Detained at POW Camp 354 near Nanyuki, Kenya, Felice Benuzzi from Trieste, together with two fellow-prisoners Dr. Giovanni ('Giuàn') Balletto from Genova and Vincenzo ('Enzo') Barsotti from Lido di Camaiore, escaped in January 1943 and climbed Mt Kenya with improvised equipment and meagre rations, two of them reaching a point on the north face of the Petit Gendarme, at about 5000 metres,[5] high up the NW ridge.

The Italian edition has as an Appendix (headed 'L'ignoto') a fuller version of the English Chapter 4, 'The Unknown', a digression that gives background historical information on the mountain.

The 2nd Italian edition (Tamari, Bologna, 1966) has on the front cover, in colour, a reproduction of Benuzzi's watercolour of the mountain seen through the camp fence.

[8]) The English version was published in February 1952 as No Picnic on Mount Kenya (William Kimber, London), with the subtitle The Story of Three P.O.W.s' Escape to Adventure.

[3][9] "No expedition on the mountain was ever a picnic" Vivienne de Watteville had written in her book Speak to the Earth (1935) about her 1929 visit to Mount Kenya.

[10] Benuzzi's English title, perhaps suggested by this line of de Watteville's, refers to the expression 'It was no picnic', meaning 'It was hard going', but with an ironic allusion to the climbers' meagre POW rations.

S. H. Burton) brought out by Longmans and Green in their 'Heritage of Literature Series' for schools (1960), helped popularise the book.

Perhaps more than any climbing story, No Picnic on Mount Kenya captures that strong underpinning of revolt common to most mountaineers.