09: MOUNT EVEREST

8848m

Mount Everest, also known in Nepal as Sagarmāthā and in Tibet as Chomolungma, is Earth’s highest mountain. It is located in the Mahalangur section of the Himalayas. The international border between China and Nepal runs across the precise summit point. Its massif includes neighboring peaks Lhotse, 8,516 m (27,940 ft); Nuptse, 7,855 m (25,771 ft) and Changtse, 7,580 m (24,870 ft).

Euophrys omnisuperstes, a minute black jumping spider, has been found at elevations as high as 6,700 metres (22,000 ft), possibly making it the highest confirmed non-microscopic permanent resident on Earth. It lurks in crevices and may feed on frozen insects that have been blown there by the wind.

First ascended on 29 May 1953 via the South Col Route by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.

11: ELBRUS

5642m

A dormant volcano located in the western Caucasus mountains, in Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay–Cherkessia of Russia, near the border with Georgia, Mt. Elbrus’s peak is the highest in the Caucasus Mountains and in Europe.

Mount Elbrus was formed more than 2.5 million years ago. The volcano is currently considered inactive, as no eruptions have ever been recorded. Elbrus was active in the Holocene, but according to the Global Volcanism Program, the last eruption took place between 0 and 100 AD.

Evidence of recent volcanism includes several lava flows on the mountain, which look fresh, and roughly 260 square kilometres (100 sq mi) of volcanic debris.

First ascended in 1874 by an English expedition led by F. Crauford Grove.

13: MOUNT McKINLEY

6195m

The highest mountain peak in North America, at some 18,000 feet (5,500 m), the base-to-peak rise is considered the largest of any mountain situated entirely above sea level. Measured by topographic prominence, it is the third most prominent peak after Mount Everest and Aconcagua. Located in the Alaska Range in the interior of the US state of Alaska, McKinley is the centerpiece of Denali National Park and Preserve.

In September 2013, Alaska’s government announced Mount McKinley is 20,237 feet (6,168 m) tall and not 20,320 feet (6,194 m) as measured in 1952 using photogrammetry.

First ascended on 07 June 1913 by by climbers Hudson Stuck, Harry Karstens, Walter Harper, and Robert Tatum, who went by the South Summit.

15: MOUNT VINSON

4892m

Vinson Massif is the highest mountain in Antarctica, lying in the Sentinel Range of the Ellsworth Mountains, which stand above the Ronne Ice Shelf near the base of the Antarctic Peninsula. The massif is located about 1,200 kilometres (750 mi) from the South Pole and is about 21 km (13 mi) long and 13 km (8.1 mi) wide. At 4,892 metres (16,050 ft) the highest point is Mount Vinson.

The climate on Vinson is generally controlled by the polar ice cap’s high-pressure system, creating predominantly stable conditions but, as in any polar climate, high winds and snowfall are a possibility.

First ascended in 1966 by four members of the American Antarctic Mountaineering Expedition 1966/67.

17: AYERS ROCK

863m

A large sandstone rock formation in the southern part of the Northern Territory in central Australia, it lies 335 km (208 mi) south west of the nearest large town, Alice Springs, 450 km (280 mi) by road. The Aboriginal name for the mountain is Uluru.

Uluru is an inselberg, literally “island mountain”. An inselberg is a prominent isolated residual knob or hill that rises abruptly from and is surrounded by extensive and relatively flat erosion lowlands in a hot, dry region.

Uluru is notable for appearing to change colour at different times of the day and year, most notably when it glows red at dawn and sunset.

First ascended in antiquity as it’s an easy climb.

19: MOUNT KENYA

5199m

Mount Kenya is the highest mountain in Kenya and the second-highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. Located in central Kenya, just south of the equator, around 150 kilometres (93 mi) north-northeast of the capital Nairobi, Mount Kenya is the source of the name of the Republic of Kenya.

Mount Kenya is a stratovolcano created approximately 3 million years after the opening of the East African rift. Before glaciation, it was 7,000 m (23,000 ft) high.

First ascended in September 1899 by Sir Halford John Mackinder, Cesar Ollier and Josef Brocherel.

21: MOUNT TYREE

4852m

Mount Tyree (4852m) is the second highest mountain of Antarctica located 13 kilometres northwest of Vinson Massif (4,892 m), the highest peak on the continent. It surmounts Patton Glacier to the north and Cervellati Glacier to the southeast.

Mt. Tyree was discovered in January 1958 during reconnaissance flights by the United States Navy VX-6 squadron, and mapped later that month by the Marie Byrd Land Traverse Party.

As of 2012, the summit has only been reached on five occasions, by a total of ten people, via three different routes:  firstly in January 1967 by John Evans and Barry Corbet.

23: OJOS DEL SALADO

6893m

Nevado Ojos del Salado is a massive stratovolcano in the Andes on the Argentina–Chile border and the highest active volcano in the world at 6,893 m (22,615 ft). It is also the second highest mountain in the Western Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere and the highest in Chile. It is located about 600 km (370 mi) north of Aconcagua, the highest mountain in the Western Hemisphere at 6,962 m (22,841 ft).

Due to its location near the Atacama Desert, the mountain has very dry conditions with snow usually only remaining on the peak during winter, though heavy storms can cover the surrounding area with a few feet of snow even in summer. Despite the generally dry conditions, there is a permanent crater lake about 100 m (330 ft) in diameter at an elevation of 6,390 m (20,960 ft) on the eastern side of the mountain. This is most likely the highest lake of any kind in the world.

First ascended on 26 February 1937 by Polish mountaineers Justyn Wojsznis and Jan Szczepanski.

25: K2

8611m

K2, also known as Chhogori/Qogir, Ketu/Kechu, and Mount Godwin-Austen, is the second highest mountain in the world at 8,611 metres (28,251 ft), after Mount Everest. It is located on the border between Baltistan, in the Gilgit–Baltistan region of northern Pakistan, and the Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County of Xinjiang, China.

K2 is known as the Savage Mountain due to the extreme difficulty of ascent and the second-highest fatality rate among the eight thousanders. One in every four people who have attempted the summit have died trying. It is more difficult and hazardous to reach the peak of K2 from the Chinese side; thus, it is usually climbed from the Pakistani side. Unlike Annapurna, the mountain with the highest fatality-to-summit rate (246 summits, 55 deaths), K2 has never been climbed during wintertime.

First ascended on 31 July 1954 by Lino Lacedelli and Achille Compagnoni.

27: TABLE MOUNTAIN

1087m

Table Mountain (Afrikaans: Tafelberg) is a flat-topped mountain forming a prominent landmark overlooking the city of Cape Town in South Africa. The main feature of Table Mountain is the level plateau approximately 3 kilometres (2 mi) from side to side, edged by impressive cliffs.

The flat top of the mountain is often covered by orographic clouds, formed when a south-easterly wind is directed up the mountain’s slopes into colder air, where the moisture condenses to form the so-called “table cloth” of cloud. Legend attributes this phenomenon to a smoking contest between the Devil and a local pirate called Van Hunks.

No record of first ascension, but certainly many centuries ago.

28: AMA DABLAM

6856m

Ama Dablam is a mountain in the Himalaya range of eastern Nepal. Ama Dablam means “Mother’s necklace”; the long ridges on each side like the arms of a mother (ama) protecting her child, and the hanging glacier thought of as the dablam, the traditional double-pendant containing pictures of the gods, worn by Sherpa women.

For its soaring ridges and steep faces Ama Dablam is sometimes referred as the “Matterhorn of the Himalayas.”

On the night of 13/14 November 2006, a large serac collapse occurred from the hanging glacier, which swept away several tents at Camp 3, killing six climbers (3 European, 3 Sherpa). Eyewitness testimony indicates that Camp 3 had not been sited in an unusual or abnormally dangerous spot, and that the serac fall was of such magnitude as to render the specific placing of the tents at Camp 3 irrelevant.

First ascended on 13 March 1961 by Mike Gill (NZ), Barry Bishop (USA), Mike Ward (UK) and Wally Romanes (NZ)

30: HALF DOME

2693m

Half Dome is a granite dome in Yosemite National Park, located in northeastern Mariposa County, California, at the eastern end of Yosemite Valley — possibly Yosemite’s most familiar rock formation.

On March 28, 2009, a large rock slide of 1,500,000 cubic feet (42,000 m³) occurred from Ahwiyah Point. The slide happened at 5:26 a.m and damaged a large area under the dome. No one was injured but hundreds of trees were knocked down and a portion of the Mirror Lake trail was buried. The slide registered on seismographs as an earthquake reaching 2.5 on the Richter Scale.

First ascended in October 1875 by George G. Anderson.

32: ARARAT

5137m

Mount Ararat is a snow-capped, dormant volcanic cone in Turkey. The Ararat massif is about 40 km (25 mi) in diameter. The Iran-Turkey boundary skirts east of Lesser Ararat, the lower peak of the Ararat massif.

Mount Ararat in Judeo-Christian tradition is associated with the “Mountains of Ararat” where, according to the book of Genesis, Noah’s ark came to rest. It also plays a significant role in Armenian culture and nationalism. The mountain can be seen on the coat of arms of Armenia.

First ascended in modern times in 1829 by Dr. Friedrich Parrot, with the help of Khachatur Abovian.

34: LHOTSE

8516m

Lhotse is the fourth highest mountain in the world and is connected to Everest via the South Col. Lhotse means “South Peak” in Tibetan. It is located at the border between Tibet (China) and the Khumbu region of Nepal.

The South Col is a vertical ridge that never drops below 8,000m. Lhotse has three summits: Lhotse Main 8516m, Lhotse Shar 8383m and Lhotse Middle or East 8413m.

First ascended in 1956 by Ernst Reiss and Fritz Luchsinger, although it was only in 2001 that a Russian team conquered Lhotse Middle.

36: MUSALA

2925m

At 2925 m Musala is the highest mountain in Bulgaria and in fact the highest of all Balkan mountains. It was given its current name in the 15th century by the Ottoman. The Bulgarians themselves originally called it “Tangra“ after their god of the sky and between 1949 and 1962 it was named Stalin, after the Soviet dictator.

Conquering the mountain does not require special equipment or skills. Temperatures stay below 0 °C for about 8 months each year. Due to this about 45% of the annual precipitation on Musala is snow, and snow cover lasts for about 200 days.

First ascended in antiquity, in legend by the father of Alexander the Great, Philipp II of Macedonia.

38: MOUNT WHITNEY

4421m

The highest summit in the contiguous United States and the Sierra Nevada, it is on the boundary between California’s Inyo and Tulare counties, 84.6 miles (136.2 km) west-northwest of the lowest point in North America at Badwater in Death Valley National Park at 282 ft (86 m) below sea level.

Mount Whitney is above the tree line and has an alpine climate and ecology. Very few plants grow near the summit: one example is the Sky Pilot, a purple cushion plant that grows low to the ground.

First ascended on 18 August 1873 by Charles Begole, A. H. Johnson, and John Lucas of nearby Lone Pine.

40: 60 YEARS EVEREST

8848m

Mount Everest, at 8848 m the highest mountain in the world, belongs to the Himalayan mountain range and is located in Nepal near the Tibetan border. It was named after the British land surveyor George Everest. Its Nepali name “Sagarmatha (forehead of the sky)“ is far more poetical, as is its Tibetan name “Qomolongma (mother of the universe).“

60 years ago, on May 29th, 1953 to be precise, the New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay succeeded in the first ascent to the peak. After his return, Hillary pleased with himself first said to his friend of many years George Lowe: “Well George, we finally knocked the bastard off.“

Although no summit photo of Hillary exists, the Western world insists that he was the first man on Mount Everest. Norgay and Hillary themselves always stressed that the conquest of the mountain was achieved as a team and stayed friends throughout their lifetimes.

42: KANGCHENJUNGA

8598m

The main peak of Kangchenjunga is the second highest mountain in Nepal after Mount Everest, and the third highest peak in the world. Until 1852, Kangchenjunga was assumed to be the highest mountain in the world, but calculations based on various readings and measurements made by the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India in 1849 came to the conclusion that Mount Everest, known as Peak XV at the time, was the highest. Allowing for further verification of all calculations, it was officially announced in 1856 that Kangchenjunga is the third highest mountain.

The Ötscher area belongs to the Ybbstal Alps, which are part of the Northern Limestone Alps. The boundary between the districts of Lilienfeld and Scheibbs lies directly on its peak.

First ascended on 25 May 1955 by Joe Brown and George Band. They stopped short of the summit as per the promise given to the Chogyal that the top of the mountain would remain inviolate. Every climber or climbing group that has reached the summit has followed this tradition.

44: NANGA PARBAT

8126m

Nanga Parbat (Naked Mountain) is the ninth highest mountain in the world and is the western anchor of the Himalayas around which the Indus river skirts before it debouches into the plains of Pakistan.  An immense, dramatic peak rising far above its surrounding terrain, Nanga Parbat is also a notoriously difficult climb. Numerous mountaineering deaths in the mid and early 20th century lent it the nickname “killer mountain”. Along with K2, it has never been climbed in winter, despite 22 attempts.

Willy Merkl led an expedition in 1934 but early in the expedition Alfred Drexel died, probably of high altitude pulmonary edema. The Tyrolean climbers Peter Aschenbrenner and Erwin Schneider reached an estimated height of (7,895 m / 25,900 ft) on July 6, but were forced to return because of worsening weather. On July 7 they and 14 others were trapped by a ferocious storm at 7,480 m (24,540 ft). During the desperate retreat that followed, three famous German mountaineers, Uli Wieland, Willo Welzenbach and Merkl himself, and six Sherpas died of exhaustion, exposure and altitude sickness, and several more suffered severe frostbite. The last survivor to reach safety, Ang Tsering, did so having spent seven days battling through the storm. It has been said that the disaster, “for sheer protracted agony, has no parallel in climbing annals.”

First ascended on 3 July 3 1953 by Austrian climber Hermann Buhl who actually climbed the last 1,300m solo. The ascent was made without oxygen, and Buhl is the only man to have made the first ascent of an 8000 m peak alone.

45: FINSTERAARHORN

4274m

The highest mountain in the Bernese Alps and the highest mountain in the canton of Berne. It is also the highest summit in the Alps lying outside the main chain, or watershed. The Finsteraarhorn is the ninth highest and third most prominent peak in the Alps.

The mountain is completely surrounded by un-inhabited glacial valleys and by the summits of the Schreckhorn and Lauteraarhorn to the north, the Gross Fiescherhorn, Grünhorn and Gross Wannenhorn to the west and the Oberaarhorn to the east.

First ascended on 10 August 1829 by Jakob Leuthold and Johann Währen.

47: TEIDE

3718m

Mount Teide is a volcano on Tenerife in the Canary Islands and is the highest point in Spain, and the highest point above sea level in the islands of the Atlantic.

At 7,500 m (24,600 ft) from its base on the ocean floor, it is the third highest volcano on a volcanic ocean island in the world after Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa in Hawaii. Its elevation makes Tenerife the tenth highest island in the world.

It remains active and its most recent eruption occurred in 1909 from the El Chinyero vent on the northwestern Santiago rift. It’s listed as a Decade Volcano.

First ascended many centuries ago.

49: MONCH

4107m

The Mönch (German: “monk”) is a mountain in the Bernese Alps, in Switzerland. Together with the Eiger and the Jungfrau it forms a highly recognisable group of mountains visible from far away. It’s the most climbed of the three peaks of the Berner Trilogy.

The Jungfrau railway tunnel runs right under the summit at a height of approximately 3,300 metres.

First ascended on on 15 August 1857 by Christian Almer, Christian Kaufmann, Ulrich Kaufmann and Sigismund Porges.

51: ANNAPURNA I

8091m

The tallest of six peaks over 7,200m that make up the Annapurna Massif and the world’s tenth highest peak, Annapurna I holds the dubious distinction of being one of the deadliest mountains in the world. A staggering one in three climbers that attempt the ascent perish in the attempt.

In particular, the ascent via the south face is considered, by some, the most difficult of all climbs. In October 2014, at least 39 people were killed as a result of snowstorms and avalanches on and around Annapurna, in Nepal’s worst-ever trekking disaster.

Annapurna is a Sanskrit name which literally means “full of food” (feminine form), but is normally translated as Goddess of the Harvests.

First ascended in 1950 by Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal, it was the first 8,000m peak to be conquered.

53: BROAD PEAK

8051m

The 8051 meter high Broad Peak is located on the border of Pakistan and China. In the absence of an indigenous name, the English researcher William Martin Conway simply named the mountain in Karakoram according its shape.

The first ascent of Broad Peak was made on June 9, 1957 by Fritz Wintersteller, Marcus Schmuck, Kurt Diemberger, and Hermann Buhl of an Austrian expedition led by Marcus Schmuck.

55: MATTERHORN 150TH

4478m

One of the tallest and deadliest peaks in the Alps, the Matterhorn is a mountain in the Pennine Alps on the border between Switzerland and Italy and one of the world’s most iconic.

Over 500 climbers are thought to have died on the mountain since the first climb in 1865, and its north face wasn’t conquered until 1931. The mountains name comes from the German for ‘Meadow Peak’.

While part of the Alps, the Matterhorn is an isolated mountain and exposed to rapid changes in weather.

First ascended in 1865 by a party led by Englishman, Edward Whymper.

57: TRETTACHSPITZE

2595m

The ascent of the 2645m high Mädelegabel is relatively easy compared to the 2595m  Trettachspitze, also known as the «Matterhorn of the Allgäu Alps». The pioneer and mountaineer Hermann von Barth wrote in 1869: “If a peak is unclimbable, it must be this one!”

It is the only high rocky summit in the Allgäu Alps that lies entirely on German soil. It is situated north of the Mädelegabel and usually ascended from the Waltenberger Haus.

The Trettachspitze was first climbed in 1855 by the brothers Urban, Alois and Mathias Jochum from the Birgsau in the Stillach valley. The youngest was just 13 years old.

59: GASHERBRUM II

8035m

At 8035 meters, the Gasherbrum II is also among the fourteen eight-thousanders worldwide. Both mountains belong to the Gasherbrum group which is located in Karakorum on the border between China and Pakistan. Also known as K4,  it is the 13th highest mountain in the world at 8,035 metres (26,362 ft) above sea level.

The mountain was first climbed on July 7, 1956, by an Austrian expedition which included Fritz Moravec, Josef Larch, and Hans Willenpart.

60: JUNGFRAU

4158m

Together with the Eiger and Mönch, the Jungfrau forms a massive wall overlooking the Bernese Oberland and the Swiss Plateau, one of the most distinctive sights of the Swiss Alps.

The wall is formed by the alignment of some of the biggest north faces in the Alps, with the Mönch (4,107 m) and Eiger (3,970 m) to the east of the Jungfrau, and overlooks the valleys to its north by a height of up to 3 km. The Jungfrau is approximately 6 km from the Eiger; with the summit of the Mönch between the two mountains, 3.5 km from the Jungfrau. The wall is extended to the east by the Fiescherwand and to the west by the Lauterbrunnen Wall.

First ascended on August 3, 1811 by J. Meyer, H. Meyer, A. Volken, and J. Bortis. The ascent followed a long expedition over the glaciers and high passes of the Bernese Alps.

PALAU OBVERSE

Utilising a standard Palau coat-of-arms/emblem depicting a trident-wielding Poseidon and mermaid. Despite the use of many artistic variants of this emblem by Coin Invest Trust, the design on this one has remained unchanged throughout the series, with even the coin date being carried on the reverse side.

For an example of some of the alternative designs applied to the series Marine Life Protection, check out CIT’s last coin in that series in our round up of their Berlin 2014 releases.