Everest Ennui

It was strange to sleep in a sleeping bag on a cot again, but I made it through the night at the simple guest house at Lobuche. After a simple breakfast we started trekking to Everest Base Camp at 8:15 AM, stopping in Gorak Shep en route for tea. We arrived at EBC at 12:30 PM — a considerably faster trek than the original trek in. (The trekkers actually stayed over at Gorak Shep at that time.)

I continued to feel the altitude change — just walking from the dining tent to my tent left me breathless and I came down with one of the few headaches I’ve had on the trip. That afternoon, we all took showers and naps and 24 hours later I was pretty much back to normal — all the more so, since Saturday was a rest day as well.

The weather at the summit was still not good. The best the guides could tell us was that we’d likely start heading up around May 18 as the weather window for summiting looked good for May 22-24. We’re all getting antsy to get going.

Sadly, this morning  (May 16) John (“J.R.”) Rudolf of Seattle advised the team that he was flying home. He had a recurrence of the GI problems that sent him to Kathmandu the prior week and, although he appeared to have recovered, he felt too weakened by the successive bouts to attempt the summit. John is a superb athlete and mountaineer as well as a great teammate.  He had already completed all of the “Seven Summits” (including both the Carstensz Pyramid and Mount Kosciuszko). His presence will be sorely missed.

While I was in Kathmandu,  I learned that another teammate, Jan Smith of Melbourne Australia, had also headed home. On all the climbs I’ve done to date, I’ve always been the oldest climber (usually by far!) but Jan one-upped me. She’ll be 66 on May 26. She had stayed at Camp 2 with three others when the five of us returned to EBC on May 4. She made it up to Camp 3 on May 5 and was quite strong on the uphill but technically weak on the downhill and the guides advised her not to go for the summit. 

Sunday (May 16), the remaining seven team members underwent refresher training on rappelling to insure we were prepared for the arduous descent we’d be facing within a week. It was well worthwhile on many fronts. After our “drop-back” over a week ago, and doing relatively little physical exercise other than trekking from Lobuche, it was good to get back into my climbing boots and harness and work up a sweat again.

Over lunch, the guides continued to be coy about the date we’d head to the summit, but shortly thereafter, word spread that we’d be heading to Camp 2 Monday morning (May 17).  We immediately began to prepare our gear and load our packs for the 4:00 AM departure. We are all full of excitement, not to mention some apprehension!

//Don