Tim Macartney-Snape

In 1990 Macartney-Snape returned once again to Mt Everest with the idea of climbing the mountain from the sea to the summit. The idea had originally been floated by adventure cameraman Michael Dillon. With sponsorship provided by Australian Geographic amongst others, it would take Macartney-Snape three months to achieve this goal. This was the first time anyone had walked from sea level and reached the top of Mt Everest, as even the first expeditions started from Kathmandu, at 1400m above sea level. Although Macartney-Snape planned climbing Everest via the more difficult West Ridge, bad weather and strong avalanche risk changed his plans and he finally ascended via the South Col route.

In this documentary, Bear Grylls takes us on a journey through the most extreme version of the world's highest and most legendary peak: Mount Everest. Several leading figures in mountaineering and extreme sports, for whom a standard ascent is no longer enough, transform Everest into a laboratory for extreme challenges. Told through archival footage and reenactments, this elite group seeks new forms of performance, attempting to ski the slopes, snowboard down them, hang-glide or paraglide above the summit ridge, open new routes on more technical and exposed faces, and break climbing records. The documentary also highlights the essential role of the Sherpas, the colossal logistics behind each attempt, the explosion of commercial expeditions, and the moral debate surrounding the ever-increasing risks involved in breaking records or achieving unprecedented feats.

A high adventure film about Tim Macartney-Snape's incredible expedition to climb Gasherbrum IV - an 8000 metre symmetrical pyramid mountain of rock and ice on the border of Pakistan and China in the Karakoram Range of the western Himalaya. Tim, as part of the US team, was the first in the team to reach the summit, and as he says "the climb was harder than Everest".

A magical documentary fantasy from a 1986 television series on Australian wilderness. Much-loved French-Australian artist Mirka Mora camps out in the winter snows of Kosciusko National Park with Tim Macartney-Snape (the first Australian to climb Everest) and his friend Sherpa Mingma.