Steven Rose, is modern day adventurer, and a mountaineer of modest ability; his greatest mountaineering achievements include an ascent of Mont Blanc, a traverse of the Black Cullins Ridge, in Skye, a winter traverse of the Aonach Eagach Ridge, in Glencoe and a solo winter climb in the Rocky mountains, Colorado. His greatest mountaineering failure and embarrassment was to be among a group of walkers to be rescued from Ben Nevis in severe winter conditions. At the age of 56 he maintains his fitness through long distance walking, regularly completing distances of twenty to thirty miles and on occasions much longer distances of up to one hundred miles non-stop walking. He completed non stop 100 mile walks, both in approximately 35 hours, in 1980 and 2000, he is planning a third in 2020.
His interest in travel has taken him to Europe, Asia, Africa, North America and South America. His interest in adventure travel and exploration mountaineering has resulted in over a dozen visits to Morocco, staying in remote Berber villages in the High Atlas mountains and crossing the north of the Sahara desert in an ageing Range Rover. In 2003 he and his family miraculously survived a severe car accident on the edge of the Sahara desert. In September 2005, he drove a 1985 Range Rover from Hampshire (UK) on a 8000 mile round trip via Spain, Morocco (including the disputed and mined Western Sahara), Mauritania and Mali to the final destination Timbuktu. More recent travel includes trips to Thailand, India, Laos and Myanmar (Burma) and Chile.
Steven left school in 1972, aged 15, with few qualifications. He joined the Merchant Navy and at the age of 16 and found himsel in the Vietnam War zone, on an oil tanker, regularly in sight and sound of battle; he eventually made seventeen return trips from Singapore to Saigon. The tanker on which he served was hit by a missile; though fortunately (for him) after his discharge. Since then, he has spent approaching forty years working with people with learning disabilities, the last twenty two years as the Chief Executive of Choice Support, a national Charity that he has led in growth from eleven to over 1800 employees and a turnover from £1 million to £40 million. Steven originally trained as a learning disability and mental health nurse and more recently maintained his interest in the NHS serving for five years as a Non-Executive Director of his Local Primary Care Trust. He spent many years as a voluntary leader in the Scout movement.
Steven was adopted at the age of 3 weeks and although British by nationality he is half Burmese. John and Muriel, his adoptive parents, both died in 2008. In 2011 Steven discovered and met his English birth mother Joy, and two half sisters and their families. After further research he discovered and met many members of the Burmese side of his family who live mainly in and around Yangon (Rangoon), although two half sisters live further afield in Australia.
Steven lives in the New Forest with his partner Claire Wiltsher who is a landscape artist; they share interests in mountaineering, long distance walking, skiing, travel to remote places and good food and wine.
He has two daughters, Catriona (25) and Christina (23) and a two year old grandson Levi.
In his youth Steven professed Trotskyism. Today he proudly remains a socialist sitting somewhere uneasily between new and old Labour. His vision is a fairer society with a more equitable distribution of welfare benefits through a system that is designed to hand over control from the state to the individual.
At the age of nineteen he had three ambitions to fulfil before reaching thirty; to run a marathon, to become a Director of Nursing and to climb Mount Everest. Whilst the first two were fulfilled the latter was not and remains and ambition today.
