Anita Arnon

So this is May 1819 we're talking about.

And this will rank him in the Annals of History among the company of Hannibal and Napoleon as far as military history and bravery.

They are the most treacherous, or among the most treacherous mountain systems on Earth.

They're 7,000 kilometres along South America's western edge.

There is terrible weather.

There is rugged terrain.

There are altitudes of some 6,000 metres.

So thin air, sickness, a sudden snowstorm can blow you off a rock face, temperatures swinging wildly.

It is a geologically unstable place and it is dangerous.

Ravines around every blind corner.

He has decided that he wants to attack Bogota, the capital of New Grenada or modern Colombia.

And he wants to do it from a direction that the Spanish could never imagine he could come.

It's the same idea of coming up the Orinoco.

You come up in a place they will never see you.

Okay, so that is what his aim is.

It's all about surprise.

You don't have the numbers still, even if you've got a swollen army with all these mercenaries coming to join you.

So what you need is surprise.

Conditions are hellish, okay.

So by the time they reached this icy pass, some 13,000 feet called Paramo de Pisba, Bolivar's men were barely alive.