원정 개요

Vertical Frontiers (Ben Bradford) blog:

Nov 7, 2012 (3rd post):

The team are back in Namche Bazar having walked out of basecamp this morning.

It already seems a while ago that we were stood on the summit of Ama Dablam, even though only two days have passed. It worked out well in the end, and the main priority of the trip being to return safe and sound with reaching the top a secondary bonus.

Starting from Camp 2 means a long day, we set off at 2 am, topping out at 11.30 and getting back to camp 2 at 5.30 in the evening.

Technical climbing in the dark up the Grey Tower led us onto the Mushroom Ridge which was just as spectacular as the last time I climbed the mountain. Steve had to turn around at this point with a bad altitude induced dizziness spell. There was no way he could continue so after some rest Lombarbu [Lama Babu] Sherpa and himself headed back down the ropes to Camp 2. A real shame for Steve and we all felt for him after he had put so much effort into getting as far as he did.

It was cold and windy as we walked across the plateau of Camp 3 and I was very glad we didn't camp there this year, with ice debris from the hanging serac on the snow and the wind whistling across the ridge, I was thankful we were there just a few minutes, let alone a whole night.

The final snow slopes leading to the summit are very hard work, and I had to restate our strict turn around time to the team which had the benefit of renewed commitment and we were on the summit just half an hour later!

It was completely different to my last time, almost a different mountain on the summit. We were there just 15 minutes before we started abseiling down the fixed ropes back towards our camp.

Nov 7, 2012 (2nd post):

We're back down at basecamp for a couple of rest days before our summit attempt, and I thought I'd escape basecamp for a couple of hours and send some photos to the blog.

Four days on the mountain has left everyone a little fatigued, so some rest, and a lot of eating is needed before we head back up again.

We had perfect weather for our acclimatisation trip, with very light winds and clear skies which was great for our journey along the ridge towards Camp 2. Our two climbing sherpas, Tendi and Lombarbu were with us for this technical section of the ridge and we got to just about 6000m before turning around to head back to Camp 1.

It looks like our summit day will be around the 4th November, weather depending.

Nov 7, 2012 (1st post):

We've had a few nights at basecamp now, settling into a routine and getting prepared for our first acclimatisation journey onto the mountain.

Yesterday we walked about four hours up to an Advanced Basecamp (ABC) to drop some gear off and more importantly get acclimatised to that altitude (5450m). It's very straightforward walking but at that height it is quite hard work, especially with a rucksack on. Having dropped our stash of food and boots it was a quick hour and a half back down to base and a late lunch.

Today we are waiting for our Puja ceremony where a local Lama walks up from the village to bless our expedition and wish us a safe passage on the mountain. It's an important occasion for our Sherpa’s as well as us and a great deal of preparation goes into the event.

Tomorrow we will head up to ABC to spend the night before climbing up to Camp 1 where we will spend two nights and climb almost to Camp 2 before coming back down to base camp. This will complete our acclimatisation and the next time we head up it will be our summit attempt.

Finally, the team are enjoying themselves and loving the good basecamp food prepared by our cook Pasang, and we've had a couple of cinema nights on my laptop, which provide some welcome entertainment and a break from thinking about the mountain.