[1] She was the daughter of the ship-owner, Frederick Gardiner who made the first ascent of Mount Elbrus[2] and she climbed the Breithorn with her father when she was only 10 years old.
[1] This cycle was broken by the Second World War, during which she was the commandant of a British Red Cross Detachment in north-west England.
[2] In February 1933 she set out to climb Mt Tasman with Alfred Maurice Binnie and the guides Vic Williams and Jack Pope.
A storm broke out as they overnighted on the Fox Glacier and threatened their tents so Pope cut out a platform in a nearby crevasse to give them some shelter.
On the sixth day Gardiner wrote out a will, making provision for her guides' wives in case the party did not survive.