This is a copy of my diary from the Xtreme Everest expedition. You don't have to read it, or if you do, you don't have to read all of it. It is probably the longest blog you've ever read. It's so long that it needs two entries to fit it in. Which, lets face it, is a bit ridiculous.

Still, if you're interested in knowing what my experience of the expedition was, here it is encapsulated. Feel free to comment or ask questions, and enjoy.

18/03/07 - Kathmandu

We caught a plane, flew to Doha, and waited…flew to Kathmandu, and in the process lost all sense of time. It’s really surreal to be in Kathmandu; after all the talking and planning it never seemed real ‘till now. We were welcomed to the hotel by a band, a banner, the logistics team and some odd traditional welcoming ceremony, including the application of a red dot to the forehead and eating an egg with something that must’ve been about 60% alcohol. It smelt like the hard-surface disinfectant wipes we use in the lab, which are 70% isopropyl alcohol, so go figure.

Still, it was good to see everyone again – we spend the next week testing before we begin our move up the mountain. Having done all that flying I’m itching to move so it’ll be a long wait. Anyway, some reading and then some sleep is required.

Evenin’

20/03/07 – Kathmandu

Yesterday we went into Kathmandu, and Kathmandu is pretty extreme – loads of temples and people, cars and dogs, manic driving and noise, smells – it lives. The roads are either wide and filled with people, bikes, cars and minibuses in equal measure or narrow, muddy and dug up filled with approximately the same volume of traffic. Highway codes and laws are recommendations rather than rules, and not ten seconds passes without the tooting of horns. There is an incredible bustle; assaults of colourful wares against drab, often random-looking buildings, and these intricate temples scattered everywhere.

The religion is very strong here, and very integrated – people will ring bells and spin mantra wheels as they walk, touching head and heart as they do (the equivalent of the Christian ‘crossing oneself’ without the warding off evil connotations). The religion itself is a strange mix of Buddhism and Hinduism. There are temples of Gods (God of Smoke and Fertility, Vishnu and Shiva, God of Alcohol etc.) which are all venerated equally. There are prayer flags everywhere in their hundreds, and the symbol of the Eye is everywhere from temples to t-shirts. As I write this there has been declared a General Workers Strike and the streets are filled with riots compared to the (slightly quieter) bustle of the previous day. The town is unsafe to walk and the hotel has locked its gates. This is apparently not infrequent, but it’s strange to think that the friendly citizens of yesterday are now beating people in the street. Kathmandu is volatile and hectic, but it’s a wonderful place to visit, and it’d CERTAINLY much more interesting than bumming around the hotel all day – there is only so much circus stuff you can do in 24 hours!

21/03/07 – Kathmandu

We went back into Kathmandu today, and it was a riot. Literally. Maoist, if you must have specifics. In other news, bought scarves and ate an excellent lunch. Oh, and the queue for petrol was around 3km long, and I am NOT exaggerating.

Being tested tomorrow…

23/03/07 - Kathmandu

Instead of being tested yesterday, I instead was ill. I was tested today instead with a rather disappointing VO2 max of ~50. Ah well, I am at 1300m and sates are generally lower here, so I have an excuse J. Our bags are being sent ahead of us independently so I need to go sort that out.

24/03/07 – Monju

Trekked from Lukla to Monju today, after flying to Lukla on what was possibly the most adrenaline-inducing flight in my life. The runway is about 200m long and terminates in a solid rock wall, which the plane aims for as it hits the runway. It stops about 20m away from the wall, but heading for a large rock in a metal tube at 150mph is fairly hair-raising. When we disembarked we could see that the runway is sloped by around 20 degrees to stop the planes, and to help them accelerate when they fly off the cliff at the other end of the runway for takeoff.

Later: We sent our bags on ahead by yak and trekked for about 4 hours to Monju, a small village with a lodge to stay in. Needless to say, some of the bags that were yak ferried failed to come, and needless to say one of them was mine. Spent the night fully skanky and dressed under a blanket. The trekking itself was fantastic though, really gorgeous scenery and a stunning set of distant snow peaks. Did manage to burn the back of my neck quite badly, despite the cap, the sunscreen and the trees (!). Exercise sats are down to 86% - 14% down on sea level land definitely feel-able.

25/03/07 – Namche Bazaar (3485m)

More trekking today to Namche Bazaar. First half of the trek was an easy stretch, made difficult only by having to overtake yak trains which take up a lot of path real estate. Second half was the much-bemoaned Namche Hill, 600m (vertical) of zig-zag path which completely wiped me out. Still, once at the top it was very satisfying. Namche is quite large, is full of climbing equipment to sell, and not much else.

Quite a lot of people have fallen ill – Liesl, Gwen, Jim…I hope I don’t succumb a second time.

30/03/07 – Deboche (3716m)

The rule ‘slow and steady wins the race’ applies nowhere more than at altitude. Trekking up the hill you are severely limited by your breathing – it’s simply impossible to go fast in any way, shape or form. The effect is very marked.

We left Namche Bazaar this morning, and trekked up through Tengboche to Deboche, where I am writing this. All in all it was quite a day – some very large ups and downs. Also caught my first glimpse of Everest today from the rather aptly named Everest View Hotel, with the jet steam ripping a plume of snow from the summit. The snow peaks were stunning – photos do not convey the presence that they have. Even Everest in the far distance draws the eye, somehow managing to exude a sense of power. Little wonder that mountains were once worshipped as gods.

Other news: I met the children from the Young Everest Study yesterday while I was doing some contact juggling and proceeded to keep them entertained all afternoon teaching them poi and cj which was good fun all in all. Might have to consider a career in pediatrics after all. It’s a pity that you can’t say ‘I love kids’ anymore without someone making a Michael Jackson interpretation. Somewhat irksome.

I have written my first postcard! We shall have to see when (if) it arrives.

01/04/07, April Fools Day – Pheriche (4285m)

We have arrived in Pheriche, the final trekking lab pre-EBC. I’ve been running CPX tests all day, and by GOD it is boring. The trek up from Deboche was short and easy, with some truly stunning snow peaks (again!), most notably Ama Dablan, considered to be one of the most beautiful mountains on earth.

[I have at this point excised a section of the diary for publicity reasons – anyone who wants to read it must see the original]

07/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

It’s been a while – someone chavved my pen in Pheriche and so I haven’t been writing. I appear to have caught the Dreaded Lurgy, which has struck me down for the past 48 hours. Whoopdy Do. Still, I’m very much in recovery now, and earlier Maryam managed to somehow find me and apple, for which I shall love her forever.

18/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

It has once again been a while since I last wrote here, mainly because I couldn’t be bothered to deal with the backlog of things I hadn’t written. My solution to this is simply to leave what I can’t be arsed to scribe and get on with it.

Two days ago a group of us non-climbers walked up to Pumori Camp 1, which was pretty good but heavy on the altitude breathlessness. Worth it for the views though.

We’ve had two treks through – I am writing this in a metabolic efficiency test in Trek B. Trek A were a nice bunch, active and cheerful. The testing is all going very well, with the exclusion of early mornings which I find VERY difficult here. Life at base camp is very much of extremes – screamingly intense sunshine during the day and snow or stars in the freezing nights.

We’ve named the areas in our camp in suburbs – I live in Lake View, the climbers live in the Ghetto, and there is Squalourville and Avalanche View over by the ice fall. Life has settled into a simple rhythm, governed by test days and the ringing tones of the meal gong. Some evenings are singing evenings with Nigel on the guitar, going through the expedition songbook; others people pack up and go to bed by 8:30. In bed there can be the howling wind or the patter of snow, or the rumbling thunder of avalanches. Near the Ghetto (near the Ice Fall) the ice cracks and shifts at night, and you can feel the vibrations under your feet.

Meals are the crux points of the day, even though the food is repetitive and fairly bland. The ‘treats’ food is much better, with salami, cheese, even whole legs of Toscana ham, as well as the obligatory chocolate, Pringles (no other crisps survive the journey here - the packets all explode due to the pressure change) etc. There is a significant trend towards weight loss here and people need to snack all day, so it’s crucial that it is good =). Having said all that, we have eaten our way through 10 barrels of snacks so far and the next snack influx is going to be far too late to catch up with our consumption rate.

Enough now. More later.

25/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

We went up Kala Pathar yesterday for sunrise. It was really a terrific experience, and it was nice to end up on top of something as opposed to half-way up. We’d gone down to Gorak Shep the night before, and met up with Trek D, who were another nice bunch. Interestingly, on that trek happens to be a lecturer from Southampton Uni, Dr. Jonas, who I tested today and may well see when I get there. It is a small world.

They also gave me my first post, from Emily, which was nice to see and better to read. I’ll send a postcard back with the same trek – post is to be encouraged! I’m putting in an order for more stamps and cards to Namche with David, so I’ll be restocked soon enough.

I don’t know if it’s just tiredness (climbing Kala Pathar starting at 4:30 in the morning was pretty tiring) but there are people really getting on the wrong side of my patience at the moment. Listening to some angry music helped and the whole thing is blown over for the moment, but I reckon its still lurking, waiting. I just have to hope that it resolves itself. There may be a chat in order.

I’ve been thinking about various friends, some of the things they said just before I left, and whether I’ll meet some of them afterwards. I guess we can only wait and see.

26/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

I thought I’d write a little about the rhythms of base camp life, now that it is fully settled into one. You’ll have to forgive (or just skip) this if it’s boring.

I’m woken by either thirst, the need to pee, or in some cases my alarm and I am nearly always up by 7:20. (On days that I don’t need to be up, I am removed from my tent by the sun which heats it to about 40 degrees within an hour). I get out of my sleeping bag, into my boots and off to the diary tent to do my diary: this involves sitting for ten minutes then measuring blood pressure, heart rate and oxygen saturations, then doing two minutes of exercise on a step and measuring HR and sats again, as well as filling in 3 questionnaires about how I feel at the time and over the previous 24 hours. All told, it takes about half and hour and is vaguely tedious. Afterwards, I head over to the lab to calibrate the Cortex machines, which were turned on at around 6:45 to warm up. Generally, breakfast is eaten once Gwen has eaten hers and takes over the calibration. While at the start of the expedition we all ate in the mess tent, now we eat outside on chairs in front of the ice fall, which is much nicer =). Camaderie at breakfast is excellent; this morning’s session was about the application of chat up lines and whether anyone has had any success with any, ever. I must remember never to use “I’m from Cheddar, cheddar cheese, fancy a bite?”

I go to the lab at around 8:15 to meet the day’s trekkers and start the days testing, which normally runs through to about 3. The lunch gong can go at pretty much any time from then on, and we get it brought to the lab and then eat it in frenzied bouts of manic consumption between tests.

At the end of testing, the lab is cleared out and sorted to be ready for the next testing day (we have 2 testing days, 2 days off, 2 testing days, 1 day off in a week) and we are free for the remainder of the afternoon. Unfortunately the afternoons tend to be pretty grim so actually we just sit about in tents (or the mess tent) sleeping, eating or reading. A few hours later the dinner gong goes, around 6:30 and we have our evening meal (which varies hugely in quality from excellent onion bhajis with rice and sweet chilli to spamburgers with potatoes).

Depending on the day, we then go down to the trekker’s camp – day one is an introduction of the lab staff and admin, day two is a brief talk about oxygen and a not-so-very-brief talk about the history of climbing Everest by George, our lab manager. Finally, on the third night, we have a party send-off with singing and wine.

Rest days have much the same meal schedule but I only get up at 8:00 when the temperature becomes unbearable. I have a baby-wipe bath and a change of clothes, then do the diary and wash my other set of clothes along with my hair in a bowl of water. I hang the clothes out to dry on a line someone helpfully tied to a rock outside my tent, and then I usually spend a few hours with my iPod and staff/poi/cj ball on a patch of snow behind the mess tent for practice. We’ve also used rest days to go on jollies up to Pumori camp one and two days for Kala Pathar. It’s nice to have a day of peace though, for all that the outings are fun.

28/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Post is not always good post, and in this case post like bills and tax returns qualifies as ‘good’. Three days ago I received a postcard saying that a good friend of mine had a new girlfriend. Now, 3 days later, I find out that she is dead, killed in a car accident by another car.

If I had believed in God, that would have been the end of my faith. No 19-year old should have to go to the mortuary to see his girlfriend for the final time.

Three days ago I smiled and today I cried. The true distance of traveling hits home with news like that. I have sent my last postcard, and my thoughts are with him, and that is the best I can do.

30/04/07

I will ask Mac to put the flag at half-mast on the one-month anniversary of the accident.

I’ve not written for a couple of days; I was somewhat put off, but yesterday I had to write a song for us to sing to the trekkers so I had to get back to it. Here is what I managed to come up with during a metabolic efficiency test.

(To the tune of ‘House of the Rising Sun’)

There is a camp at Everest

They call camp CXE

And into it Trek ‘E’ did march

Through the shadow of Nuptse

They came and slaved upon the bikes

They did their di-ary

And every day they trekked on up

To the camp at EBC

We bled them till they were dry

We tested all their brains

We starved them for hours, then measured their power

The seat, it was a pain

But now the last day is come

Trek ‘E’ is almost free

No more will you be tested here

At the lab at EBC

1^st verse repeat

Don’t tell me – I am fully aware that it’s not a piece of musical genius but it was the best by hypoxic mind could do at this juncture.

Today is a rest day – Trek E left yesterday and now we have an unusual 3 days off. Unfortunately the weather forecast is dire so we can’t really do anything interesting. Having said that, today has been ok so far; I’ve done some staff and cjing on the ice and lounged about in my tent, washed etc

On that note…

31/04/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

I’ve been thinking a lot about death recently, and the fragility of life. How easy to trip, get ill, have a rock fall on you, be wiped off the face of a mountain by the wind, by a piece of falling ice, by an avalanche. I find it painful to think of people’s loss, to think of what happens after, to think of all the things I’d never get to do. I find it very difficult to imagine what my friend’s response to my death would be: how would they react? How would I be thought of?

None of these are pleasant trains of thought.

On a brighter note, today was hot and sunny, so I donned my shorts and went for a quick stroll on to the glacier (not the crevassy, avalanchey bit, the flat (ish!) ice bit). The ice forms ‘waves’ between 2 and 7 metres high and forms fantastic patterns and formations, some of them truly bizarre. I took a few photos, but it is difficult to convey a sense of scale – it’s all much larger than it looks. There are also more icicles than you can imagine, some of them like razors in sharpness. It’s a bleak place, but it is beautiful and unreal. I ended up climbing a wave for the view, found that it wasn’t worth the effort and then skiing down on my boots. Good fun =) The dinner gong is going, so I an going to be gone.

To Do List

- Clear rocks threatening to crush self while sleeping

- Sort out washing and organize

- Clean out tent

- Sort out half-mast flag for 5^th May

- Inventory snacks left in barrels

- Get ECG done.

1/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

We had 4” of snow last night, and so naturally this morning a snowball fight started. It was also blisteringly hot (for the second day running) so it was the first snowball fight in shorts I’ve ever had. There were tactics, taking high ground, charges and sneaking around behind cover. There was also a lot of gasping for air – it takes it out of you up here. In my distraction, I managed to leave my contact ball on top of my fleece in the sunshine, and it promptly burnt a hole in my fleece and melted part of itself, definitely need a new one when I get back.

The weather changed around lunchtime becoming snowy and grim. Everyone was sitting at the lunch table in the mess tent when a gigantic rumble shook the tent. Everyone piled out of the tent in time to see a huge HUGE avalanche come off Pumori. This was easily in the order of hundreds of thousands of tones, and easily the biggest I have ever seen (and bear in mind that I’ve been here for a while and I’ve seen some big ones). I caught some photos but it’s so big it looks more like a cloud.

Must remember to look at Pumori when it clears and see what is gone from the top.

[there is a doodle here, and within it are songs I associated with various people, which I’ll jot down here for good measure]

Alex R – Rise From the Ashes (Quietdrive)

B - Falling (Lacuna Coil)

Claire R – Dragons (Jimmy Nail)

Dave McG – She Moves In Her Own Way (The Kooks)

Emma P – Blue and Yellow (The Used), Time To Start (Blue Man Group)

Emily R – Say It Right (Nelly Furtado)

Keir P – Take a Bow, Knights of Cydonia (Muse)

Jenny M – Surrender (Evanescence)

Lucy T – Officium Defunctorum

Nat D – The Blower’s Daughter (Damien Rice)

Nick W – Spitting Games

Millie S – Lithium (Evanescence), No Matter What (Asha)

Paul S – Points of Authority (Linken Park)

Sophie B – Pretty Girl (Sugarcult)

Either the 2^nd or 3^rd May, 2007 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Last night I watched the moon rise between the West Ridge and Nuptse, and it was gorgeous, and amazing, and impossible to photograph. Either you ended up with the moon looking like the sun, or the entire photo was black excluding the moon. Yesterday the IMAX team arrived, and is with us for 14 days.

4/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

I evidently got bored with that last entry. You’ll have to forgive me. Today is another rest day, and I had a want to do my washing. Naturally, there is therefore no sun and heavy clouds are hanging just down the valley. Bonus. Therefore, I instead cleared my tent, shifted some boulders, and generally spring cleaned. It’s even spring, which although convenient is totally coincidental.

Yesterday we had the Caudwell trek through, Trek F. We had to test all of them in one day which was lame, although the climbing team helped out which was VERY welcome, so thanks to them.

Let’s say no more of that save that by the end of the day my patience was really wearing thin…

I’m in my tent at the moment and it’s snowing outside – it sounds like rain. For all that my senses can tell me at the moment, I could be camped in Wales. I know that if I open my tent, Wales once again becomes thousands of miles away instead of a tent’s-wall thickness away. I miss the UK sometimes, but I do like it here. Tomorrow is the half-way point. Time flies…

Later: One of our trekkers is ill with some abdominal pain, and I’ve been sitting in the mess tent for the last hour listening to the phone calls and decision making required to get her out of Base Camp by helicopter. The evacuation cost $9100, and the insurance companies are being very difficult despite clear liability on their policy. Half the conversations started like this:

“…and we therefore need urgent helicopter evacuation from Everest Base Camp in Nepal”

--long pause—

“Everest. The mountain.”

-- pause—

“Base camp. At the bottom of the mountain.”

After which they tried to insist that the trekker be evacuated by fixed wing aircraft, despite being told that we were camped on a glacier in a mountain range at 18,000 feet. We are now, two hours down the line, making some progress but it has been less than impressive up to now. The helicopter arrives tomorrow at first light – we went ahead and organised it regardless as a necessary requirement for patient safety.

I think that Mike and Chris deserve a round of applause, along with the medical staff taking care of the trekker. Very impressed.

5/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Today I said goodbye to someone I’ll never now meet. There is never a good time to grieve, and I’m not sure why there is such grief for someone I never met, never spoke to.

Blue skies, and the clouds have faded down the valley.

Enough.

8/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

This evening we watched 50 First Dates, a film that I really considered to be scraping the bottom of the plot barrel, but which actually turned out to be rather heart warming (although I confess to being a sucker for chick flicks)

There is also new entertainment for the lab staff-trekker introductions – we have to squeeze in a random word to our intro lines. Tonight mine was wizard [I’d later go on to get words like submission, bareback and racetrack] but other people got words like ‘robot’, ‘fiddle’ and notably ‘apocalypse’. Kay even managed ‘petunia’ which was pretty impressive really.

In addition to all this, half of our new snacks arrived today! Once again we will be calorifically in balance! I’m looking forward to it already…

09/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

I have a terrible need to express something, but it somehow defies expression. I was thinking earlier about whether I could live with each day being the first day of my life.

10/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

So yesterday evening I gave my first talk, about oxygen, to the trekkers (amongst whom, unfortunately, were 7 anaesthetists) It went pretty well – I basically dredged up my biology A-level and compressed the respiration topic into 10 minutes or so. I actually rather enjoyed it, and several people said it was good afterwards, so that was satisfying. I was also bought a beer, which is now sitting in the corner of my tent being eyed suspiciously.

Today was long and hard – half of Trek H went down early, half the rest were on Diamox, and so on our bike for today we had a grand total of ONE trekker. Today was effectively a rest day =).

I may now also be doing poi in an IMAX film – we’ll see on march 4^th, 2009. Could be interesting.

I also ate about 10cm worth of a salami today in one sitting, and now have stomach ache. Rubbish.

12/05/07, Day 54 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

People are growing restless here, and everyone else seems to be ill. There’re people dropping everywhere: urinary tract infections, diarrhoea, vomiting...everything that can be classed as (relatively) minor but is still putting people out of action.

There is also an increased number of people wanting to go home. I’ll admit that I too think of places other than here with a fond edge to the thoughts, but I am quite happy to remain here for another 36 days – the remainder of the expedition. Even people who have been down the Namche for a week are whining…if I thought it were true I’d say I had the patience of a saint.

And no, hypoxia doesn’t induce sarcasm. Honest.

Oh, and another thing. This morning I woke up, put on my down jacket and upon trying to put my boots on discovered that they were filled to the brim with snow.

RUBBISH!!

16/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Today the Mountain Madness team summited, along with the ‘Super Sherpa’ team – the first summits from the south side this year.

There were also the first deaths, and the bodies were found at the bottom of the South Col.

It made me think: how much would you risk to stand atop one of these peaks? This truly is a strange place – in one tent people are celebrating and in the next they are phoning families. Surely there are not many places like this on earth.

19/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

This morning one of our team was urgently helivaced from Pheriche with either HAPE, pneumonia or a PE.

Sometimes a mood will come upon you, and you’ll want to go home, check your e-mail, go out with friends – all the normal things in life. While I am not in a hurry to get back I’ll be glad to get moving and I’m looking forward to arriving in Heathrow again. It is trek day 62, and just under a month ‘till we are back. We finish here in ten days, including our own testing.

21/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

It is hot hot hot – the sun is blazing down and with it’s downpour of heat comes a shower of avalanches – there is a constant background of rumbling thunder.

Yesterday I donned crampons for the first time and went out on to the Khumbu glacier, and it was fantastic! The landscape is alien, pinnacles of ice and the huge ice waves that are so common here. Here and there the ice is cracked, and from within the gap the rich, pale blue of glacial ice is revealed. All through the glacier are rivers, lakes, cut deep into the ice or gurgling under your feet. Waterfalls spring from the top of ice peaks with no apparent source and hanging from every ledge are icicles by the hundred. It’s a different world, ten minutes out of base camp.

The highlight of the trip was walking over a ladder, like the ones over crevasses in the ice fall itself. It was only a short thing over a river, but it gives you the idea of what walking on crampons over a ladder crossing a 30-metre deep crevasse feels like.

8 days left at base camp, and then we roll on to Island Peak!

24/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Today I was present for the second round of summits in the comms tent. There was a good atmosphere; people had slept there all night, or came in early in the morning etc. Much laughter and joking. Still, when the summit finally came, I felt oddly forced-happy, unemotional etc. I HATE it when that happens to me.

I was thinking this morning about what to do when I get back to the UK. Or rather, I was thinking about whether I should go up to Durham, to take Dave up on his offer and potentially meet the elusive Lucy. I guess part of it depends on whether I could meet her over the summer at some point, which is up to her. And how do I even feel about the prospect?

It’s a tricky one and no mistake.

26/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Last night we had a big party for no apparent reason, sort of a party-before-the-climbers-come-back-party, which was excellent fun and involved some typical party antics – namely the stripping of the logistics team and some heavy-duty hypoxic dancing, which is completely knackering.

I am now sitting at the edge of the ice fall, waiting for the climbers to appear back from the summit. There is music playing, cameras pointing and lots of people from Trek M. We shall see.

Later: Unsurprisingly, disconnected.

27/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

Today is the last day of trekker testing, and thank god for that. In three days we are gone (or the lab staff are), off to Island peak and then to Namche. Looking forward to being on the move, and in a surreal kind of way, being back in the UK.

Later: We have finished!

28/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

I just went out to where the HRA used to be, next to a large lake, and it was beautiful. Severe, emptry, barren and beautiful. There was something about walking over the flat tent pedestals, peering into crevasses and ice caves, hearing the drip of ice melting echoing in caverns of blue ice shot with sunbeams.

It was perfect.

30/05/07 – Everest Base Camp (5300m)

And now I’m back there again, on what is likely my last day at Base Camp. The sun has just risen, and almost no-one else is up yet. Above me the jet stream is silently tearing snow from Nuptse’s peak and hurling it into the cloudless sky, and where I am sitting I can see a thousand sunbeams reflecting and refracting from the icicles marching around the edge of the frozen lake. Already there is the quiet tap of water dripping from icicle tips on to the ice. Above my boulder seat is the HRA’s old kitchen, now no more than a ruin in the shadow of Pumori. This place, for all it’s rocky austerity, is beautiful, and I will miss it’s dangerous elegance and chilly wonder, and it’s cold detatchment from the world – this is no place for people to live. The only reason here is the mountain, the windswept summit 3.5km straight up from even this desolate land of ice with it’s caves and palaces and lakes. There will always be some base camp with me, I think.

31/05/07 – Chukung

I’m in Chukung now after a trek down to Dingboche yesterday, which took 6 hours. We got to Dingboche at around 8:00, and it was dark. The people of Dingboche could do with a quick lesson in town planning – it took us half an hour to even find the ‘road’ from the trail, after spending some time wandering through fields and climbing walls that weren’t mortared together. Still, we got there eventually. My shoulders, pectorials, hips, calves and lower back are all stiff/bruised, as I was carrying a 22kg pack from EBC – at the time only 5kg away from being half my body weight. I tell you, after 3 months atrophying my muscles that was FAR from easy. But hey, such is life, I made it and I’m still alive. This morning I could hardly carry a 5kg pack as the flu-like monster that had been pursuing me out of base camp finally caught up with me. Still, feel better now so all is well.

1/06/07 – Island Peak High Camp (5420m)

Well it was touch-and-go for a while back in Chukung and on the way – I really didn’t think I’d be able to go on. Once again I am in debt to my immune system, which woke up after a few days break and wiped out the nausea etc - within about 2 hours I felt vastly better and today is testimony to that success. It was a fantastic walk up, really stunning (again) and tomorrow morning we leave to make our summit attempt. Roll on!

2/06/07 – Chukung

Successful summit: Island Peak (6189m), 0723am.

Unsuccessful defense against high-altitude chest infection (coughing, fever) 1634pm.

3/06/07 – Pheriche (4278m)

So, I am back at the White Yak and feeling significantly better than before, although I’ve still got a bit of a chest infection and I’m still coughing like there is no tomorrow. The worst is over.

So, Island Peak. What can I say? I could talk about the sunrise on the glacier under a full moon, or about the plodding endlessness of the 100m ice face up to the summit ridge, about the rhythm of crampon-crampon-jumar-ice axe. I could go on about the relief of reaching the summit, looking around, of eating marshmallows at 6km above sea level. I could go on about all that, but it wouldn’t convey what it was actually like. It was beautiful, tiring, satisfying, nerve-wracking and very literally breathtaking.

We walked up to the glacier at night, from 3am walking under the moon, scrambling up to around 5800m. We donned our crampons when we reached the glacier at sunrise, ditched our poles in favour of an axe and put on our harnesses. Going out on to the glacier, there was the sort of sunrise you only see in postcards and it was glorious. There were some big crevasses, crossable by ice bridges. Walking over an ice bridge a 20m deep drop on each side was pretty interesting I can tell you. We then crunched over the snow-covered permafrost to the face of the summit ridge: a 100m, 60-degree slope of snow and ice. There were ropes fixed up the face, and we jumared up to the summit ridge proper, which was knackering. After that the climb to the summit seemed to go on for ages, with a sheer drop down both sides down a very long way indeed. Notable on this was a very thin bit of ridge, literally a foot wide, which was bloody scary to walk over. I am VERY glad I am not scared of heights, especially seeing as that bit was actually worse on the abseil down, and I did almost fall off it. Keeps your heart going, I suppose.

The summit itself was just a relief and a slight triumph, but I was too tired to really appreciate the moment. The view was pretty good. We stopped and stayed there for ~20 minutes, then we went down.

I won’t talk much aboiut the walk down, save to say that by the time I reached high camp I felt pretty rough and I was glad to get back to Chukung, take some pills and go to bed.

Still, is good.

Later: Just had my first shower for 2 months! And the first rain I’ve seen for about the same period!

4/06/07 – Pheriche (4278m)

The rest of the base camp lab staff exc. George have gone either up to Gokyo or to Dingboche over the ridge to meet the climbers. Disappointingly I’ve been coughing like a maniac (Island Peak did me in in that respect) so I am going to head down to Namche Bazaar tomorrow and check my e-mail for the first time in 2.5 months. I’m really looking forward to getting back to low altitude now – 4300 is pretty low but still pretty high as well. The monsoon is drawing close as well; more rain/hail/cloud/wind everywhere, which is just grand.

I went over to Dingboche looking specifically to visit a shop we found on the way back from Chukung yesterday which sells the ultimate luxuries we’ve been without these past 2-3 months – fruit juice and apples. Fruit juice! Apples!

The writing does not convey the love. Words are useless.

A Brief Interlude About FLIES at 4300m

Believe it or not, there are still loads of flies at Pheriche. Fat, lazy flies. What is actually difficult to believe is that they manage to stay alive up here. In the UK if you swat at a fly, it lives up to it’s name. Here, they don’t respond. They can hardly fly, if you brush them off you they are stunned for minutes at a time or killed, and when none of that is happening they simply drop out of the sky.

So my question is this: If they can’t fly, evade predators, get to food and spontaneously die, how do they get so fat up here?

End of Interlude

And the end of the entry.

05/06/07 – Namche Bazaar (3485m)

Firstly, take a look at that date.

…

…

Ok, entry. I’ve just gotten back to Namche Bazaar from Pheriche in 4:40, which is a pretty good time considering they told me it’d take 6 hours. I also appear to be the only one here, in the rich thick air of 3500m – I thought the lodge was closed when I got here it was so deserted. All’s well that ends well though, and I was about to leave when the lodge owner appeared and let me in. My bag should arrive tomorrow – I only carried the bare essentials – equipped with sleeping bag and toothbrush I can take on anything! The air here is amazing. I can stomp up hills here that would have killed me higher up, and my cough already feels better than before. Finally, and most notably, today is the first day hat I have seen trees in 2 ½ months.

Trees trees trees =)

06/06/07 – Namche Bazaar (3485m)

The weather in Namche has clearly taken a turn for the woese while I’ve been away – the monsoon is coming. It was sunnier in Pheriche and THAT is saying something.

Still, I’m going to go into Namche later and check my e-mail. It’s quite exciting, I’ve been out of touch a while which is pretty unusual in this modern day and age, and I am unreasonably excited about being in touch again.

Later: Just came back from Namche town, where I checked my e-mail and bought a couple of postcards. The place is dead compared to last time – there are empty stalls everywhere, empty streets, shuttered windows. The trekking season is well and truly over here, I think, and people have moved elsewhere. It is cloudy and grey, the air is wet, and it smells of rain.

It smells of rain! It’s smells that you don’t realise you miss until you smell them again.

07/06/07 – Namche Bazaar (3485m)

It appears that the weather has ‘cleared’ in that there is no longer thick fog everywhere and hence there are helis shuttling kit out of Syangboche just up the hill from here, taking it to lower altitudes where they can carry more. (they can fly 3t out of Kathmandu, but only 1.5-2.0t out from here because the air is thin). Reassuringly enough, there is a crashed MI-17 outside of this lodge, just to make you think ‘hmmm’.

In today’s ‘things I haven’t seen/smelt/felt/heard in 2 ½ months’ is appetite – it’s back with a vengeance; at least double of triple helpings of every meal, then an endless desire for snacks I can’t afford the rest of the time.

My feet itch. I need to get on the move, preferably out of the country (or at least the region). 3 months is a long time to be in one area far from all you know, and 3 days is a long time to be in a humid foggy hut on the side of a mountain. I just want to be on the move, walking with a purpose, not burning time and wondering how many songs I have left before my iPod runs flat. Don’t get me wrong – I like Namche well enough, but after my march down the trail from Pheriche I still burn to do more, to go somewhere with purpose, to escape this place.

Oh, I’m also really poor now – only $20 and a few rupees to get me through. As such, no internet, no chocolate or fizzy drinks, and no pointless gifts. I was very patient at base camp and now its running thin. Three more days here. Things to do in that time include:

- Shower (20 minutes)

- Sort out bag (20 minutes)

- Change $ to rupees (30 minutes)

- Eat and sleep (~34 hours)

This means that I need only fill 37 hours and 50 minutes over the next while. You may have deduced that I’m feeling a mite irritable at this point.

Later: As part of my grand time-burning scheme, I today read a copy of “The Devil Wears Prada” from cover to cover. I have to say that UI actually thought it was rather good, although I’m not entirely sure I enjoyed it – the writing was good and I got so included that I felt a stressed out as the main character. Worth a read.

I’m desperate not to finish this entry [although on typing it up I wish I had] – when I do I have to find something else to do – but the only thing I have left to say is that I posted my last postcards today. I still have stamps left, but I’ve already sent everyone two postcards, so I’m a bit lost as to what to do with the remainder.

Meh.

9/06/07 – Lukla (2900m)

Today is the first day I’ve been less than 3km above sea level for a goodly while. I left Namche one day early in order to try and ensure we all get out of Lukla on time. Ironically, everyone who was here earlier is still here – none have managed to leave. The cloud is low and foggy every day and there’s yet to be a single flight.

As for me, I’ve just spent 5 hours walking through drizzle with atrophied muscles and no food or money, with both iPods flat and an enthusiasm level similar to a geriatric with COPD who’s just been informed that he’s won a free aerobics class.

A spring roll and a plate of chips later: Feel much better now. Out of Lukla as soon as possible.

10/06/07 – Lukla (2900m)

The morning dawned beautiful and clear, with a few clouds lurking down in the valley. By the time that we’d be thinking about flying, visibility was down to ~500m, and we are here another day.

7 hours later: We are still in Lukla and there is now increased discussion of ‘The Jiri Option’ – a 3 day hike to Jiri and then a day catching a bus to Kathmandu. It’s a tough walk, long days, through tropical monsoon valleys complete with leeches etc. It’s guaranteed to get you to Kathmandu in 4 days, but in that time the 45 minutes flight from Lukla may depart.

Tricksy.

11/06/07 – Lukla (2900m)

The morning dawned beautiful and clear, with a few clouds lurking down in the valley. By the time that we’d be thinking about flying, visibility was down to ~500m, and we are here another day.

The days have been nicknamed ‘Groundfog Day’ – an endless repetition of then same day over and over and over, doomed to continue until the weather is just so. In this instance, we actually made it to the departure lounge (if it is such a thing) of Lukla airport, and two planes have actually arrived only to be trapped as the cloud closed in once more. Hence we are waiting again…

Kathmandu (1390m)

I am back in Kathmandu! The smells! The sounds! Cars! Towels! Toilet paper you don’t need to pay for! Newspapers! Free electricity! Flowers! Meat! All these things and trappings of civilisation that I’d forgotten were missing after all this time. Being in the Summit Hotel (ironically enough, also the base of UNMIN – the UN Mission in Nepal) is surreal, unreal and partially dreamlike. It’d almost be worth going away for another three months just for this. Little things strike me as odd – a man in a shirt, for example, I haven’t seen for 3 months.

Also, my heart rate is amazingly slow. There is so much oxygen here its unreal. I’ve also gotten my hands back on my fire poi, which I may be forced to play with later. I feel halfway home already…

12/06/07 – Kathmandu (1390m)

Went into Kathmandu today after another Summit Burger for lunch. Bought a few gifts etc; it seems much less wild now even after 2 ½ months in the Khumbu. I made a little faux pas avec the cash machine, - I made the beginners error of accidentally retrieving 30,000 rupees instead of 3000 (about £270 instead of £27).

Oops.

14/06/07 – Kathmandu (1390m)

Last night, yesterday…so much to say about so little time. I’ll confess that I started yesterday feeling pretty down – the 30,000Rs that I had was spent (Sherpa tip, rabies jabs and lending Isa 7000 saw to that), I had to get the rabies booster because I’d been bitten by a dog in Lukla and I was thinking a lot about pegging it in a nasty manner. [for those of you who don’t know, rabies is incurable once symptomatic and throughout history there are a known 6 cases of people surviving it once it presents. Not so very inspiring.] I was also tired after a goodly while in the pool in the early morning before, and all told I felt pretty weighed down.

Still, I went to the Ciwec Clinic and got the first of two injections for the rabies (I was pre-immunised so theoretically I am fully immune, but with something like rabies ‘better safe than sorry’ is DEFINITELY high on the list). I also visited a school in Kathmandu filled with enthusiastic children, which was quite good in retrospect but at the time I was still a wee bit grim so I didn’t enjoy it so much. I went back to the hotel and remembered that there was the final team party at the Hyatt in Kathmandu.

The Hyatt in Kathmandu is quite a place. Photos say it better than words, but it was quite inspiring. The food there was truly excellent, and after 3 months of variously-cooked potatoes it was practically orgasmic. I ate 5 plates of food, freely mixing starters, main courses and desserts, often in unorthodox combinations – the most notable of which being poppadoms in strawberry ice-cream.

After that we wandered down to the bar, which was also a bizarrely fantastic place, and had a disco-cum-piss up which was good fun. Those who know me will be pleased to know that I was drinking at this point (although they may be less pleased to know that I failed to get smashed AGAIN).

We left at 1:00, sang all the way back (much to the irritation of Jim) and then all got in the pool.

Et voila!

17/06/07 - Doha Airport, Qatar (200m)

We flew out of Kathmandu at 20:20 this evening; it is now 1:30 Nepali time. We’ve flown a few thousand km and already the Summit Hotel, Kathmandu, the foothills and the mountains seem a world away. In a way it was – I am now in the timeless world on in-between, a multitude of airports that never sleep and the dividing intervals of flight – themselves just a relentless timeless roar over continents. This is the domain of air travel, an endless stream of people, all from different places, their only common feature being that they are all in a time zone to which they do not belong.

Hence, the timeless world of in-between.

Paul asked me the other day (well, back in Namche) what I’d learnt from the expedition (I know, the classic ‘what I learnt today’ ending – sorry!) and it got me thinking of the things I’d gleaned or achieved on the expedition. In no particular order:

- I’ve learnt to deal with people better – i.e reassuring them, explaining things and outing them at ease. V. valuable for being a doctor.

- I’ve lived in a tent for 2 ½ months, 5.3km above sea level, subsisting mainly on a variety of potato and spam dishes.

- I can now shower, shave and do my washing with a bowl of hot water and some soap. Oh, and a razor. Soap doesn’t take the stubble off somehow.

- I can ice climb. I have used this newfound ability to successfully consume marshmallows at over 6km above sea level, and in the process to summit a peak over 4 times higher than the highest mountain in the UK.

- I’ve done what so many people try and fail – lost over 10% of my body weight in less than 30 days. And I didn’t want to.

- And finally, I’ve learnt plenty of odds and ends about medicine and exercise physiology, although of the latter much of it is a desire never to run a CPX test again.

There was a shoet (6 hourr) delay between starting and finishing this entry, and I am now moving towards the UK at over 550mph. I’ll be home in just under 5 hours.

It’s been some time.