Our man in the mountains will be missed
Posted Tuesday, July 24, 2007, 10:22 PM by Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet author Clem Lindenmayer's body has been found after he went missing in the Gongga mountains in China, three months ago.
Clem spent much of the last two decades exploring the world's mountainous regions and wild landscapes, from Switzerland to Tasmania and Patagonia. He felt a special affection for rugged beauty and although a real mountain man with a love of wilderness, flora, fauna and foreign languages, he came with the requisite hodge-podge of past jobs. After working as a dishwasher, telex operator, translator and assembler of exhibition stands, he eventually teamed up his passion for outdoor activities with research and writing for Lonely Planet. His experience walking and trekking saw him write and contribute to many Lonely Planet titles.
It was no surprise that Clem eventually made his way to, and fell in love with, China. Periods of lengthy travel were interspersed with courses in Asian Studies and Mandarin. Having previously crossed mountain passes and wild tracts on almost every continent, his intention to one day trek across the Transarctic Mountains in Antarctica was taken seriously. Unfortunately his curiosity came to its conclusion in the Gongga mountains - a rugged area in the West of Sichuan province, China. Clem had been missing for three months, the discovery of his body a terribly sad ending to a life filled with adventure and discovery.
Clem will be missed by his wife, Romi, his family, as well as all the Lonely Planet staff who had the opportunity to work with him.
'In 2001 Chile's Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales (Ministry of National Resources) officially remapped and marked the Dientes Circuit, applying names to features according to the simple principle of usage. Names that had been tentatively given to lakes and passes in previous editions of this guidebook (simply so that readers could identify them more easily) were taken up as official nomenclature. New names were given to a number of key features on the circuit that had remained nameless - from Paso Australia to Laguna Zeta - but Bienes Nacionales also added a Cerro Clem and Montes Lindenmayer. I swear I had nothing to do with it - fame just creeps up on you when you're least expecting it, I suppose.'
- Clem 'Monty' Lindenmayer, p257 Trekking in the Patagonian Andes.
Labels: Asia and Pacific, Inside Lonely Planet, Trekking
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17 Comments:
Clem was a prolific and highly valued author for Lonely Planet over a number of years. He worked on guidebooks including Western Europe and China but his real love was trekking and his contribution to Lonely Planet's series of walking guides has been immeasurable.
Clem 'owned' our guidebooks to Walking in Switzerland and Trekking in the Patagonian Andes, in both cases working on first editions, setting the books up and quite literally blazing trails. While researching Trekking in the Patagonian Andes he excitedly emailed back to us that the Chilean Department of Natural Resources had marked Lonely Planet's Dientes Circuit route on an official park map, in which it also used all the names the previous edition of his book had proposed for unnamed lakes and passes. The same department also named further geographical features, including Paso Australia, the Montes Lindenmayer and Cerro Clem, in honour of Clem's work in Patagonia. Clem also worked on Hiking in the Rocky Mountains and Hiking in the USA.
Our hearts go out to his family.
- Judy Slatyer and Simon Westcott
Prior to going to China in 97 to work I read up on the China & grabbed a Lonely planet (carried it for six years on my travels)and benefited from the experiences of your authors and admired their tenancity to travel and investigate every corner of China especially prior to 97. It inspired me to do extensive traveling in China and managed to visit some of the extreme parts. Andrew Lindenmayer travels and insights were of benefit to me and his lifes experience has truely been an adventure. He has probably lived the life of several people and passed doing what loved. C.Plested
I never worked with Clem, nor ever even met him but I am saddened by his death. Clem's books were those rare things, guidebooks that got the blood moving faster and the brain excited, dreaming about all the fantastic potential adventures described inside. He opened up beautiful places to anyone with enough moxy to travel in his footsteps and reminded us of the endless adventures waiting out there. Perhaps we can take solace in the fact that Clem was where he loved to be when he died, out in the wilds, in the mountains, blazing a trail. I've walked Clem's trails many times in Montana and Wyoming and will continue to do so. For that, I'm immensely grateful.
- Bradley Mayhew
I'm very sad to hear this. I've read his work, and he was always deeply passionate and enthusiastic about is work, and love of land.
When I started in the Outdoor Activities unit, Clem's Walking in Switzerland and Trekking in the Patagonian Andes were already entrenched classics and he was providing inspiration for the Hiking in the USA and Rocky Mountains titles. Clem's adventures took him to many of the world's most beautiful and remote locations, and to share these experiences with others his manuscripts were detailed and precise with on-the-trail practicality as the highest priority. Reader responses typically praised Clem's accuracy and more than one gratefully acknowledged how his maps and advice had helped extract them from tricky situations.
I remember how the Outdoor Activity unit shared his pride when official Chilean maps honoured his name and nationality in Patagonian landmarks, and followed his suggestions for names of other landmarks. It was due recognition of his regional expertise and the authority of the Trekking in the Patagonian Andes book - a book that enjoys an outstanding reputation and, along with Clem's other titles, has helped consolidate the Lonely Planet brand in the adventure travel universe. Clem and his achievements are an important part of the Lonely Planet story and he will be sadly missed by those of us who had the pleasure to help him publish his great guides.
- Lindsay Brown, Former Publishing Manager - Outdoor Activities Guides
How sad :(
Condolences to his wife & family.
I loved his trekking contributions to Western Europe & his routes were the best. He will be missed.
Condolences to his wife & family.
Rest in Peace and he will be missed.
When I commissioned Clem to write the current edition of Trekking in the Patagonian Andes - which involved little more than agreeing with everything Clem had planned - I was so inspired by what I read that I ended up in Patagonia myself just a few months later, following his descriptions through some of the most awesome mountainscapes on the planet. One of my most vivid memories is of a morning in a Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi hut, when my hiking companion's copy of Clem's Trekking in the Patagonian Andes was spotted by the hut warden.
'Ah, la biblia,' the warden said with an appreciative smile. The bible.
It made me realise that, with this book, Clem had done something that so few guidebooks are ever able to achieve: to be memorable and lasting. That his name lives on in the Andes is only fitting.
- Andrew Bain, former Commissioning Editor - Outdoor Activities guides
Very sad. I hiked about half the routes in Clem's Patagonia book last year and was very appreciative of the excellent research and descriptions.
As a fellow trekking addict, I can easily imagine myself in the same situation.
I'll think of Clem next time I'm down in Chile...
Jim S., USA
RIP Clem.
Full life and you passed away what you loved doing.
I would be happy with that.
RIP Clem,
Deepest sympathies to family and friends. You, your writing, your work will be greatly missed
RIP!!!
Last year I trekked with the book "trekking in the Patagonian Andes". Clem inspired me with his books and trekking. I did everthing "by the book" Clem said, I did most of the trekks in the book. I really feel sad about him but on the other hand I'm glad (as much as could be said) that he died doing what he liked.
May God be with his soul.
RIP
For sure, Clem will be missed in the mountains and of course by his family and friends. But for sure, Clem will be remembered for a long time in the mountains. The magic mountains of the patagonian Andes will remember Clem because he truely loved them and every trekker inspired by the books and the adventorous spirit of Clem, will remember him whenever we walk along the trails or climb one of these mountains in Patagonia.
I read and followed his book "trekking in the patagonian andes" while travelling in patagonia, followed every his line, his every word. Thanks to him I had a completely different trip experience, and I felt his huge love to mother nature through his words. I was very sad to hear the news... Clem, thank you. Thank you for showing me a way of travel, a way of life, may you rest in peace.
It's a cliche, but at least he died while doing what he loved.
I read about the search and followed the story. My condolences to his family and friends!!
The best tribute to Clem would be to return the copyright for Trekking in the Patagonian Andes to his heirs. Then he would truly own it.
During seven years at Lonely Planet I was lucky enough to work with Clem on new editions of a number of walking guides. Lucky, because Clem clearly loved and took great pride in his work, and there’s no better kind of author to work with than that — though his command of several other languages helped, too. In the months before I joined LP, I had travelled to Parque Nacional Los Glaciares as a climber and had used the first edition of Trekking in the Patagonian Andes extensively for background, contacts, transport information and navigation. It was amazingly useful, and inspiring as well: Clem evidently loved the places he wrote about and knew inside out the experience of travelling through them as an outsider on foot. Better by far, though, than being Clem’s editor or publisher, and even better than being one of his avid readers, was collaborating with him to research and write the third edition of TPA — covering the magnificent parks he’d been to so often, he didn’t mind letting the hired help go there in his place: Nahuel Huapi, Los Glaciares, Torres del Paine and others. Everywhere it was clear how highly Clem and his work were regarded. I didn’t broadcast what I was doing in Patagonia unless for a good reason but, on the Torres del Paine Circuit, I mentioned to some temporary companions that I was updating the trekking guidebook for Lonely Planet. A Canadian woman turned to look at me through narrowed eyes and, with deep suspicion in her voice, said: ‘You’re not Clem.’ Indeed not. There was only one Clem and, in the world of walking guide writers, there are few who could hold a candle to him.
— Nick Tapp, former Publisher — Outdoor Activities guides
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