(L to R) Nema Sherpa, Dorjee Sherpa and Phurba Tashi Sherpa, October 31, 2008 atop Ama Dablam. Six months later these three were also among the first to reach Everest’s summit. Just passing along some recent good news. On May 5th Phurba Tashi, Dorje, and Nema, along with two sherpa from IMG and British climber David Tait, summited Mount Everest. Their efforts fixing the route to the 29,035 foot summit...
It was October 18th, nine days after arriving to Nepal, that we finished our trek and made it to basecamp. What a spot. The looming west face of the mountain frames the backdrop for the camp and the huge hanging snowfield just below the summit, known as the ‘dablam’ (loosely translated- pendant or charm box), accents it further. As we made our way to our tents, passing through other expeditions...
As we suffer alongside the pool at the Hyatt Resort/Hotel in Kathmandu, waiting to fly home later today, we can’t help but think about how lucky we’ve been. Be it our health, the weather, the ever changing route conditions or Adrian and the sherpas efforts, it seems everything was going right for us. Well let’s add one more thing to the list of good fortunes, our quick escape from Lukla....
Though it has been five days since we’ve summited, there’s still quite a lot happening. We left basecamp yesterday after nearly three weeks there, and will be in Lukla tonight. If the weather holds we should be back at the hotel in Kathmandu tomorrow. We can’t wait to get into a new set of clothes. Once we get home and get a chance to sort through the 1000+ photos we’ve...
“Now we wait.” That begins a prepared update from Ted via sat phone to Aspen at 9:34 p.m. Monday. “Nine days ago, we arrived to Ama Dablam base camp with near perfect weather. We made three trips with loads of gear and food to Camp 1, at 19,000 feet. After spending two uncomfortable nights there, we climbed up to Camp 2, familiarizing ourselves with all of the technical rock pitches, including...
From Dingboche ~14,200 feet- So far, so good. Actually, it’s better than that. It has been a perfect start to the trip. With ideal weather, great food and comfy tea house accommodations, everyone is healthy and having fun. In an effort to acclimatize, we went up Chukking Ri this morning. It took us four hours to reach the snow free summit, above 18,000 feet, with awesome views of the Lhotse Face,...