Mick’s legacy continues supporting Thunderball 2025
Heroic legacy supporting Thunderball By DON HUGHES WHEN I FIRST met Mick Parker, he revealed none of the inspiring and lofty characteristics you would normally assign to an elite world-class mountain climber. Indeed, he came across as a softly spoken, quiet young man. He was slight of build, compassionate, artistic, and spiritual. Mick seemed more […]
Heroic legacy supporting Thunderball
By DON HUGHES
WHEN I FIRST met Mick Parker, he revealed none of the inspiring and lofty characteristics you would normally assign to an elite world-class mountain climber.
Indeed, he came across as a softly spoken, quiet young man.
He was slight of build, compassionate, artistic, and spiritual.
Mick seemed more content with living alone in the spare room at the back of his parent’s Warrandyte garage, amongst his music and art than scaling mountains.
But he had a subtle yet determined glint in his eye.
This outward trait, coupled with a steady, calm and steely demeanour, gradually revealed the true inner Mick to expose his sheer strength of character and single-minded intensity required to climb the world’s greatest peaks.
Mick was the ultimate contradiction.
Shunning any publicity and dismissing his notable achievements with a shrug, I was privileged to slowly become acquainted with this remarkable man.
Underneath his humble persona was a likeable rouge who grew up in the Warrandyte bush.
This is where that sense of freedom and challenge prospered and guided him along a pathway of extreme personal experience and challenge.
He also had a good sense of humour.
An elite climber
As one of Australia’s most successful 8,000-metre climbers, all done without oxygen, guides or Sherpas, Mick understood the need to conquer fear and be extremely well-disciplined.
He also understood safety and what to do in an emergency.
Training for years at home, in South America, Pakistan, and China, his ultimate challenge was to scale Makalu in Nepal to become one of those elite mountain adventurers and great Himalayan climbers.
In James Knight’s gripping book, Spirit High, (2015, Xoum Publishing, Sydney) he tells “The Mick Parker Story” that is ultimately about chasing your dreams, no matter where they take you.
A must-read for anyone who is inspired to push the boundaries of thought, speech, or action, combined with courage, equality, and humbleness, the story highlights that even the most experienced of us can find ourselves in trouble and needing help.
Saddened to hear of Mick’s untimely death in 2009, only days after scaling Makalu, I struggled to comprehend why.
He personified courage and calculated daring.
His spirit, however, still flies high.
The bush bungalow
A few years after I first met Mick, he moved into a small bungalow in the bush on the outskirts of Warrandyte.
He was expanding his sign-writing endeavours and needed some benches and shelving crafted and installed.
Given my background as an army engineer, I was the man for the job.
After discussing his requirements, in his customary nonchalant style (he was preparing for yet another mountain foray), he handed me the keys and asked me to “just do it”.
I arrived at the remote location with all my materials.
Mick had forgotten one thing — that he cohabitated with a huge eight-metre-long python that was just hanging from the rafters to greet me.
I think I could hear him chuckling from the Himalayas.
Sponsoring heroes
The Mick Parker Foundation was established to honour and commemorate this inspirational son of Manningham.
With the announcement of Thunderball last year, the Foundation immediately stepped forward to become its inaugural Hero sponsor.
Thunderball is a gala event raising money for the Manningham SES Unit, whose volunteers possess all the skills of an adventurer, but they use these skills to come to the aid of those in need, following flood, storm or misadventure.
“The Foundation is honoured to support the heroic efforts of our SES volunteers”, stated Bruce Parker, Mick’s proud father.
“This will critically assist in raising much-needed funds to allow our SES heroes to concentrate on what they do best — saving lives.
“Mick would have applauded the courage, skill, and dedication demonstrated almost daily by our current Manningham SES Unit — they are the real heroes.”
Thunderball will be held in August, with proceeds going to purchase a 4×4 vehicle to assist the SES in supporting Police, Ambulance and other agencies for such emergencies as floods, storms, patient extraction, search and rescue, or swift river rescue.
A prospectus is available from thunderball.net.au or by contacting thunderball2025@gmail.com.