Pen-y-Gwryd expeditions took place, at Helyg near Capel Curig. On the right at the hotel entrance there is a Tyrolean-style Stüberl (dining room) with the signatures, written on the ceiling, of the teams that did the first ascent of Everest in 1953 and of the first ascent of Kangchenjunga in 1955 – these include Sir Edmund Hillary, Tenzing Norgay, Sir John Hunt, Charles Evans, George Band, Joe Brown, John Angelo Jackson, Wilfred Noyce, Tony Streather, Tom Mackinnon, Norman Hardie, Neil Mather, John Clegg and others, including Noel Odell from Mallory's 1924 expedition and Chris Bonington of later successes. There are many
George Band Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2009 New Year Honours. George Band died of natural causes in Hampshire, England, UK, on 26 August 2011, aged 82. George Band George Christopher Band OBE (2 February 1929 – 26 August 2011) was an English mountaineer. He was the youngest climber on the 1953 British expedition to Mount Everest on which Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first ascent of the mountain. George Band was born in Taiwan and educated at Eltham College. He did his National Service with the Royal Corps of Signals and read Geology