My travel diaries
Thursday 10 May, 2007 - Advanced Base Camp, Everest North Side
Tomorrow we finally get away on our first big climb of Lhakpa Ri, and it will be not a moment too soon. We seem to have spent most of our time inactive and sitting around in tents, and some hard physical exercise is long overdue. I felt a little bit better this morning and am starting to get some of my appetite back, but even so eating is such an effort. We've still spent only three of a possible eight nights at this altitude.
This morning we had some more skills training on the glacier. It's such a picturesque setting for it here, looking across the glacier at Lhakpa Ri on one side and a view of the north ridge of Everest looking all the way up to the summit directly above us. My skills are improving, though I'm finding it a lot easier when I take off my thick gloves to clip in, and it may well be too cold to do this on the way up to the North Col.
It seems to be getting a little colder at ABC as well. It was minus six degrees in the tent this morning, and the first time my pee froze in my Nalgene bottle. Edward Norton, leader of the 1924 Everest expedition, described ABC (their Camp III) as a 'truly horrid spot', and reminisced about the hatefulness of the evening meals, with the camp in shadow and his feet cold as stones. I kind of know how he felt.
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