|
Everest 2003: Ellis Stewart
"LIVING
THE DREAM 2003"
|
 |
From Dreams to
Reality
EverestNews.com-
Dispatch Two 2/21/03
I
have had a very productive few weeks since my last
despatch to Everest news. As you can imagine in
preparing for a trip of this nature, the majority
of my waking hours are spent training, and trying
to get my body into a good condition to cope with
the rigours of the North Side of the Mountain.
However as we all know, it is as much Luck and
Weather as in a climbers physical condition.
|
A
whole manner of circumstances have to come together on
Everest. You need to be healthy and fit and fully
acclimatised. The camps need to be in place, and fully
stocked. Equipment needs to be fully working and
doubly checked. Oxygen sets functioning. Oxygen cached
where it should be. And you need to be in the right
place at the right time, when that window of
opportunity in the weather presents itself. If you are
down on the Col or at ABC when that window comes, then
it is game over. All the hard years of physical toil,
the experiences learnt and gained on previous climbs.
It all comes to nothing if you are not ready when the
Mountain decides it is ready.
Everything has to come together and be in harmony at
the right time. It is the nature of high altitude
climbing. Nothing is certain on these giants. The
summit is by no means a certainty. However it is a
joyous half way point in the climb, and providing you
have enough energy in reserve then you should be able
to rappel down the steps and back to the shelter of
Camp III for the longest and most deserving rest you
are ever likely to experience in your life time.
I
have just finished watching a very personal account of
climbing on this side of Everest. Stuart Peacock, a
Brit who scaled the peak last spring as part of the
British Climbing Company Adventure Peaks Everest 2002
Expedition, carried a camcorder all the way to the
summit. From the streets of Kathmandu, travelling
across Tibet up to North Col and onto the summit
itself. The film is a fascinating account of his dream
of climbing the mountain. It features rare and high
quality footage of the North Col and North Ridge, and
for the first time ever the route along the North East
Ridge. Including spectacular views of the First,
Second & Third Steps.
For any lover of Everest, and everything concerning
Everest. This is the nearest that you will ever get to
seeing what is involved in climbing the route. Stuart
sells the film on either video or DVD format and I
strongly urge any one who is serious about climbing
this mountain by this route to get a copy. If you
contact EverestNews.com direct they should be able to
put you in touch with Stuart. [only in PAL right now,
buy maybe soon!]
Stuart also lectures on his climb in an evenings
entertainment entitled Everest- Walking in the
footsteps of legends. Before I depart for Nepal in a
few weeks time I am hoping to organise this lecture in
my home town. This will increase the awareness of my
own climb of the route within my local community.
In
other news I have been in contact with a Professor of
Chemistry at Cheshire high school in Connecticut this
week. He is interested in me helping out with
experiments whilst on the mountain. Studying the
effects of gases at altitude. I am only too keen to
help with this as I am deeply fascinated by the
scientific research on altitude, and also in part by
the gas levels as the air becomes thinner and thinner.
I will let you know more on this as I get more
information.
I
will finish this latest despatch with a couple of
pages from my journal to Aconcagua in 2001. I reached
the summit via a variant of the Polish Glacier route
with Guy Cotter (Summit of Everest 94, 97, etc) &
Arnold Witzig (Summit of Everest 2002). I hope you
enjoy reading this account of lat page of my journal,
the final climb through the night to the summit of the
western skies. It began with near disaster and ended
in sheer elation. Enjoy.
Monday 12th February 2001
We
turned in last night at about 6.30pm, with the
intention of leaving at 3.00 am, should the winds die
down. I didn't sleep a wink at all, I was too nervous
and the sound of the wind made sure that sleep was
impossible. I started to doze on and off when I
became suddenly aware of something! Outside there was
no noise at all. I sat bolt upright and looked at my
watch, the time was 2.48 am. This was it we were on!
The winds had blown themselves out. As I looked
outside our tent all I could see was the night sky and
a billion stars twinkling brightly like never before.
The miracle had happened my prayers had been
answered. We brewed up and replenished ourselves with
some much-needed fluids before the final climb to the
summit. It took the three of us well over an hour to
get ready into our high altitude gear. One thing that
I did become aware of was how cold it had become, my
fingers were starting to freeze, and so I wasted no
time in putting on several pairs of gloves.
We
all left camp two at 3.30 in the pitch black and
freezing night temperature. Upon checking my
thermometer I was alarmed to see that the reading was
-30°c. We were climbing in frostbite conditions, so
it was important to keep moving and keep blood flowing
to the extremities. This was without doubt the
coldest I had ever been in my whole life. I followed
the beam of my head torch, which gave off a pathetic
amount of light. In fact, I gave up after an hour and
turned the torch off, allowing my eyes time to adjust
to the darkness.
We
began climbing the glacier, higher and higher we went,
I used my ice axe for support over the steeper
sections of snow and ice, and was very grateful to
have it with me. Before very long I didn't feel too
good at all; I felt exhausted; I felt like I was going
to wretch at any second, but most worrying, was the
fact that I was dropping behind Guy and Arnold at an
alarming rate.
Highest Toilet Stop
I
knew that I needed to stop and empty my bowels, yet my
head was telling me to keep going. The thought of
having to remove layers and warm clothing, and undo my
sallopettes and then expose my bare bottom to the
freezing nighttime temperature was not very appealing
at all. I was worried that I might freeze something
very dear to me, you can survive without the odd
finger or toe, but I couldn't live without my John
Thomas, no way.
Anyway the urgency of the matter got greater and I had
no choice but to find the most convenient looking bit
of ground, and strip and squat, holding on to my ice
axe, which I planted firmly into the ice. I was
extremely relieved to relieve myself of some excess
baggage, and the minute I began climbing up again I
noticed I was moving with much more conviction, and I
felt much stronger than I had done since leaving the
tent over an hour ago.
Brief Optimism
My
feet quickly froze into two blocks of ice, and I
resigned myself to the fact that I may very well catch
frostbite. I caught up to Guy and Arnold and
discovered that they too were having a hard time with
the cold temperature. A shooting star whizzed by
overhead and I allowed myself a wisp of optimism to
creep in. Upon checking my altimeter, we were now at
6,300 metres and still moving strong for the top. We
climbed up through 3 snowfields, using my axe for
support. It reminded me of ascending up through a mini
icefall, very invigorating it was.
When we came out over the other side of the
snowfields, the sun was beginning to rise, away to the
east. We made our way on up heading for the ridge on
the skyline, the icy darkness was beginning to become
lighter and more of the route could now be seen.
Sunrise >>> (Part two of dispatch)
|
