TIMEPIECES: Hillary Tenzing Edition
The Hillary Tenzing Edition timepieces. You can brag about these things for days.
What makes a timepiece special?
History and heritage.
Now if you are the type of person that just sits at a 9 to 5 job, creating the history and heritage for your particular timepiece may be a bit difficult.
You’re probably not in a position to claim having conquered the amazon, or climbed the peaks of K2, or traversed the deserts of Africa.
Hell, you probably have never even used a hunting knife.
The Hillary Tenzing Edition watches, however, helps solve your personal shortcomings for history and heritage by allowing you to purchase timepieces that represent the storied lives of Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, who were the first people to reach the summit of Mount Everest.
The Rolex Hillary Tenzing Edition consists of a handcrafted wooden crate as used in the 1953 British expedition.
Here are excerpts from their Wikipedia entries:
Sir Edmund Percival Hillary, was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953 at the age of 33, he and Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers known to have reached the summit of Mount Everest. They were part of the ninth British expedition to Everest, led by John Hunt. He was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
Tenzing Norgay was a Nepalese Sherpa mountaineer. Among the most famous mountain climbers in history, he was one of the first two individuals known to have reached the summit of Mount Everest, which he accomplished with Edmund Hillary on 29 May 1953. He was named by Time Magazine as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
If you think about it, the lives of these two men kind of makes your personal accomplishments seem - I dunno - rather pedestrian doesn’t it?
A closeup of the Hillary Tenzing Edition packaging.
To make you feel even less accomplished, their sons, Peter Hillary and Jamling Tenzing Norgay also climbed the summit of Mount Everest in honor of their fathers’ feat.
The Hillary Tenzing Edition timepieces commemorate both generations’ accomplishments.
The Hillary Tenzing Edition Rolexes. Lots of history and heritage in these bad boys.
According to the press release from http://www.hillarytenzingedition.com/:
The Rolex Hillary Tenzing Edition (HTE) project is the successor of the Rolex Single Red Deepsea project in which we cooperated with Swiss adventurer Bertrand Piccard (www.singlereddeepsea.com), son of legendary Jacques Piccard who dove 10 kms into the Pacific Ocean. From the deepest point in the sea, the next logical step was to go to the highest point on earth, Mount Everest.
Our project is on the one hand a tribute to Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay and their achievement and legacy on Everest. On the other hand it is homage to Rolex and its impressive heritage as sports tool watch. We are contractually linked to Peter Hillary and Jamling Tenzing Norgay, the drivers in creating the Hillary Tenzing Edition package. We are not in any way affiliated with Rolex.
Name change
Despite the essential role of Rolex watches in the Himalayas, this package is not created by Rolex. As the Explorer is a well known model made by Rolex, we decided in July 2011 to change the name of our project from Hillary Tenzing Explorer to Hillary Tenzing Edition, to stress we are not affiliated with Rolex and avoid any further confusion. Hence, you will find information online on our project under the previous name Hillary Tenzing Explorer and the new name Hillary Tenzing Edition, they are both the same.
The new name Hillary Tenzing Edition also reflects the exclusiveness of our Hillary Tenzing homage, as it is truly a unique edition. In a limited series of only 88 packages it is already a sought-after collector’s item. Each package contains a one of a kind silver HTE pin, a special HTE edition of the great book Everest by George Band and a leather bound map of the original 1953 expedition route to Everest, to name a few highlights.
Rolex Hillary Tenzing Edition watches
Centrepiece will be the 3 Hillary Tenzing Edition watches. Each HTE watch celebrates the success and legacy of the daring Hillary & Tenzing adventurers and their Rolex Explorers during extreme expeditions.
The HTE 36mm is based on the Oyster Perpetual model used by the 1953 Everest expedition and is tribute to the first ascent of the highest mountain by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.
The new Explorer I is chosen for HTE 39mm, honouring Sir Ed and son Peter Hillary as the first and second generation to reach the top of Everest.
Peter Hillary and Jamling Tenzing Norgay both wore an Explorer II while climbing the summit of Everest. The HTE 42mm uses the new Explorer II to commemorate the achievement of retracing their father’s footsteps.
Additionally:
Exclusive Himalayan Trek Buyers of a Hillary Tenzing Edition package get an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to join Peter Hillary and Jamling Tenzing Norgay to Everest Basecamp in May 2012. Peter Hillary: “This is the first time ever, Jamling and I will take a group together to Everest Basecamp. We will be following in the footsteps of our fathers’ 1953 expedition, trekking through picturesque villages and experiencing the culture of Sherpa people in their homeland.”
Undoubtedly, this is a unique chance to get first hand anecdotes about their fathers and their own adventures in this private Himalayan trek.
The Hillary Tenzing Edition event in Geneva.
So for the low, low price of about 28,800 Euros, not only do you have the ability to obtain timepieces that are oozing with history and heritage, you can also add some of history of your own.
For more information about the Hillary Tenzing Edition line of watches, you can visit their official site at http://www.hillarytenzingedition.com/.
But if you’re trying to answer why they used the last name of one dude and the first name of the other dude… you may be out of luck.
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