One of the world’s greatest mountaineers Doug Scott CBE will be a special guest at Clitheroe Grand, Clitheroe, on Wednesday .

A true adventurer, Scott found fame when he and the late Dougal Haston became the first Britons to climb the south-west face of Mount Everest.

CLIMBING down The Ogre, a brutal vertical pillar of jagged granite in the Karakoram Himalaya, Doug Scott struggled for survival.

“Dangling from a thin rope, 24,000 feet up, well it is not the best place to be when you’ve got two fractured legs,” recalled Scott matter-of-factly.

“It was agony, the pain was unspeakable, but it was no problem because I’d only broken both tibia bones after crashing into the rock face.

“If I’d snapped my femur (upper leg) then I’ve no doubt I’d still be on the mountain.”

He adds: “There wasn’t any fear, just anticipation.

“I never had any doubt that I would get down, I just didn’t know how I was going to do it.”

It took Scott and his team, including British mountaineer Chris Bonington who broke several ribs on the descent, eight days to reach base camp.

“I crawled down that mountain on my hands and knees in places, my knees swollen and bleeding, then I had to wait four days for a stretcher,” added Scott.

“We survived on Tom and Jerry nougat bars, the only supplies remaining.

“Even then, and in mortal peril, seeing the cloud below you, billowing out of the Nepal valleys, you just felt you were part of something much bigger than yourself.”

Two years earlier, in 1975, Scott had climbed Everest by the notorious Southwest face and his achievement made headlines around the world.

“The temperature was minus 40 degrees, it was going dark and we were 100 metres short of Everest’s summit,” said Scott.

“We dug a giant snow cave and survived in there for nine hours until it was light.

“Reaching the summit via that route was the defining moment in my life.”

Scott has made forty-five expeditions to Asia’s high mountains and reached the summit of forty peaks

“That was a successful one (Everest) and, of course, you only tend to talk about your successes in life, don’t you?

“The so-called failures, by definition, is when the most interesting things happen.

“You’ve gone to the edge without getting to the summit and learned a lot more about your inner-self.”

One of Britain’s greatest altitude mountaineers, Scott was known for his outstanding physical strength.

“When you are at the limits of your endurance, when you’re climbing high above the clouds, all your life comes down to that point.

“It feels as if the rest of your life is very distant and does have the effect of calming your inner chatter.”

Scott began climbing when he was 13, his interest sparked by seeing climbers on the Black Rocks in Derbyshire when he was hiking with the Scouts.

“When I left school, I was there every weekend, climbing.

“I’d catch the X2 Bus back to Nottingham on a Sunday evening from the Peak District with grit and lichen embedded in my hands.

“Climbing quickly became a way of life, although I was never that talented really.

“At first, I did everything on a shoestring, hitchhiking to Norway, The Dolomites, Iraq, Turkey and Nepal.

“I had this crazy thing in my mind, seeking out the biggest overhang in the world to climb.”

Proceeds from the evening will support the work of Community Action Nepal.

Doug Scott: The Hard Road to Everest, the Grand, Clitheroe, Wednesday, March 18. Details from 01200 421599 or www.thegrandvenue.co.uk.