alpenstock means A stout adjustable walking stick with a metal point, used by mountain climbers and walkers in hilly or uneven terrain. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 91 out of 100.
alpenstock is pronounced /ˈælp.ən.stɑk/.
Why “alpenstock” is a great word
ALPENSTOCK — [Noun] A stout, adjustable walking stick with a metal point, used by mountain climbers and walkers in hilly or uneven terrain. Borrowed from German Alpenstock, from Alpen ("alps") + Stock ("stick, staff"). First attested in English in the early 19th century. Unlike a "walking stick," a general-purpose and often elegant aid for level paths, or the modern "trekking pole," a lightweight, technical instrument often used in pairs, the alpenstock is a singular, weightier implement of deliberate ascent. It is the iron-shod staccato on granite, the third leg braced against a scree slope's slide, and the vertical line held aloft on a summit cairn—a humble technology for negotiating the earth's stubborn verticality, one deliberate point of contact at a time.
Etymology
Borrowed from German Alpenstock, from Alpen (“alps”) + Stock (“stick”), early 19th c.
noun
- A stout adjustable walking stick with a metal point, used by mountain climbers and walkers in hilly or uneven terrain.“[…]liaison being leaked to Der Spiegel resulted in the bizarre deaths of both an Ottawan paparazzo and a Bavarian international-affairs editor, of an alpenstock through the abdomen and an ill-swallowed cocktail onion, respectively?’”