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Posts for Everest from 03/2011

Mt. Everest Expedition: Sara McGahan on Climbing and her Studies

Posted by: | March 30, 2011
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Everest
Elevation: 11,300'

Hi, my name is Sara for those of you that are reading this that don’t know me, I am 16 years old, and a sophomore at The Westminster Schools in Atlanta, Georgia. I started climbing when I was 12 years old, and since then I have climbed Kilimanjaro, Elbrus, Aconcagua, Rainier, Denali (Mt. McKinley), and a bunch of other mountains.

I like climbing for a number of reasons.  I like training for climbing because I know that when I am doing it its with a goal in mind. I love the people I meet when I am climbing, and hearing all their stories and experiences. I have also been able to travel to a lot of different places like Tanzania, Argentina, Russia, Australia, Nepal, and the states of Washington, Alaska, and Colorado. Its really interesting and fun to go to all these places, and to see different people and cultures.

While on this climb I am working on two different projects for classes at my school:

1.  For science, I am measuring heart rate and blood oxygen levels at different altitudes of 4 people (including myself) to study the effects of high altitude.  I am taking readings using a small finger device and doing it twice a day.  As we move up to higher and higher altitudes its interesting to see how peoples bodies react to the altitude, and how they change as the body starts to acclimatize.

2.  Right now I am in the Northern part of Nepal and Tibet is just over the border in China. The Dali Lama is openly held in very high regard here in Nepal, but pictures of the Dali Lama are forbidden in Tibet.  For English I will be talking to people about the current situation of the Dali Lama in Tibet, their views on this situation, and any impact its had on climbing near this border and on the villages close to the border.

As I write this I am sitting in an internet cafe in Namche, Nepal.  Namche is the center for trekking and climbing in Sagarmatha National Park.  Today we took a hike from Namche, which is at about 11,200 feet, up to the villages of Khumjung, Khunde, and Syangbouche. The views from these villages are truly breath taking. Some of the men in the villages work as porters and sherpas (guides for climbers and trekkers), and the rest of the people are farmers.  Our group stopped half way at the Everest Hotel to have a coke, and we sat on the terrace with clear views of Everest, Lotse, Ama Dablam, and lots of other huge mountains.  Really, it is one of the most beautiful places in the world.

Sara McGahan

 

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Mt. Everest Expedition: Bill & Sara McGahan Start Their Expedition

Posted by: | March 28, 2011
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Everest
Elevation: 11,300'

Hi. This is Bill blogging from Namche, Nepal.

I started climbing with my daughter Sara about 3 1/2 years ago when she was just 12, and since that time we have had many adventures together. I love climbing, but even more so, I love spending the time with Sara, who is now 16.  When we are at home in Atlanta she is so busy and I never get to hear about all the things that go on in her life every day.  So while we are climbing, and over meals, or watching a movie or TV show on her itouch, I get to hear all the funny things that happen on a daily basis. For example, I just learned all about the social importance of ‘threads” on Facebook, and the song with the line “the best 30 seconds of my life” (if you don’t know what song that is, that’s probably a good thing!).

So this past week has been fun.  It takes a lot of patience to fly from the states to Kathmandu, with the layovers, cramped planes, visa lines and time changes, so its a big relief to finally get to a hotel room and start to work on your jet lag. Its been about a week, and I think I am finally over the 10 hour change.

The flight from Kathmandu to Lukla is quite an adventure, which starts with getting up in Kathmandu at 4:30 am and then literally fighting your way through a mosh pit of folks in the airport. It’s actually great fun if you keep it in perspective. And of course, the 45 minute flight up to the mountains through a saddle into the very short landing strip (on a twin prop, specialized short takeoff and landing plane) is intense. If you have any doubt, go to youtube and search “lukla airport” and check out the clips.  The strip is only open for brief spurts every morning due to the clouds, so you have to be on the 1st flight, hence the mosh pit.

There are two ways to get to Lukla, flying or walking, and the walk takes days. So, the main way (really the only way) is to fly in.  All goods used by the many villages in the mountains get flown in.  Then, once into Lukla, porters pick up all the goods and carry them up the trail. The trail is filled with porters carrying 70 to 80 pound loads on their backs, some the size of refrigerators. Most everything gets to the towns in the mountains makes it way there on the backs of the porters (or yaks or donkeys). All of our bags going to base camp are carried by these porters, and it takes them about 7 to 10 days to get up to basecamp. The porters climb from an altitude of about 9,000 feet, down to about 8,000 feet, and then all the way up to nearly 18,000 feet.  Its just amazing what they do.

The “tea houses” that we stay in are really beautiful little lodges. They are made of stone (cut up here from the sides of the hills).  The rooms are simple but clean, and the common dining room serves delicious food. We are eating so very well, and with dishes that we are accustomed to - pizza, chicken, steak, french fries, eggs, pancakes, etc… and these dishes - combined with the RMI condiments - have been great.  We are buying bottled water along the way, but the bottles are getting more and more expensive the further we go.

Our climb so far has really consisted of getting into Namche, the center for all trekking and climbing in this area. The “Namche hill” is a 2000 foot hill from about 9,000’ to 11,000’ just before Namche that takes about 2 hours to climb.  It was raining yesterday when we were ascending, so our biggest challenge was dodging the puddles and the yak dung along the way (not to mention the yaks which also have considerable loads on their backs).

This morning we awoke early to climb above Namche to get our first vies of Everest, Lhotse and the other massive mountains in the surrounding area. After a half hour trek at 6:30 this morning we were rewarded with perfect views. Everest had its tell tale plume of clouds streaking off the summit as it pierced the jet stream.  It looks quite daunting, perhaps because it is.

Our trip is led by Dave Hahn, who is not only an insane climber, but one of the most down to earth people you will ever meet. He breaks it all down to seem so simple, and he makes me (and Sara) believe that all we have to do is take this adventure day by day, and climb by climb. This coming from a man who has summitted Everest 12 times, more than any non-sherpa in the world.  If I were him I would be at least a little boastful, but he never is. And he seems to know everyone along the trail, at the hotels, and in the shops.  Its one big mixer for Dave as we head to base camp!

So today is a rest day, and quite a beautiful one. Sara and I are going to break out Yatzee and the deck of cards. The goal today is to continue to have our bodies adjust to 11,000 feet while remaining strong and sickness free.  Rest days are my strongest days in the mountains!!!

Thanks for following our climb.

Bill McGahan

(Photos by Expedition Leader Dave Hahn)

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Mt. Everest Expedition: Team in Namche

Posted by: | March 28, 2011
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Everest
Elevation: 11,300'

Hello from Namche -

We arrived at Namche this afternoon in great spirits. After a nice big breakfast, we started walking around 8:00 am. At first the trail follows the contour of the valley floor and then gradually climbs to Jorsale, the offical boundary of Sagarmatha National Park. While the permit was issued in Kathmandu on Friday, this is a formality and gives us the permission to enter the park. After confirming the details of the expedition, we were back on the trail.

All of the elevation gain today occurs in one stretch called the “Namche Hill”. It is not so much steep as it is long, but we climbed right up it. Keeping a solid pace, we passed through 9,000 feet, then 10,000 feet’ and finally 11,000 feet. The reward at the top is a stunning view of the village of Namche terraced into the hillside. A incredible sight.

We made our way to our teahouse, called Camp de Base, our home for the next three nights. After a cup of tea and a change of clothes, it is
now time to do a little exploring…

The RMI Everest Team

On The Map

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Mt. Everest Expedition: Flight of the Climbers

Posted by: | March 26, 2011
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Everest
Elevation: 4,383'

My little team began to combine in Kathmandu yesterday afternoon.  Jeff Martin met my flight into hot and dusty K-Du at around one o’clock.  As my boss at RMI, Jeff has already been over here for nearly a week, chasing down logistical details and getting all the arrangements arranged.  My climbers, Bill and Sara McGahan, beat me into town by about an hour, having flown East out of Atlanta, while I circled West from Taos.  Long, long flights no matter how you slice it…. a passel of time zones and bad airplane food.  I had time for a quick shower back at the hotel before Jeff and I taxied our way over to the Ministry of Tourism.  I scribbled my name a half-dozen times and shook a bunch of official hands… swallowed the obligatory cup of sweet tea and voile!!  we walked out with an all-important Everest climbing permit.  We retreated to the hotel to join Bill and Sara for dinner.  Despite the fun reunion, we got yawning and fading fast… hopelessly jet-lagged we stumbled off to our rooms.  Linden Mallory is already up in the Khumbu, we’ll get together with him about a week into our trek, and Mark Tucker will join us at about the same time to complete the team.  For now it is just four of us, which made today pretty easy when it came to a final gear check and packing session.  We enjoyed an interview and conversation with Bili Bierling who is helping the legendary Elizabeth Hawley with the monumental task of keeping track of climber statistics in the Nepal Himalaya.  Then we each made a few forays out into the streets to track down odds and ends -our version of sightseeing at this busy point in the expedition.  We need to be ready to fly good and early tomorrow morning, up from 4,000 feet in Kathmandu to 9,200 feet in Lukla before the air gets cloudy and turbulent.  My clock is set for 4:15 and my bags are packed once again… with luck we’ll be walking in mountains by mid-morning.

RMI Guide Dave Hahn

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Everest Expedition:  Preparations in Kathmandu

Posted by: | March 21, 2011
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Everest

A week ago, under the soft grey winter skies of Seattle, Jeff Martin and I hauled our 8 duffel bags from the loading curb at Sea Tac to the Korean Air check-in counter. Two window and one aisle seat, three oxygen masks safety demonstrations, about 5500 air miles, and one questionable airline fish meal later, we piled the duffels onto a rickety luggage cart and rolled them through the doors of Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan Airport into the turmoil of Kathmandu.

Since arrival our days are filled with preparations for RMI’s upcoming Everest Expedition. The array of moving parts that come together for a safe and successful Himalayan Expedition are at times overwhelming. It takes months of hard work by numerous people, both here in Kathmandu by our fantastic Nepali partners, High Altitude Dreams, to RMI’s preparations back in the States. While most of the minute to minute tasks are more of the mundane variety – from taking inventory of our lithium batteries supply (535) to the tetris challenge of packing the variety of medication and vitamin bottles into the tackle box of the Base Camp Medical Kit - the effect is invigorating. It is here in Kathmandu that the Everest Expedition morphs from the multiple separate components of focus that consumed our attention over the winter months to the cumulative creation of everyone’s efforts. It is here that the excitement builds and the climb begins to take shape. The Expedition becomes tangible and real: the tents and ropes are sorted and counted, the loads are packed and on their way by yak and porter to Base Camp, and the permit sits in front of us awaiting Dave Hahn’s signature as the Expedition Leader. 

The preparations in Kathmandu also plunge us into the city’s daily chaos: dodging traffic rickshaws and speeding taxes in an almost desperate game of frogger to cross the street, navigating the narrow alley ways in order to track down a crucial item, finding relief in the living rooms of friends’ homes while sharing a cup of tea and catching up since the last visit.

On Saturday this teeming city of 1.4 million celebrated the Hindu Holi Festival, known as the Festival Of Colors – a holiday linked to several mythical tales in Hinduism and manifested in a messy, wild, and boisterous all day street party. Walking through the streets of Indra Chwok, a particularly narrow and busy neighborhood in Kathmandu’s heart, on Saturday, bands of people sang and danced in the streets, covering each other in red, yellow, black, and blue chalky powder as others dumped buckets of water from rooftops or lobbed water balloons from doorways. Amidst the frenzy of celebration, Jeff and I were greeted with shy hesitation at first –foreigners yet uncolored with powder amidst the festivities.  Yet once a few brave souls rubbed our cheeks with powder we were marked: color came from every direction, buckets of water and water balloons launched our way. The hotel staff had more than a few chuckles when we walked in the door, grinning and covered in multiple colors. 

This week our Island Peak and Base Camp Trek team heads into the Khumbu, followed days later by our Everest Team, and we are again immersed in the world of the mountains. The time spent with crampons on our feet is often the focus of our climbing pursuits but this time in Kathmandu is a reminder that this too is a part of the adventure - even when wearing flip flops. The months of hard work leading up to the mountain, the places we travel to, the sites we see, the people, the stories, and laughs we encounter along the way are all part of our mountaineering adventures.

- Linden Mallory

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