To La Pedriza who left and fell in love. I was fourteen years old at that time. Of its cliffs, meadows and fields. He understood that nature as a refuge, a place to escape from a reality that still carried the ravages of a past war. He fell in love so much that he surrendered to the mountains. It was at the same time that he began working as an upholsterer in a small family workshop, a job to which he has dedicated his entire life. This does not mean that he neglected that granite landscape: from La Pedriza at fourteen to climbing the west slope of the Dru, one of the most mythical in the French Alps, at twenty-three. From there, the climber has made numerous first routes and climbs to different peaks in Spain and the Alps. However, Carlos Soria (Ávila, 1939) has never been a mountain professional. “Amateur, nothing more.” An enthusiast who has managed to climb a virgin seven thousand, the Dome Khan, and take over the fourteen eight thousand, the highest mountain peaks in the world, among which are Everest, K2, Nanga Parbat and Annapurna, considered the most dangerous in the world. And of all of them, with the exception of two, they have managed to reach their peaks. «My hobby of climbing mountains has given me a life the way I like. It has given me the opportunity to learn many interesting stories. I worked as an upholsterer, but I was born a mountaineer without knowing it,” he says in conversation with this newspaper. Now, a goal: return to Manaslu (Nepal, 8,163 meters), the eighth in the world in altitude. Return, because already in 1975 he participated – having previously attempted it in 1973 – in the first Spanish expedition to this peak, led by Jerónimo López and Gerardo Blázquez, which was the first national eight thousand. «Now, 50 years later, we return. And more excited than ever.”Expedition to Manaslu in 1975 Madrid communityThe idea of organizing, once again, an expedition to this summit to commemorate the 50th anniversary of that milestone came from the Royal Spanish Mountaineering Society Peñalara. The budget to make the ascension possible is 190,000 euros. It will be in the spring of next year, at the beginning of March. And led, this time, by Soria. Among the expedition members who will accompany the athlete is the climber Belén Rodríguez, who will try to beat the women’s world speed record, round trip, from base camp to the summit, through the original route of this mountain. Soria will be 86 years old when I ascend, again, to this peak of the Nepalese Himalayas. Despite the serious accident he suffered on Dhaulagiri, an expedition he carried out with his partner Sito Carcavilla in May of last year, at approximately 7,700 meters high, due to the fall of a Sherpa and from whom he is “miraculously alive”, He hasn’t lost interest in climbing mountains. Quite the opposite. «I have never thought about throwing in the towel. I wanted to go back. Climbing is what I like to do the most. Little by little, Soria recovered from that open tibia fracture. «Six months after the accident, they had to operate on me again. Recovery was slow. Time and patience. As if it were a miracle, I left Dhaulagiri alive, it is the thought that I clung to and cling to,” says the man from Avila. madrid_dia_0703Among the mountaineer’s recognitions are the Sports Merit Medal, the National Geographic Society Award Spanish, the Seven Stars of the Community of Madrid 2019 or the best athlete of the year by the Spanish Ski Federation (1979). Now face the new challenge with attitude and, above all, enthusiasm. For this he has trained a lot, every day: “For me, sport, knowing how to eat well, taking care of myself, in general, has been and is very important.” «Reaching retirement in a good physical and mental state, that should be the goal. At that age we still have a lot of life, and a very interesting one, ahead of us.”Soria ended up moving away from the big city to live surrounded by nature. Since he retired twenty years ago, he has lived in Moralzarzal, near the mountains. He rarely visits Madrid now, but he assures that it is a “wonderful city that has a lot of quality, a lot of culture, a lot of movement.” It is, precisely, the Community of Madrid that is going to sponsor the return to Manaslu with 18,000 euros. But “in addition to the financial help of the Community, we need the financial support of those companies that may be interested in the expedition taking place.”
#Himalayas #years #throw #towel
