Tony Howard

Started climbing in 1953 and was very active in the Peak District in 1950s and 60s, writing guides to gritstone and limestone. In the early 1960s he worked as an outdoors instructor in Wales and the Lake District, qualifying as a British Mountaineering Council guide in 1965, the year he was on the first ascent of Norway's 1000m Troll Wall, ‘the biggest unclimbed rock wall in Europe’. He then worked as a Mountain Guide in Romsdal from 1965 to 1970. Elsewhere, he has climbed in most north African and Middle Eastern countries from 1963 onwards, and climbed and/or trekked in Greenland, Canada, America, South Georgia, India, Nepal, Thailand, Madagascar and Iran. He was a founding partner of Troll climbing equipment in 1965. In 1984 together with Di Taylor he founded the adventure travel consultancy NOMADS (New Opportunities for Mountaineering, Adventure and Desert Sports), when they discovered the climbing potential of Wadi Rum in Jordan. Tony has worked with Austrian and BBC TV, filming in the mountains of Jordan and is a regular contributor to outdoor magazines and travel guides. They return to the Middle East every spring to enjoy the hot rock, great trekking and the companionship of their many Bedouin friends. In spring 2015 they completed exploration of Jordan's first truly long-distance trail, the 640km Jordan Trail (www.nomadstravel.co.uk/countries/jordan/jordan-trail1).

Their recent explorations have also included invitations to Nagaland and Bodoland in remote North East India to develop trekking and adventure tourism. In the summer of 2015 Tony and Di were guests at Romsdal's Norwegian Mountain Festival which was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the first ascents of the Troll Wall by Norwegian and English teams.

Photo caption: Di and Tony with HM Queen Noor who sponsored their explorations in Jordan

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