Today is the twentieth day of my trip, and the eleventh day on the mountain. Cho Oyu is a large and high peak (26,906 ft). Thus, unlike many mountains in the United States, we can not just drive to the trailhead, toss our packs on our back, and start heading uphill. That would be a guaranteed formula for failure and severe altitude sickness.
Instead, we creep up on the mountain.
We spent four nights at Base Camp, getting used to the 16,000 foot elevation. We let our bodies rest and grow new blood cells. We did hikes up to 17,600 feet to add a little more altitude stress to encourage our bodies to acclimatize. We saw some amazing orange-pink alpenglow on sunsets over the surrounding peaks.
Once 16,000 feet felt okay, we moved up to Interim camp (17,600 ft) for a night, and then on to Advanced Base Camp (ABC) at 18,600 feet. We have been at ABC now for five nights. At this altitude, there is less than half the oxygen that there is at sea level, so everything is hard. The walk to the outhouse is about 100 feet – by time you get there you are panting. Coming back is worse, as it is 15 feet uphill, and that really sends your heart rate soaring.
We did nothing but rest, eat, sleep, read and plan for the first 4 days. This scheduled rest period was good timing too, as we got hit with a four-day snow storm. Since our rest coincided with the storm, we did not fall behind on our plans. We are all passing around coughs and colds. Headaches are common. Kinda hard to think up here too.
Yesterday the storm moved out and so did we. We went on a hard day hike up and down, up and down over glacial debris of rock, dirt and ice – the moraine. In the stagnant section of the glacier, we saw huge triangular pinnacles of blue-white ice sticking 50 feet up in the air. A single one looks like a sculpture by man. The millions of them we saw stretching out for miles looked like a sculpture by God and nature.
We hiked to the Old Lake camp (19,700 ft) and beyond. The steep, loose rock and dirt scree above made footing tricky. I had to rest ever other step. By our designated turn around time we had reached 20,370 feet – a little bit higher than North America’s highest peak of Denali (Mt. McKinley). We were wiped out when we returned to ABC at 18,600 ft.
We are resting and packing today. Tomorrow we load up full packs and move up to Camp 1 for a night at 20,996 feet. It is going to hurt staying there. But it is necessary and the next forward step as we continue creeping up on Cho Oyu.
Himalayan climbing is spectacular, but it can be trying. It takes a lot of time, work, dedication and patience. I suppose that is true for any big endeavor worth striving for. Please let me know what big goal you are creeping up on, and then go take one more step towards it. I will do the same and report back soon.
Keep creeping up on your mountain.
Jim
Tags: Advanced Base Camp, Camp1, Cho Oyu, Old Lake Camp
Jim,
You’re blog posts are good enough I can visualize your experience! Thanks for taking the time to write them! I hope you continue to acclimate and that your cough abates. Be well my friend!
Terry
Hey Jimmy,
I was watching the weather radar and saw the cloud cover and thinking you were getting a good snow dump. Living vicariously through you. Keep up the good work and thinking about you every day.
Wishing you great success,
Terry
Jim,
Sounds like everything is going as planned which is good news. No surprises, no drama. Keep taking good care of yourself.
Alan