One would not exist without the other. Indissociable, the Guide and the client have been so since the beginnings of mountaineering. It was the English and French aristocrats of the eighteenthᵉ century, who became adventurers and "scientists" under the impetus of the ideas that were emerging in the Age of Enlightenment, who came to the valleys of the Alps and the Pyrenees to see the glaciers and climb the summits. They recruited mountaineers (crystal smiths, chamois hunters, farmers and shepherds) to find the access route and carry their equipment.

The relationship between a guide and a customer is not an insignificant one, with the backdrop of mountain scenery that we travel through together, risk is inherent!

Roped together, guide and customer link their destinies For better or for worse, they form an ephemeral couple that lasts for the duration of a mountain race, then endures over time as affinities develop. The guide takes charge of the client's safety and returns him to normal life once the mission is over. And this risk, permanently present and hidden, generates intense situations that are hard to find in everyday life today. This can create strong bonds between fellow climbers.

The moment the mountaineer becomes a Guide, he is transformed and reborn as a repository of existence, and sees the mountain with a different eye: that of the dangers from which the client must be protected by every possible means; a preoccupation that never leaves the Guide.

GHM and AMM are mountain enthusiasts, nomads of the peaks. They love to share their passion for this wild and majestic world with their customers, who don't feel ready to explore on their own. The Guide is a leader who shows the way to achieve his clients' dreams and pushes the limits when the client is ready to do so.

Employing a Guide or MA to provide safety services is not like buying a consumer good; it is above all a relationship of trust: is believing in the word of others; it is an attentive, vigilant guide, capable of giving the appropriate instructions to maximise the safety of his client, and a client who listens and applies the advice so as not to compromise his own safety as well as that of the Guide.

It's a complex relationship where the client is the boss and employs a guide for his safety; but in the mountains, the roles are reversed: the guide becomes the boss, the leader of the roped party, the guarantor of collective safety.

Use a Guide or an AMM, is trusting the other person's word at the moment of commitment The guide honours this commitment when he decides to be available to go into the mountains and carry out his safety mission; the client, on the other hand, gives his word to hire a guide or AMM, and then proves it by paying him financially. On the one hand, the client offers physical safety; on the other, he offers financial security in exchange.

This relationship was built at a time when mountain dwellers were extremely poor, and any outside financial contribution was welcome. Even if things have changed somewhat, the relationship has remained the same: mutual trust to ensure that we'll still be there tomorrow!