My Experience on Mt. Everest. John All

This narrative describes my climb of the North Col/North Ridge Route on Mt. Everest and is selections from my journal of the climb. This route is accessed through Tibet and is the one attempted by George Mallory and various British teams prior to World War II. It was closed to climbing after the Chinese invasion of Tibet and only re-opened in the late 1970’s. It is one of the two main climbing routes used today – the other being the southern route that Hillary and Norgay used for the first ascent of the mountain in 1953. The Hillary route begins in Nepal and is by far the easier and safer of the two. Currently, if you summit from North side, there is a 5% chance you will not survive the descent. In 2010, there were approximately 150 people who attempted the climb from Tibet. Approximate 50 people summitted and 7 people died that we know of (expeditions leave the bodies on the mountain and will not talk about deaths because it hurts their reputation, so those are only what we know about from talking to the Sherpas), thus this year was almost a 15% summit death rate. Be careful what you wish for… The first three days of the route are spent ascending the East Rongbuk glacier, but I do not talk about that long slog through loose rock and seracs or the time spent at 5200 meters and 6400 meters acclimatizing other than to say: It feels like you have a lead suit on your body every minute. Even getting into your sleeping bag leaves you gasping for breath like you are so close to dying. Most of the day you just lay in the tent staring at the ceiling. Small tasks to do begin to fill your mind but you just can't move and after hours of thinking about doing something like putting on lip balm, you slap yourself and get up and do your chores on your way to eat and drink and then immediately go back to bed. I was lying in the tent reading a Newsweek where they were talking about all of 'torture' techniques that Bush allowed during his reign. Unfortunately most of them also sound like climbing here - drowning, cold exposure, lack of sleep, hunger, etc. This is a beautiful bleak place that does its best to break you every minute, every day. Laughing here leads to a coughing fit that lasts 5 minutes. Pretty much everything leads to a coughing fit; which leads to the feeling that you are drowning and 'can you just catch your breath and please breath easily before you die'. I can barely stand sleeping with myself because I smell so badly of salt and every other odor you can imagine. After a long time of that slow wasting, mixed with carrying loads to higher camps, your lungs have adapted to 6400 meters and you are ready to climb. Cast: I was not climbing with a big commercial expedition. I climbed with a British chap named Ed, whose wife had been volunteering with the Himalayan Rescue Association while he climbed here for a few months. We hired a man we knew named Anil to handle the permits and logistics and two Sherpas brothers named NaTenji and Lhakpa to help carry tents and oxygen up to the higher camps. Ed and I climbed at different speeds, so it was usually me alone on the mountain until we reached camp.

May 20, 2010. North Col, Mt Everest. 7050 m. -11deg C

I had trouble sleeping again last night because of too much rest and nervous anticipation of the climb the next day. Also, we got hit by a heck of a wind/snow storm. It shook the tent like crazy all night and it forced snow into every vent and tiny opening. I stuffed my shoes into a crack in the floor of the vestibule that was blasting me with snow. Finally it let up and I fell asleep. I didn't read or anything because I wanted to give my mind free reign to think and plan the climb. Once I got up this morning, I was packed really quickly except for drying my snow-covered sleeping bag. But everyone else was much slower so I had plenty of time. We took several pictures and breathed incense before we left. I had forgotten how ungainly my overboots are and difficult to walk in, but they kept me from getting too badly frostbitten so far and are worth the trouble. The climb begins on scree and climbs the first couple of hundred meters of elevation slipping and trying not to twist an ankle on the loose rock, but I felt good and moved through it quickly. I took some GCPs to slow myself down and make the unpleasant section worthwhile – the glacier margin is here and so any climate changes will be along the rock/ice edge. The line of scree slowly pinches out between the glacier and a cliff and we put on crampons where the cliff rained a thin veneer of rock into the grooves of the glacier. Next, it is a pleasant, relatively flat walk on the translucent glacier that extended for miles around us to the North Col headwall. There are small, twelve-inch wide crevasses every once in a while, but nothing too difficult to jump – even though some of them extend for 30 or more feet into the darkness below. As you are walking towards the North Col headwall, it appears easy from a distance but gets steeper and trickier looking as you get closer. From here on it is crampons, ice axes, and fixed ropes for safety. The ropes are put it by the Chinese Tibet Mountaineering Association (CTMA) as part of our climbing permit costs. They are not very strong, but help with the climbing and MIGHT hold a bad fall. The Chinese side of the mountain is far better organized for a far cheaper price than the Nepal side. But the Nepal route is far easier to climb – especially at the upper sections – and thus has far fewer people die every year. Not surprisingly, the lower death toll and higher success rate attracts climbers to the Nepal side of the mountain in far higher numbers in spite of the dollar cost. Overall, the North Col headwall is a very pleasant climb. We wandered through snow ramps and up a lot more steep ice than I expected. The views were incredible and we had left late enough in the day that we could pretty much move at our own pace. The climbing is a lot longer than I expected, but never too strenuous. The altitude slowed us down, but was never that big of a deal unless I tried to move super fast and pass someone. Then I felt like someone was strangling me - for a few seconds you just cannot take in enough air. There were two ladders across crevasses we had to cross on the route and the second one was a decent size with a long fall and surprisingly at the edge of a cliff, so there was good exposure to your left as you stepped on the ladder over the void. I rushed across it because it was a major bottle neck but Ed was polite and got caught behind four people descending and five climbing. Bei peak is just to the northwest and is the ridge behind which Camp 1 hides. It is steep and much harder that I expected but it a good looking peak. Below the peak, on its ridge heading east, there is the incredible wall of yellow and black striated alternating zones. Perfect colors for sunset and just a beautiful wall. Looking south, Everest suddenly looks so CLOSE. A long snow ramp, then a rock ramp that looks super straight forward to reach the Northeast Ridge, then some tough rock through the Steps to a snow pyramid and the summit. It seems no more than a couple of hours walk on a good day - if it was thousands of meters lower in elevation! Even if it was lower, I think it would still be a major attraction because it is so beautiful and the route so aesthetically pleasing. While I am not looking forward to sleeping up there in the cold, I am incredibly excited about the route and the climbing and visiting Chomolungma (the Tibetan name for Mt. Everest). It was actually a perfect day - sunny but not super hot and just a few occasional wind gusts - of course they were monsters when they came and one of them froze my beard solid! We got to the North Col around 3 or so and found that Ed's tent had been beaten into a new shape. At least it was still here- Ed was talking to a guide and they both watched as the wind launched his tent and its contents - sleeping bag, pad, clothes, etc - over the 2000 foot cliff. His climb was ended before it began. I dug our fuel canisters out of the ice while Ed prepared to cook. He made some of the Indian food while I rested. It tasted great, but now my stomach hurts and I fear it will require a bathroom break (into a crevasse on the glacier) later tonight. Ed also melted a lot of glacier ice, so now I have two hot water bottles at my feet for tomorrow. The tent keeps getting hit by rare but incredibly strong winds. The whole tent shivers and shakes and presses onto us. I hope we don't get blown off the ridge tomorrow!

May 21, 2010. Camp Two, Mt. Everest, 7800 m -15deg C

Our night last night was a tough one; my belly was in agony most of the night and a super windy snow storm pounded the tent and constantly would cover my face with little particles of snow. With the lack of sleep, we neither one wanted to get up and move. But I really feared getting up late and getting a late start and finishing at dark. I wanted to get in during the afternoon so we had plenty of time for recovery before tomorrow. NaTenji and Lhakpa also took off early and so that made the decision easier. The 'climb' itself was just hours and hours of walking up a snow slope – almost the same steepness as a ski slope, but it is only 40 feet wide with thousands of feet drop on either side. I felt good but just took it slowly, slowly to conserve myself for higher up. Unfortunately, I packed too much stuff and so my pack hung heavily on me and really slowed me down as I got higher. Tomorrow it will be a lighter pack for sure! The lack of oxygen up here near 8000 meters was a killer and slowly destroyed my vitality. Camp Two is spread up the hill about 100 meters on a thin ridge. Our camp was near the top of the Camp, and so I had to stagger through steep scree and wind-destroyed tents as the lack of oxygen became more and more difficult. Even the people using oxygen were not going a lot faster than me, but they were the only ones that passed me. We were all moving SO slowly. Finally I staggered into the tent. But of course then my job isn't done. I have to spread out my thermarest, my sleeping bag, unpack my pack and spread everything out, then drink some water and eat a powerbar before I collapsed. Ed cleverly took the side of the tent away from the cooking vestibule, so I spend hours boiling water from glacier ice for drinking and cooking and then drinking for the next day. It is the last thing keeping me awake tonight. We had great weather all day but now we have a slight snow falling. It slows my water boiling but hopefully won't be a problem tomorrow. There are still people coming into camp at 8:45pm. I feel very sorry for them today and tomorrow. The view up here towards arid Tibet and incredibly mountainous Nepal is stunning. Every step opens more of the world to our eyes. It makes every bit of pain worth it.

May 22, 2010. Camp 3, Mt. Everest. 8300 m -20degC

Wow, today was actually an easy day and we have had time for a long rest. Waking up this morning was a bummer because the entire tent (roof, walls, and floor) was covered with 1/2 inch of hoarfrost. The slightest movement (or wind) made it snow inside the tent and everything was totally covered. Fortunately we didn't plan to leave until 9 am and the sun hit us pretty well so thing dried quickly in the bone dry air, even though it was frigidly cold. Getting moving was a matter of jumping over packs, ropes, rocks, and piles of gear on the tiny platform set in the steep scree. Today was an interesting day. Not really a climb, just a steep hike in loose, loose rock, with a bit of fresh snow scattered everywhere from last night. I didn't bother putting on my crampons and I slipped some, but I would have slipped with the crampons as well on the rock so I was happy with the decision. People were aghast that I was climbing without crampons, but as a rock- climber, I feel more comfortable without them. Today we began using oxygen – both to increase our speed as well as to avoid brain damage. I felt incredible with the oxygen. We only used 1.5 L/min until we hit 8000 m, and then I moved up to 2.0 L/min afterwards because I had plenty left and figured the more I used, the happier my brain. We are using far less than the 4-5 L/min that most people, including Hillary, used. Oxygen is incredible; I feel like a new person and feel super confident. The climb itself today was two steep sections of cliff, with a couple of traverses around the steepest headwalls. There were little channels of snow that linked up between the rock and ledges. Most of the rock was tiny marble-sized scree and loose. It wasn't fun or very aesthetic climbing, but seeing Everest growing larger and larger is priceless. It was a painfully slow day as there were so many people who seemed like they were dying and super slow. Many of them hadn’t done enough high altitude climbing to prepare for this climb and were now paying the price, even with oxygen. I try to take ten steps at a time and ten rest breathes. When we got up to Camp 3, I was surprised to find that we weren't arrived at the Ridge (after two full days of climbing!). We are at the bottom of the Yellow Band (the major cliff feature at the top of Mt. Everest) and so we will have to climb it first thing after we left camp. There is still a couple of hundred meters of elevation to reach the Ridge. I wish we could have just climbed it today since I felt so good and the weather was perfect. There was no wind and it was sunny all day - I had to unzip the legs of my down suit and I took off the upper part for a while. I must have looked like a freak; naked at 8000 meters. Still, we couldn't have asked for a better day. Once things got sorted out, we all four crammed into the three man tent and rested/slept for a few hours (from 2-6pm). There are shattered tents all around us and we are precariously balanced on a small pile of rocks on a steep slope. After resting, we spent several hours boiling water and eating and drinking. All of the slow groups just left (between 7:30 and 8:30 pm). We are going to give them an hour head start to get out of the way and leave at 9:30 pm. It is getting a bit windy and super cold (-30 Celsius). I feel confident and strong. I hope everything goes as it should.

May 23, 2010. Camp 2, Mt. Everest. 7800 m, -30deg C and the thermometer couldn't go lower even though the temp did...

I summitted Mt. Everest/Chomolungma! It still hasn't really sunk in but I have a lifetime to contemplate it. It was an awe inspiring summit but the weight of so many dead hangs over any feeling of accomplishment beyond survival. Our plan worked well - when we left at 9:30pm, we were well behind the first three teams and ahead of a big group. I climbed slowly and steadily to avoid catching the groups in front, while Ed and NaTenji left while I was putting my boots on and had about a 5 minute gap between us and they got stuck behind a pathetically slow group. One great thing about the route is that the Chinese Tibet Mountaineering Association has put up fixed ropes in all of the technical areas. That means when you are scrambling or climbing, you usually have a rope that you can clip into for protection. Old ropes, older pitons for anchors, and poor placement mean that it isn't fantastic, but considering the effort to place and update the ropes yearly, it is an incredible asset and without it, very few people would summit. I was also moving a bit slower because I had decided to not wear crampons again. While most of the time it sped me up, there were times I wished I followed the conventional wisdom and wore them. It made the climb a heck of a lot harder overall. But the early British teams didn’t have crampons and I was curious from a historic perspective if I could do what they failed to do – i.e. climb the mountain in just boots. Most of the climb is a poor mix of loose scree and small scree with only occasional section of steeper bad rock. Leaving from Camp 3, you start climbing straight up a very steep rock section (the Yellow Band) where you climb steeply and then traverse to another section where you can continue moving upward. It is all loose-as-hell sandstone that slopes that wrong way (outward) and constantly makes you slip, so that non-climbers had an extremely difficult time and took forever. Then there was a steep section of snow that requires fancy footwork and heavy use of the fixed line with no crampons and, like a miracle, I was finally on the North East Ridge that I had been staring at for weeks!! I was sort of stunned to see it because even though it is 1400 meters tall from the North Col and at least 2-3000 meters total on the north side, it is only 10 meters wide and it is more than 5000 meters tall on the opposite side! The truest knife edge ridge I can imagine and it is higher than all but 5-6 peaks on earth! It was such a wonderful and content feeling to finally reach the North- East Ridge. I looked right and it seemed an easy walk to the summit. Left looked incredibly hard in the Pinnacles. It was a wonderful place and probably the happiest, most excited part of the entire climb. Everything felt perfect. I walked along the section of the ridge that was flat and easy for about 100 meters when I saw a small overhang cave with some oxygen bottles and two sleeping bags. 'That is smart' I thought, 'someone put these here for an emergency'. But there are not small emergencies at 8500 m that can be solved with sleeping bags. It was a dead body and the 'bags' were his down clothes. As with most of the bodies above 8000 m, he was in the fetal position but had fallen over and so his head was lower than his boots. He was still wearing crampons and everything but no pack or anything easily removable. NaTenji later told us most used equipment in Thamel (Kathmandu) comes from the bodies. Under this body was another body buried in some snow. The lower body was an Indian man from the 1996 disastrous year. I don't know why they were stacked in the cave. Since it was near the descent, maybe someone, someday will come and get them. My euphoria at reaching the awesome North-East Ridge was crushed in a blast of mortality. After that, I sort of stumbled along lost in thought. The Ridge itself is nice, upward sloping but easy walking with occasional sections where you bypass rock outcrops to the right and move steadily upward. Because you stay right, you never really get a good view of the massive snow face to the left, which is the largest rock face on Earth. But it is definitely weird to be walking along a flat rock path at over 8600 m. Finally the ridge constricts and you have to climb. The First Step looms impressive but is pretty easy to pass on the right with only moderate climbing (5.3 maybe) and not horrible exposure. But the rock is extremely brittle and falls off in your hand and everything slopes outward about 30 degrees and is snow polished; so it perfect for you to think you have a good hold and then slip right off without knowing what happened. But overall the First Step was fun. Lhakpa had been following close behind me up to now, but he wasn't a fast climber and so I left him until after the Second Step and it was nice to be climbing Mt. Everest completely alone on the hardest section. It was this rock climbing section where my decision to not wear crampons was the smartest. Another easy stretch and then I hit the Second Step. This was a totally different climbing matter. The climb straight up the prow didn't look super hard - if it wasn't just a pile of loose rock sloping the wrong way. If it was solid, it would be fun; but as it is, it is an impossible death trap. So the route went right: easier but longer and steeper. There is a short but tricky boulder move (5.7) that now has a ladder so it is easy but the slope of the rock getting to the ladder still makes it committing. Now you are in a small alcove with a crack above your head and a slope up to a flat boulder with big exposure on your right. You wedge your boots about halfway up the boulder in a crack and pull yourself around the roof onto the flat boulder surface. At this point you feel very precarious and are being pushed out into the void by the roof/wall and are standing balanced on the boulder. When you look right, down the cliff, you see a dead man about 10 meters below you – he is still tied into a rope, but at night all you see is the high reflective strips on his boots and clothes. Then you REALLY feel precarious and move around the roof/wall/bulge and pull yourself onto a ledge/snow channel. That section is only 5.4 but is the most intense of the whole Step because of the exposure (and the dead body). You walk up the 30 degree snow channel - I had to move around two climbers who were descending (at 3am after they had a pitch dark summit!). When I passed them, they were changing an oxygen cylinder and let the old one drop and it almost hit Lhakpa down below! That was one of the worst parts of the climb - people constantly stopped in the middle of the cliff or climb and acted like there was no one else around. Heading to Camp 3, one guy not only stopped in the middle of the cliff, but his knee buckled and he fell upside down into me. If I hadn't stopped him because I was strong and knew how to climb and brace myself, we both would have died. Neither he nor his partner thanked me or apologized. I was super happy to be alone most of the day. At the top of the snow chute was the section that killed George Mallory and Andrew Irvine. It is an overhung cliff corner with a wide crack, or a five meter face with two meters of steep loose rock scrambling above. There are several dead bodies here for a reason. However, thanks to the Olympics and bringing a torch to the summit two years ago, there is now a super nice new ladder that is well anchored and extremely easy to use. Getting onto the ladder from above is the only remotely tricky part and so the feared Second Step that killed so many is now toothless. Anil told us that in the rush to get the torch onto the summit of Everest in time for the 2008 Olympics, 10-15 Chinese climbers died. You can't schedule Everest and there are very few good Chinese climbers (fewer now). Even in the best conditions, climbers die. But if someone tells you to go up during a snowstorm, many climbers die. Officially no one died and they closed the Tibetan section of Everest for a big chunk of the next climbing season in 2009 and had to hire a bunch of Sherpas from Nepal to hide the bodies - which is how anyone even knows about it. They left all of the older Western bodies; which is too bad because the bodies are what 'altered' the experience for me so dramatically. After the Second Step, you meander along the ridge a bit more (I wish I could be more specific but your mind just doesn't work right at these altitudes) until you come to another snow slope. There is a broken rock face directly in from of you and the Ridge become very narrow. Where the trail goes is hard to tell as you walk up the snow, but there was a Sherpa sitting in front of the rock face who maybe we could ask. Until I realized that sitting in the dark was weird and as I got closer I saw that he was laying sideways in the snow in the fetal position. What is worse, the easy way to continue would be to basically step over the dead body. But it looked like that would take you to the 5000 meter cliff and I saw no footprints going that way thankfully. Although there were a surprisingly number of prints that went up and circled the body. (I found out that this guy's girlfriend was waiting for him in Base Camp while he climbed and never returned. He had summitted fine and just sat down to rest 'for 10 minutes' and never got up. I can't imagine what that did to her. And still he sits here just as he fell, so undignified and deserted.) Not being sure where to go, I decided to follow the frayed looking rope and head up the broken rock face. It was only 5.6 but everything looked extremely loose and I was terrified it would break apart in my hands or especially under my feet. Looking down at my feet to select footholds and seeing the dead body didn't help. Especially when the footholds were all fractured and I guess it was ice holding them in place. But it was the right path and once we climbed this Third Step, we were on the summit pyramid. So many climbers throughout history would have given all they had and were to have reached this point. It was here, when I looked east, that the sun was just beginning to turn the horizon orange. From now on, with each step, the snow or rock would begin to change color and lighten in front of me. I kept looking back and waiting for the sun to light up some part of Tibet, until I realized that NOTHING I could see for hundreds of miles between me and the sun was high enough to receive sun before Everest itself. I have been on many, many high peaks, but this was so dominant that it spoke the language of the very Earth itself. I could see probably ten of the world's highest peaks and they were just marbles lying on a rumpled table cloth down below - so that the sun, that only I could see, was still too far away for them, too high above. It was like looking at the Earth from a space station - beyond words - as the sun struggled to fill all of the hills and valleys - 8000 meter hills. As we walked up a rocky snow field, I saw another Sherpa sitting on some rocks in the growing light. But I wasn't tricked this time, especially when I saw that he was sprawled upside down. It looked like he had been sitting facing away from the trail, looking at the view toward Makalu, when he fell backwards down the slope almost onto the trail. This body is the worst because it is sprawled with its arms outraised and his face looking directly at the trail from a few feet away. It is the only face you can see while climbing and his face is bleached and dried and his eyes pecked out by birds, so it is not something you seek to examine closely. I have only described the four bodies within a few feet of the trail. There are nine that are within ten meters of the trail, but these you can avoid if you try not to look at strange colors or shapes. There are many, many others further away from the trail that have fallen further away. At the upper end of Camp 3 is one of Anil's friends - there is a sleeping bag lying in some debris amongst the tents with a dead Brazilian inside. He summitted without oxygen but died, they think around the Second Step, but his body kept moving until Camp 3. So it definitely is not a good idea to rummage through discarded equipment on Mt. Everest. It costs many, many thousands of dollars to have a body brought down from the mountain - and it is only possible from probably Camp 3 or below. I just find it so, so, so sad that all of these bodies don't even have friends or anyone who will cover their faces or put them in a dignified position. They all lay as they fell. Surely they weren't climbing alone. It would have only taken ten minute to turn them over or move them out of sight and prepare them for what comes next, so that dozens of people a year don't see them in such an undignified and pitiful position. Such a sad monument. The summit pyramid itself is not straight forward, but not hard. Like a lot of mountains, you just have to wander around, linking the weaknesses and ramps and ledge to get up. But here, if the route wasn't marked, you would never find the way before you ran out of oxygen and died. I should mention - climbing the summit pyramid and even on the North East Ridge - you are dying and you can feel it accelerate with every step. There is no specific organ or body part that is dying. Somehow you can feel inside yourself, every cell itself is dying. It is like you are a snowman walking into brighter and brighter sun. You don't die all at once, but slowly disappear. The oxygen mask puts the process at bay to some extent, but you know you have such a limited time here and that you are doing your body harm that may be irreparable. All it would take would be to run out of oxygen and lay down for a few minutes, and you die. Simple, quick, and probably painless. So wandering up the maze on top has a bit of a desperate feel. Fortunately, it is just a quick reverse Z along a ledge to a ramp to the final snow ramps. On the lower part of the Z, people above were kicking rocks on me. I met them at the lower joint of the Z at the anchor. I was going to yell at them, but one person in their group was clearly dying and the others were trying to carry him down the mountain as quickly as possible. I tried to let them pass to one side, but they rudely told me to move to the corner of the cliff and hope they didn't knock me over. They were soon past and we continued upward. In pictures, you see Mt. Everest from the cliff-side with the massive drops and no snow. The best visualization of the mountain is that it is a piece of paper cut into a triangle and standing on one side and your view is of the face of the paper. But to climb it, you are climbing the knife-edge, which usually isn't too steep and has a lot of snow near the top. These steep snowfields really made me re -think my crampon decision. But I figured I was so close and what the heck, I'll keep going. The hardest part of the climb for me was the 80-degree snow field that now greeted me. It was icy hard and there were no steps cut or anything. But there was a nice fixed line so I could 'batman' my way up by pulling on the rope and digging the front of my boots into the ice. Not fun but it was probably only 75 meters before the angle eased off. Throughout the whole pyramid, Lhakpa kept saying - 'don't you want to put on crampons now?'. But I was so close and stubborn. It would be quite an accomplishment to climb Mt. Everest without crampons. Once things eased off, it was just an undulating series of snow ridges and valleys to the summit. The sun had hit the snow and was changing it through every reddish color imaginable. We could see a couple of people and a bunch of Buddhist prayer flags on the high point above and it was just such an easy stroll to get there - except for the whole panting for oxygen thing as you climbed. At around 6am Nepali time, I summitted the highest mountain in the world. I wish I could say it was a beautiful summit. The views were stunning. But the summit itself is just a small high point on the ridge. Maybe one meter by three meters of high point and then it heads south down one ridge and north down the other. If you weren’t paying attention, you could walk right past it. To the west it is a cliff but not too steep for a while. To the east is the largest cliff on Earth, and the snow is undercut there and if you go within a meter of the edge of the snow, it will break off underneath you and you will fall 5000+ meters. There are no guardrails and everyone just tries to step around each other without getting too close to the edge. That cliff side is beautiful - fluted snow that looks like it has been sculpted as far down as your eye can see. By far the prettiest part of the entire mountain - it is funny I have seen Everest so many times but never from this side. The weather was stunningly perfect - not a cloud anywhere on Earth that I could see for thousands of square miles. I have never even seen pictures so perfect. Looking down on so many familiar places in Nepal and at Base Camp felt almost god-like. I took pictures over and over. I took some with the WKU banner. And then some of the prayer flags and junk on the top. Lhakpa kept pulling me to descend and finally I agreed although I hated to leave. I gave Chomolungma a Snickers from me and a Snickers Cruncher from Narcisa by putting them on the edge of the giant face and letting them slide down and caress the goddess for 5000 meters. I walked down the snow to the first rocky area as we descended. My brother Joe asked me for a rock from the summit and I thank goodness for that because without that reminder, I would have forgotten. So I stopped and stuffed my pockets with as many rocks as looked neat and that I could carry. I walked a ways further down the snow fields until I remembered my GPS! I forgot to get points on the summit even though I had marked GCPs all the way to less than 100 m from it. So I left Lhakpa to talk to some Sherpas coming up and re-summitted Mt. Everest! It was nice because now I was alone (except for the 5-8 other people on the summit circulating through from the South side) and could move at my own pace. I took GCPs on the top and then down on the Nepal south side as well. I walked down the south ridge for five minutes to get pictures of the South Col and Lhotse. I took pictures back up from that side. I realized I had taken all of my pictures with my mask and goggles on, so took them off and took some solo pictures - but my face is horribly sunburned and they make me like I am really suffering worse than I was at this point. In fact, all of my preparations had paid off perfectly and the climb was remarkably easy. I had climbed at my own pace quite comfortably and happily. Decades of climbing and mountaineering and nearly a year of backpacking from 3-5000 m in Nepal was a prelude to this moment. It felt great to be on top of the world and I wasn't really that tired at all even though I had been climbing for nine hours already. I could feel my cells disintegrating, but my larger body felt fine. After I had done everything possible and took every picture three times and soaked in where I was and how perfect the day was - once I was as truly satisfied as you can be on a summit for a short time - I headed down. The snow slopes were very difficult and energy consuming without crampons. Lhakpa quit trying to get me put them on, but it was at this point - with the sun up and it getting hotter - that I started getting dehydrated. But the descent is straightforward and along the ridge at least, doesn't present any problems for a decent climber. Seeing or avoiding seeing the bodies was the biggest hazard and daylight wasn't kind to them. I took dozens of pictures of every aspect of the descent, but by this point it was getting to be harder to turn my neck and head from thirst, so the pictures mainly are focused downward. I also began to get very tired as we passed the Steps in order. The Second Step looks so small until you are upon it and see that it is just big enough to be impossible. And the First Step looks so hard until you are there and link the features together so easily. We passed a couple of climbers on the descent but most of them had disappeared. We found out later that the big group behind us - Anil's old boss and who we spent a lot of time chatting with - had only summitted 4 out of 22 climbers due to a colossal series of mistakes. But at the time it just seemed like a wonderfully clear descent. It was once we reached the end of the North-East Ridge and started descending into the Yellow Band that I started having trouble. I was very, very dehydrated at this point after 12 or so hours of constant motion in one of the driest places on earth. Lhakpa and his brother were strong but not smart, and told us just a liter of water for the climb would be fine. After 12 hours my throat was almost swollen shut and I had trouble breathing. Apparently it is a liter PER HOUR that you need - although no one could carry that much. Instead, if you hire a Sherpa, he is supposed to carry a small epigas stove and you spend 15 minutes boiling water every few hours to rest and kept yourself strong. But our guys decided to ignore this and we didn't know any better. The other problem is that Mt. Everest is the largest scree pile on Earth as well. So while there are a few cliffs that kill you, the frost-thaw cycle has broken most of them into small rocks from baseball to watermelon-sized. So descending you are sliding down loose rock on a steep slope only partially in control. Since I am tall with a high mass and higher center of gravity, keeping my balance is extremely difficult. But of course, loosing control even for a second means becoming one of the bodies that litter the route. No crampons doesn't help. So I staggered down the route, more and more drunkenly as I grew desperate for water. Fortunately it is a steep but basically straight down trail to Camp 3 with two small traverses. Most people can make it here to die. I came stumbling into the harsh Camp - usually they can make a tent platform big enough for one and a half people if they work long enough - croaking for water. NaTenji was passed out from exhaustion and Lhakpa just sat staring blindly when he arrived. They told me Ed had headed down the mountain for Camp 1 fifteen minutes before. I asked if they had water or where the stove was (Anil bought 50 epigas containers and there were supposed to be 10 at this camp. However, they all 'disappeared' and I suspect they were sold for good money at this elevation) and they told me the gas was gone and there was no water or any way to make any. Other Sherpas who are friends of Anil’s were pissed when they heard this, and said they could have asked anyone for gas. Anyway, I knew we literally would die if we stayed here at 8300m (WAY up in the 'death zone' and this is not melodramatic, this is where most people die, including a Scottish and a Japanese climber in 2010) for more than a few hours. It was cooling off and the perfect day had to end sometime. So I put my pack on and headed down. Camp 2 was 7800 m and while that is higher than 99% of the mountains on Earth, it is lower than here and more importantly, I knew I had some epigas left in the tent. So I stumbled down the scree and made it there by later afternoon. I passed some people from the big group (Adventure Peaks out of England) and they had two guys who looked like they were dying as well. They could barely walk and were only carrying an oxygen bottle and were being semi-carried. I gave them some GU energy gel and the one guy perked up immediately. Neither of them died thankfully. Not long after I passed them, I repelled a small section of cliff and slipped on loose rock sideways and smashed into my back and side. But fortunately I just rolled down the rock and was only dazed - falling while alone at that elevation is a great way to die. Because of the altitude, it didn't get stored in my memories and I forgot about it until I lay down in the tent and felt the bruises and soreness and tried to remember what happened. While I was descending, I got hot in my down suit because I was moving so quickly. I normally take off my hood and unzip the front when that happens and so I did this time. There was a sharp, icy wind blowing (the beginnings of a snow storm/blizzard) and it made my jacket turn icy with hoarfrost. It was only after I got to camp I realized that is had also made my ear icy - actually frozen it solid. I have no feeling in it and it has grown to twice its normal size and literally exploded twice and covered my head and hair with pus. It is so big I couldn't put on my glacier glasses because they wouldn't go over it. I got to Camp 2 and got the stove started and melting some ice. Lhakpa and NaTenji came stumbling down like dead men an hour later or so and passed out. I got us each a half liter of water and a small package of freeze dried food each before the gas ran out. Ed was lucky he is younger and not taking any pictures and got further down the mountain. Sleeping at 7800 m with no oxygen, food, or water after I drank it, was not a pleasant experience. I could still feel my cells and body dying, only more slowly now. I knew we had to get down quickly tomorrow or things would get desperate. As bad as this may sound, I was super healthy, fit, and ready to go and the weather was as perfect as it possible. In spite of everything being superb, we were seriously near death after only a few hours on the mountain. Even the slightest storm could kill so easily. And as we tried to fitfully sleep, it started snowing.

May 24, 2010. ABC. Tibet -15deg C!

The faint snow that started last night (it is funny, in my delirium, I thought it would be nice if it snowed so everyone else wouldn't have as perfect as a summit day as I did) turned it to a storm/blizzard that lasted all day (four days actually) and dumped four or five feet of snow on the route. I 'woke' after a hard night, starving and with my throat swollen shut from dehydration. I struggled to move but desperately wanted the lethargy to win, and to just lay there until someone made everything go away. My mind was in shambled from the lack of oxygen for so long and I only dreamed of water. And the snow just kept pounding down. At some point I said 'John, are you going to lay here until you die?' and rolled over and packed my pack lying on my side. I was coughing badly and it was ripping my dry throat to shreds. I put my harness on, grabbed my ice ax and left. The first part of the descent from Camp 2 is the worst of the whole mountain - nothing but piles of baseball-sized scree. Everything was covered in snow and it was snowing so hard, I couldn't see five feet away. I started eating snow out of desperation at this point and ate it the entire rest of the trip down. I would stop to catch my breath and shove in snow until it melted and move on - which did even more damage to my throat but probably saved me because that small amount of water would help me keep moving. When I would blindly fall with my heavy pack on - summit rocks are not light - sometimes I would flip completely head over heels and just lay there on my back groaning. Other times one leg would slide and the other stay and I would do a split and then fall onto my back. I hated that hour or two of hell. But finally it ended and I reach the snow slope. Above the North Col is the 500 meter snow slope (just like a ski slope) that looks so easy and would be if there was oxygen. When I was reading about Everest history, one of the British guys in the 1930's said he glissaded from the top of the snow to the North Col in 15 minutes and I was desperate for something like that. I was hoping the snow storm would mean there enough snow and less ice so I would slide well. And thank goodness it turned out perfectly! I sat down, turned to my right, with my ice ax in my right hand, and pushed off. Sometime when the angle would get too steep and I would getting going REALLY fast and start bouncing or rolling, I would dig the ice ax in and eventually dig deep enough to find ice and slow myself and stop. I was covered head to foot in snow but the down suit laughed at that and so I wasn't cold. The blizzard was so strong I couldn’t really see where I was going so I was happy I didn’t hit anyone. There were a couple of flat sections that I had to stumble along on foot and once I passed a guy. He had climbed the same day as me but without oxygen. He looked FAR worse than me and said he only got to 8500 m but was cheerful about it. People who climb without oxygen usually either fails to summit, or die, or both. Fortunately I met him on a flat section and he was moving super slowly so he was easy to pass. Overall the 1500-foot snow slide was one of the more fun parts of the trip. I knew the snow was so soft, I couldn't get hurt. Unless I had slid 15 meters sideways of the cliff - but to be honest, that thought didn't occur to me until this very second! Now it doesn't seem as smart. Oh well, I lived. Note: I talked to Ed about it and he thought I was insane. This long snowslope is about 40-50 feet wide and has a big cliff on one side and a gigantic cliff on the other. The slightest mistake at the speeds I was sliding and I could have gone off either side. Several times the angles changed and I veered towards one side of the cliff or the other. But in my altitude-addled state, I didn't notice any danger. I was just mildly irritated that I had gone off course and completely obvious to the monumental risk. I guess that is why 5% of Everest summiteers die on the descent. Down at the North Col, I was devastated to have lost my free ride. Walking again was hard, but even harder after 100 meters, when I fell into a crevasse! I know there were crevasses at either side of the Col, but this one was a small. However, in the blizzard I could not see my feet and snow covered everything. So I had stepped into a hole and flipped completely over. Thank goodness it wasn’t a big crevasse or I would have just disappeared and no one would have ever known what happened to me. I got up and thought, 'well, at least that's over' and within two steps hit the other side of the crevasse and did another full body flip because it was sloped steeply downward. Thankfully it was small as well and then it really was over and I could just stumble through the deep snow. A few other people had come this way today and so even with the deep snow and the blizzard blowing, there was still a trail to follow through the flat Col. Finally I reached the far side and dragged myself up the wall and hill beyond to Camp 1. I had planned on stopping here for an hour or so to boil water, because again I knew I had a stove but I found that the camp had been crushed by the blizzard. Ed's tent was smashed flat - maybe 6 inches tall - and buried in snow. All of the other tents had their poles broken and looked even worse. I knew where I could dig out a snow shovel next to his tent and it was only a few feet down, but there was no possible way for me to have that kind of energy. A lot of other people were trying to dig out their tents to rescue gear, but I abandoned my Gore-Tex and Capilene and down gloves buried in the tent and just kept moving. I was eating more and more snow at this point because the damn weather was a blizzard, but the cloud cover wasn't that thick so it was bright and hazy-like. Classic hot and humid greenhouse effect - during a blizzard! The worst possible conditions as you can imagine. But at least descending the steep ice wall of the North Col, I shouldn't trip any more. The first part of the descent is down a vertical ice wall to a crevasse, which you cross balanced on a long ladder that doesn't shift TOO much. I didn't think about how icy the ropes would be and almost plunged down the wall onto the ladder or past it into the crevasse. But I got things under control and three steps, rest, eat snow, three steps - down the wall until I reached the glacier. Once I was on flat ground (I have NEVER been happier to walk on flat ground in entire life) I stumbled along and kept telling myself 'John, you have been a walker all of your life, don't stop, keeping moving forward'. And somehow it worked. The crevasses were all covered in snow and at this point I doubt I wouldn’t have cared if I fell into one. The first time we descended from the North Col, a guy from one of the rich teams was there giving tea to their team at the place where you leave the glacier and take off your crampons. The guy knew Anil and had given us some free tea. For several hours I had been dreaming of such a person being there and saving me or better giving me a Coke. The first thing I wanted in camp was going to be a Coke. Amazing how thoughts of a Coke can push you when you have nothing left. And there were some Sherpas there at the crampon point! But they ignored me and had no tea. I was literally crying after I passed them because my fantasy had taken on a life of its own and I was so spent. I managed to get my crampons taken off somehow and started down the last scree slope toward camp, when Chombe, our Tibetan kitchen 'boy' (even though he probably 30, he helps wash dishes and gets water etc) steps into view. NaTenji had radioed and said they were coming and he came to meet me with a Coke. I gave him a huge hug. The ordeal was over. With a Coke in my hand, I floated back to Advanced Base Camp and triumph.