Carlo Alberto (Betto) PINELLI

Born in Turin, Italy, in 1935, he graduated in History of the Art of India and Central Asia and Archaeology, Betto is a director, writer and screenwriter and is among Mountain Wilderness’ founding fathers.

He discovered mountains as a child during his holidays in the Aosta Valley and then climbed many classic routes in the Mont-Blanc, Dolomites and Gran Sasso.

For many years, he led the Paolo Consiglio mountaineering school of the Italian Alpine Club and is a member of the Italian Academic Alpine Club.

From the 1960s to the 1980s, Betto organised eight mountaineering and discovery expeditions in the Himalayas and in the Hindu Kush, climbing several virgin peaks. During the summer of 1990 he led the famous FREE K2 cleaning expedition aimed at relieving one of Asia’s major peaks of the tonnes of waste, altitude camps and fixed ropes left behind by mountaineers.

In 2003 he led the mountaineering and humanitarian mission OXUS – Mountains for Peace organised by Mountain Wilderness in Afghanistan.

Over the last few years, being in charge of the Asian Desk within Mountain Wilderness International, Betto organised and led a series of environment-friendly mountaineering courses for locals in India and Pakistan (Swat Project).

He shot and produced more than a hundred documentaries and popular science movies dealing with adventure, travel, anthropology, ecology and culture, many of them for Italian and international TV networks and is a university professor in Naples.