with all the keen rich smell of the upland
air mine, life is so glorious my hand loses its power to write and the
pen drops from my fingers while I absorb its beauty in silence. Not a
sound to be heard but the whispering rush of mountain torrents, the
far away tinkle of a cowbell or goatbell, the distant bleat of a
sheep, the occasional whirr of wings as a questing insect burrows in
the heart of a flower. Two climbers have just topped the rise,
silhouetted against the mountain backdrop, iceaxes sticking up out of
their packs, point upward. They pass through my green hollow. "Bonjour
Messieurs" " 'Jour Madam" "Jour Madam", with that slight Inclination
of the head that makes the French so charming. "