Khumbu Mountaineering Trilogy (page 2)

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(l-r): Chris Bidle, Al, Dan Solinski.	(l-r): Dan Bergin, John Lama, Pema
Al's down jacket has seen better days.	look up towards the Zatrwa La

Oct 7

The trip begins. After an early breakfast, we walked a few blocks through the Thamel district to the main highway and caught a bus to the airport. After a short wait, we boarded a Russian MI-17 helicopter for Lukla. It was too cloudy to see any big mountains during the 45-minute flight. We landed in Lukla and set up our camp in the yard of a teahouse right next to the airstrip. We met the Sherpa staff, and we had our first camp lunch. Our first close-up view of real Himalayan mountains (Nupla and the Kalo Himal) was made even more spectacular by the clear weather and classic sunset. We could look up the Kalo Himal, right above us, and see the the climb we would be making over the next few days, over the 15,000 ft. Zatrwa La pass.

Oct 8

The Sherpas served us morning tea in our tents, as they would throughout the rest of the trip. We packed and hit the trail. Our duffle bags weighed about fifty pounds each, and we watched in amazement as some of the porters (none of whom weighed more than 130 lbs.) would stack two of them on top of a doko basket, pick the whole hundred-pound load up with a forehead strap, and start hauling it up the mountain. Our first day was a short one, with lunch near a tea house. We stopped for the night by a stream at 11,300 ft. Al wanted us to move slowly the first few days, to help in the acclimatization process. "You acclimatize while you're resting. If you wear yourself out, your body won't acclimatize as efficiently." With dozens of Himalayan expeditions to his credit, I guess he knows what he's talking about.

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Al, with the honeymooners	Phrua, Al Burgess, Lhakpa

Nick gave me a quick bouldering lesson on a nearby rock.We spent the afternoon watching a woman milk her zoes (a yak-cow hybrid), and talking to some of the other folks hiking through. An Aussie and his son were on their way down, and they told us about a body lying on the Mera glacier (a Nepali guide who'd been caught in bad weather, and was left to die by his client). And if that wasn't enough to make us nervous about our trek, we could see, from camp, snow clouds moving in on the mountain above us.

Oct 9

A cold morning. Brad gave some of us pointers on how to climb efficiently. A few of us were struggling a bit at this point. We stopped at 13,100 ft. at noon and set up camp for the night. Our cook, Kedar, made us pizza for lunch. Nick, Bob, and others decided to take a quick hike up to the pass and back for some afternoon exercise. We ran into a young couple who had decided, for their honeymoon, to hire sixteen porters and trek by themselves to Mera.

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Kitchen tent. (l-r): Chris Bidle,	(l-r): Taz Wilson, Joe Giammarco,
Dan Bergin, Stuart McLaughlin,	Dan Solinski, Al Burgess,
Phrua, Bob Knapp	Brad Johnson

Oct 10

Another cold morning; This was pass-crossing day. We climbed in the snow (covering the ground, and coming down intermittently). Some of the porters were struggling. Sneakers and flip-flops don't really cut it when the ground's slippery. We reached Zatrwa Og (the top of the ridge) in bright sunshine, traversed to the Zatrwa La pass itself, and descended to Tuli Kharka, in the Hinku valley. Dan Solinski and Al descended together, talking about stocks and investments, while I had a hard time keeping up. We had lunch in the Tuli Kharka tea house, in lousy weather (sleet and rain). We had a long, wet, miserable hike from Tuli Kharka to camp. The trail went uphill for awhile before descending through a forest. The trail was rough and wet, some of us started feeling ill.

Oct 11

The morning was clear, and we actually began to dry out. Just before Tashing Ongma, we got our first view of Mera, towering above the valley to the north.

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Peak 43, Joe Giammarco

We stopped for lunch near Mosom Kharka, on the west side of the river, where we had a great view of Kusum Kangguru (famous for being the most difficult of all the trekking peaks in Nepal). That afternoon, Chris and I thought we were lost, until we began to smell the smoke from the Sherpas' campfire. We pulled into camp, and tried unsuccessfully to dry off and warm up. A long, long day. We camped at around 4000 meters, in Lungsamba, near a yak shed. A cold, clear, beautiful evening. We took pictures for awhile. I had an awful cold, and I wasn't alone.

Oct 12

The view in the morning was spectacular. Kusum Kangguru, the west face of Mera, and pyramid-shaped Peak 43. Only in the Himalayas could a 20,000 ft. peak as beautiful as Peak 43 not be given a name. We stopped at the "Himalayan Hotel", a tea shop in Tangnag. We met a large group of Brits who had just come off of Mera. Only about half of them actually summited. We had lunch nearby, then walked only 90 minutes to camp, just before Dig Khare (about 15,100 ft.) Camp was in a beautiful spot, just across from the west face of Mera. Just before sunset, the clouds cleared a bit, and we watched two huge avalanches thunder down the face. Al commented that avalanches make him a bit jumpy, which isn't surprising. We all took a lot of pictures. An incredibly beautiful evening.

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Avalanche on the west face of Mera	The moon and Jupiter over Mera

Oct 13

Another beautiful morning. After breakfast, and more pictures, we hiked for an hour or so to Khare, the Mera base camp (just under 17,000 ft.). After lunch, I got a crampon and gaiters lesson from Al and Brad. I took a one-hour hike up the ridge in the afternoon. When I came down, I started feeling a bit spent. While I took a nap, my tentmate, Mil, saw some Nepalis carrying down, through camp, the body of the man who had died on the glacier the previous week. They wrapped him up, strapped him to a long pole, and carried him through camp and down the valley, probably to be cremated. A cloudy, cold evening.

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Joe Giammarco, Al Burgess,	(l-r): Al Burgess, Bob Knapp,
and Dave Mellor at Khare	Brad Johnson, Phrua

Oct 14

The plan today was to climb up to the glacier, get our gear on, and climb the glacier to the Mera La (18,000 ft.). I felt slow and weak. At the glacier, I overdressed a bit, so when I started up the snow slope, I started to overheat. The group took off ahead, while Phrua stayed back to keep an eye on me. Just a short distance from the Mera La, I turned back. The rest of the group caught up with me before I got off the glacier. I staggered back down to camp, with Dan Solinski staying close behind me. I went right to bed, and Mil and I both got sick that night. Not a fun day or night.

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Lhakpa, setting down an

injured Dan Bergin

Oct 15

I stayed in my sleeping bag, sick, all day. Mil was as sick as I was, as was Stuart. I managed to get up and out in the afternoon, just in time to see Lhakpa carrying Dan Bergin down the hill to camp. Dan had fallen and injured his ankle, so Lhakpa put him on his back, even though Dan outweighs him by at least thirty pounds. Al came to the tent to check up on me a few times. He gave me some pills to take, and assured me I was probably just worn out, and not used to the altitude. I watched some folks from other groups practicing rappelling on a large boulder in camp. A rest and recovery day. I was marginally better by evening, but Mil wasn't improving at all.

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