The Summit Push Begins The time has come at last for us to make our final push to the summit of Everest! Today we left Base Camp, climbed up through the Khumbu Icefall for the last time on this expedition, and continued up to Camp 2. Greg and Vanessa made great time through the Icefall…
It was a beautiful day for a hike above Basecamp! After another delicious breakfast, we headed down the glacier and up the West side of the Khumbu Valley to a little 18,000ft high point overlooking Everest base camp and with amazing views of the upper slopes of Mount Everest. It looked like a pretty windy…
It was a rest day at Mountain Trip Base Camp today. Spending time resting, recovering, and acclimating here at our base camp is an inevitable part of any Everest Expedition. We keep ourselves entertained in a variety of ways, and the days actually seem to go by pretty quickly here. We’ll generally have breakfast shortly…
Vanessa called in to HQ early this morning for a quick update on Mountain Trip’s Everest Expedition, who have successfully returned to Base Camp after a round of acclimatization. Before descending, they had reached their highest point to date, above Camp 2. The team awoke and began to prepare for their descent at 4 a.m., departing…
We awoke at 3:45 a.m. this morning and struggled out of our sleeping bags in the dark to get an early start on our climb up the Lhotse Face, a demanding section of the route that begins just a few hundred feet above Camp 2. After a breakfast of cereal and freshly-baked cinnamon rolls (yes,…
We had a great hike today, up to the base of the Lhotse Face, and are planning to climb on up to Camp 3 tomorrow morning. This will be our last day up here at C2 and we want to get all of the acclimating we can out of our days up here. We all…
The whole crew is here today – our team of climbing Sherpa moved up to Camp 2 with us today bringing the last of the equipment needed for the time being. Greg, Vanessa, and I are still working on acclimating to living at over 21,000ft, so we had another mellow day here with a little…
Vanessa called in from Camp 2 via satellite phone, detailing the events of the day. She said they made good time through the Khumbu Icefall, and that the day’s biggest struggle was staying cool enough in the hot sun–which might seem strange considering that they’re incredibly high on the world’s tallest peak. Communicating from 21,500′…
Above you can see Vanessa, Greg, and DaOngchhu trekking below Pumori in the morning’s first light. Today went very well, and we’ve returned to Camp 2 for the night. We had an early start today at 1 a.m., and awoke a beautiful starry night. Everyone felt well and we made quick work of the Khumbu…
We woke up early again today (1am) and left camp excited to be making a move to Camp 2 under clear starry skies. After about an hour into the day Vanessa started feeling ill again, and after taking a good long break for some hot tea and a chance to weigh our options, we decided…