Andinia.com - Product Review: US Outdoor Store - mountaineering and climbing gear for ice and rocks

US Outdoor Store - mountaineering and climbing gear for ice and rocks

This merchant offers an ample variety of items for mountaineering, rock and ice climbing, and other extreme sports as well.

Add to this fact reasonable prices, good shipping policies and shopping guarantees, and you have a website that will merit your visit any time you want to shop for some equipment.

In order to review information about the company that distributes this product, shipping policies and general issues concerning these products please click here.

Since we, those working at Andinia as web as our website guests love to climb mountains, it is perhaps interesting to propel everyone's imagination right now with a simple question: how would have been the biggest mountain that ever existed on Earth? We know that in these days, the highest one is Mount Everest, also known as Qomoluqma by the inhabitants of the region where it lies, and we should consider that their name is even more proper to ours, so we also include it here.

However, the highest mountain on the planet, in absolute terms, is the Mauna Loa volcano, in Hawaii. This volcanic cone rises over 11.000 metres from the sea bottom.

It is an established fact that in our planet, no mountain may surpass 12.000 metres over the sea level due to two main constrains: first, because such a mass would collapse on its own weight, no matter what, and considering the mechanical resistance of the rocks that we find on our planet. And secondly, because continents move, and they really act like caterpillar machines on a grand scale, so there is no time for a mountain to grow that high before geological changes in the continental configuration begin to destroy them in some way or another.

The great ranges like the Himalayas and the Andes are relatively recent, but we know - for example - that during the Cambrian period (between 550 and 505 million years ago), a glacial episode of deep proportions took place. Sea levels at that time were sensibly lower than those we see today, since a great quantity of water was concentrated on the extensive ice caps that covered the planet during those distant years when complex life was just beginning in our blue planet. That was long before even dinosaurs existed; these great animals populated the globe between 230 and 66,4 million years ago; so it may be interesting to ponder how many spectacular mountains like the K2, Aconcagua or Fitz Roy existed since then, only to become dust over countless days.