Remarkably, Ross Cullen ''climbed and scrambled'' across many parts of the world.
Aged 66, and having retired as a professor of resource economics at Lincoln University, he is still active in the mountains.
This, then, is not the memoir of a professional climber but someone who used every available weekend and holiday to venture forth.
For 17 of those years he lived in Dunedin, as a student and university staff member, and anyone close to the climbing world of the past few decades is bound to come across lots of familiar names and familiar places.
The book is about Cullen's climbing and travelling and his thoughts about and approaches to the mountains and those who climb them, rather than about his life per se.
He includes his involvement with Dunedin-based alpine and cliff search and rescue, and the sad incident when Dunedin climber and team leader Bruce Clark slipped and fell to his death during an exercise in 1984 at what is now called Bruce Peak near Lake Ohau.
While he ranges widely (from the Arctic to the Antarctic), the wider Hopkins Valley region is his favourite, and he edited the climbing guide for the area.
He was also a president of the New Zealand Alpine Club.
A nice feel for Cullen's character comes through the book's flavour and writing.
I've no doubt, from that, he would be a thoughtful, wry, lively and capable companion in the mountains.
• Phillip Somerville is ODT editorial manager and a keen alpine tramper.
