Right on schedule, the second week of April, camps 1 and 2 are already in according to this email I revived from Phil Crampton of Altitude Junkies:
My Sherpas have already established camp one and camp two so we plan to continue to stock camp two in anticipation of the climbers sleeping there. We will take a few more days rest at BC and then sleep at one before moving to camp two for a few evenings before returning to base. We are a climbing team of seven members, illness one base camp manager and ten climbing Sherpas with five base camp cooks so we should have enough staff to keep everyone happy.
It was April 14th last year when the first teams reported these camps established, identical to 2007. During this time at base camp, teams are reviewing and brushing up on skills, including a few techniques many climbers have not experienced – walking across a ladder with crampons. The RMI teams is taking this approach for training:
We rigged several ladders over the glacial rocks to simulate the icefall in which we practiced walking up and down the shaky ladders. For starters, we began in our trekking shoes stepping from rung to rung getting used to the shake and wobble of the aluminum ladders. Once everyone felt comfortable with this, we put on our stiff 8,000 meter boots and ran the course again. After this, we continued our progression and added roped hand lines while wearing crampons which replicates the actual movement during icefall travel. With the addition of hand lines, we were able to steepen the ladder grade for both uphill and downhill travel and even practiced several “emergency” scenarios. One scenario involved stopping mid crossing and kneeling down on the ladder rungs to re-attach a crampon that had “accidentally” popped off. Although this was not a very likely scenario, it had the advantage of addressing a “possibility” while increasing confidence and agility.
EverestER has the Blog of the Day with their story of a Rai Nepali kitchen worker who nearly died. He was carried to the on the back of a porter with a blood sat of 29%. A must read for what Luanne and her team does for the locals, for free, for anyone asking for help. You can support them with a donation at their site.
Adventure Consultants had their Puja this morning. They do a nice job of describing the process:
The Puja asks for safe passage on the mountain and for forgiveness from the mountain God. During the Puja we offer rice, chang (local rice wine) and food to the four mountain Gods in the Khumbu area. The Lama also blesses our ice axes and crampons. We also burn sange, which is made of flour, sugar and tea, during the Puja. At the end of the Puja we erect a tall pole of prayer flags, extending in five different directions over our camp. We then throw tsampa flour three times, the white colour symbolises the mountains around us. We then put flour on each others faces, to represent living a long life; until we can grow a white beard.
And off the climber’s route, EverestER has a nice picture on their blog of Mr and Mrs Gary Matthews. Hmm, the couple were married yesterday at base camp apparently!
You may note the picture was taken by renown climber, cinematographer (Imax) David Breashears. The Gear Junkie made this report on his site:
Breashears took time to film at the Hanesbrands Puja. He shared in the blessed food and drinks offered after the ceremony, a celebration bathed in sunlight and juniper smoke. Later, Breashears passed around a booklet previewing the “Rivers of Ice” show, including decades-old photos juxtaposed with pictures he has taken from similar vantages today. Glaciers that were once fat and white are now brown and curdled. Near one peak, a deep lake sits in the place where a glacier once grew. “We’re not making any blanket statements about climate change,” Breashears said. “But the pictures illustrate a message in a quick, obvious way.”
This month, Breashears will photograph around Everest Base Camp with a special super-high-resolution camera system that stitches 200 or more digital photos together to create a seamless panoramic collage. If you can’t make it to Base Camp to see the photo show, go online to see more from the “Rivers of Ice” series at www.asiasociety.org/onthinnerice.
Some climbers have already visited the first ladder in the Icefall, a common way of saying hello to what is up next. I am sure the pulse rates are up a bit.
Climb On!
Alan
