Planet Earth - Mountains

While the 1st episode gives a broad overview of our blue planet, the 2nd instalment of this series delves deeper into one of Earth’s most incredible creation – the mountains.
Erta Ale in Ethiopia, the world’s longest continually erupting volcano – it has been spewing lava the over 100 years – starts off the documentary, showing one of the ways that a mountain can be created. The camera then pans to the nearby highlands, where the geladas baboons literally live at the edge of the mountains. They are the only primates whose diets are entirely dependent on grass, which they share with the walia ibex, a highly endangered species of deer.
Guanacos, a relative of the llamas, have to endure the volatile weather of the Andes, where one can experience four seasons in just one day. Sitting by the steep slopes, they endure a sudden blizzard serenely, accepting these sudden changes as part of living on the mountain ranges.
With high mountains comes snow covered peaks. Yet at the Matterhorn on the Alpine range, with its steep slopes, refuses to allow snow to settle on its peaks. Be it spring, summer, autumn or winter, the Matterhorn is always brown like dark chocolates among soft, flourlike peaks.
Perhaps the most famous of all the mountain ranges is the Himalayas mountain range, where Mount Everest, the tallest peak in the world sits. Mount Everest and its surrounding peaks, which include K2, are termed by the locals as mountains ‘so high that birds do not fly through it’. Yet annually, the demoiselle cranes, in its migration south to seek shelter from the harsh winters, have to battle these mountains and the intense turbulence. It is also on this mountain range that the Earth’s biggest glacier, the Baltoro in Pakistan, can be found. 69.2 kilometres long, the glacier is so huge that it can be seen from space (amazing stuff).
Among the inhabitants that live on the Himalayan mountains is the rare snow leopard, so rare that this is the first time that it has been caught on film in its natural habitat. It took the crew one year of patient waiting to give us this footage, and it is sure worth the effort, allowing us to see such a majestic, beautiful creature come life on television, watching it hunt along the steep slopes with such grace it looks as if it was dancing, as well as taking care of its offspring.
There are, of course, a few memorable shots in this episode. One of it is caught on the Ethiopian highlands, where is seems as if the end of the rainbow has touched Earth. Coupled with walia ibex in the foreground, it is just postcard picture perfect. The waterfall within the glacier is another unforgettable scene. Surrounded by blue, cold, seemingly immovable ice, the image of the movement of water is simply breathtaking. And who can forget those majestic mountains? With the use of extensive aerial photography to capture all the main ranges, the mountains seem to exude quiet strength and rugged beauty.
This episode just serves to confirm my belief that the Planet Earth series is one of the best documentaries ever filmed, if not the best.