As mentioned earlier, an alpine chough was seen flying over the summit by the leader of my 1993 expedition as we stood up there, and I’ve often wondered how birds can fly from sea level to much greater altitudes than the summit of Mount Everest in a few hours without getting cracking headaches. The answer seems partly to be the same as the Sherpas: birds have a greater density of capillaries than ground-living creatures.4 Incidentally, the avian world altitude record was (briefly) held by a Rüppell’s vulture that collided with an aircraft at 37,100ft (11,300m).
‘Can you have a shower on Everest?’ I am often asked. Not always. I have evolved a favourite way of washing self and clothes at Base Camp. I beg a huge aluminium bowl of warm water from the cook-tent, put it in my tent and sit in it. Hair is washed first, using a cup, then I wash the rest of me. After that I stamp on my sweaty clothes in the soapy water like a grape-treading French peasant. The remaining water goes into a heartening soup for visiting trekkers.
‘Where do you go to the lavatory?’ A favourite question from children, this one. These days we take all solid waste off the mountain, so at Base Camp you sit on a lavatory seat attached to a plastic barrel that is later taken down the valley and emptied into tanks. Local farmers then use this waste as fertiliser. Perched on top of the barrel in full view of the whole Base Camp, but gazing up at the summit, is to experience the sublime and the ridiculous at the same time. Up the mountain I remember performing into a plastic bag on a couple of occasions. I – very carefully – packed these and took them off the mountain.
To help acclimatisation you have to drink far more than you normally would. As a result you have to urinate two or three times at night – but not outside. To prevent frostbite of vital parts we use a pee-bottle inside the tent. Old hands can do this inside their sleeping bag without waking up properly – or knocking over the bottle. The resulting bottleful mustn’t be mistaken for your orange juice during the night and must be emptied before it freezes. Women climbers seem to manage all this in a way that seems to involve kneeling. I don’t look too closely.
When I woke up at Base Camp on the first day of the expedition I found myself in a bright-orange tent about the same size and shape as a Volkswagen Beetle. I wrote in my diary that I was wearing climbing socks, underpants, a vest, shirt, fleece jacket and a fleece hat. I was lying in a light down bag, inside a thick down expedition sleeping bag, inside a big green Gore-tex bivvi bag. Yet I still woke up cold a couple of times the previous night. Maybe the lack of oxygen caused the internal fires to burn colder. That evening we ate tomato soup, yak steaks and potatoes. And Christmas pudding and brandy sauce.
To reach the summit from Base Camp, you hike up a stony valley for 12 miles past the 80ft-high ice pinnacles shaped like shark’s fins, and then labour up Norton’s Via Dolorosa. Advanced Base Camp is a motley collection of brightly coloured tents strung along the side of the glacier, directly below the flanks of the mountain. The real climbing begins from here. You have to surmount the 23,000ft (7,010m) saddle of the North Col, the site of Camp I (this is the same camp as the pre-war Camp IV), then spend a day climbing up Camp II at 25,500ft (7,775m). You spend your last evening before your summit attempt in Camp III at 27,200ft (8,270m) melting snow on your gas stove, desperately trying to get as much liquid on board as possible. On account of the dry air, you ought to drink over a gallon a day. You probably don’t have much appetite but you must eat, as a climber burns 15,000 calories on summit day. That’s the equivalent of 30 Big Mac hamburgers. The year I climbed Everest I went from twelve stone to ten stone in two months – it is a guaranteed Fat Camp. Because you don’t have much appetite at high altitude you tend to over-eat at Base Camp. Where else could you stuff yourself until you’re bloated, and still end up losing two stone?
Finally, you get up at midnight and go for the summit, wearing a padded down suit and a rucksack containing a couple of oxygen cylinders and a bottle of water. Using a ratchet device called a jumar, you slide up fixed ropes placed days before by the Sherpas. It is tough, but it is hardly exploration. The whole expedition takes around 12 weeks.
We had joined the 1990 Earth Day 20 International Peace Climb, a combined American–Soviet–Chinese trip led by Jim Whittaker, the first American to climb Everest. It was the first time that the three nations had collaborated to climb a mountain. The plan was to bring together mountaineers from Cold War enemy nations to show what could be accomplished through cooperation. As Whittaker wrote in the 1991 American Alpine Journal, ‘This was before glasnost, before perestroika, before the Reagan–Gorbachev summit, before Gorbachev went to Beijing. We would hold the summit of all summit meetings, enemies becoming friends.’
The International Peace Climb certainly required diplomatic leadership. We were in Chinese-controlled Tibet, and the Chinese had not allowed Soviets on their soil in 30 years. Whittaker went to both countries to get their leaders’ support, and it was a laudable effort on his part.
But it wasn’t entirely peaceful. Whittaker had to leave the expedition early on with a medical problem and returned two weeks later to find several disputes brewing. Some of the Soviet climbers – who, frankly, were prima donnas – objected to doing the washing-up, presumably because back home they would have staff to do that sort of thing. Some Chinese climbers were seen hiding food up the hill behind boulders, and some of the Americans complained that they were paying for everything. I witnessed one fist-fight, but the trip was successful in that it got 20 climbers to the top – the highest number on a single expedition thus far. Ed Viesturs, a 30-year-old veterinary surgeon from Seattle, was there on his first Everest summit, and he would go on to climb all the 8,000m peaks without supplementary oxygen. Our filming expedition was a small side-show, although Breashears was clearly respected by the international climbers.
One day we walked up to the main camp with our team to film a satellite phone-call that Whittaker was to make to President George H. W. Bush (the father). As we approached we saw a cluster of worried-looking climbers standing around the vital petrol generator that was supposed to power the presidential call. One by one they would pull on the starter-cord and the engine would run for a minute. Then it would die. Apparently they had tried everything: fresh fuel, fresh oil, new plugs, and so on. But it wouldn’t keep running, so the call was off.
As the crowd melted away I decided to take a look, being something of a mechanic. I noticed there was a pair of wires disappearing into a switch mounted on the oil-pan that was designed to turn the engine off if the oil level fell dangerously low. The level was OK on the dip-stick, but what if the switch was faulty? I removed the wires and joined them. Then I pulled the engine into life. It ran – and kept on running. The crowd re-gathered, and our filming was back on. During the satellite call I noticed that Whittaker told the president that ‘his team’ had fixed the problem. I realised then how easily credit could be appropriated by those in charge – something that I wish I had learned properly, as future events in the same place were going to prove.
In the end, David Breashears, Brian and I, carrying an Arriflex film camera, film magazines and a tape recorder, managed to get to where Somervell sat down to die of asphyxiation on the North Ridge, at approximately 25,500ft (7,750m). I was very conscious that the body that Smythe saw was just a few hundred yards away, but there was nothing I could do. Brian performed heroically in getting himself to that height, and we filmed him there putting on one of his loudest performances. But he was exhausted and could go no higher. As it was, we had to support him back into camp. In the end Galahad of Everest was a fine film that still stands up to scrutiny today.
Clearing up our camp on the North Col after our climb I heard a bizarre radio call to a Peace Climb member sitting in the tent next to me. ‘Torch all the tents!’ This was an odd instruction from someone who must have watched too many Vietnam movies. Presumably it was to save carrying them down the hill. The expedition member dutifully held a cigarette lighter to one of the tents, while the Sherpas watched in h
orror. The flame didn’t catch in the thin air and it resulted only in a small, charred hole. We managed to persuade him that the Soviets might be quite grateful to take something home with them, and later we were treated to the sight of hugely laden haystacks of men wobbling down the slopes.
We sent Brian down ahead of us, and David and I also rolled up all our tents and cooking gear into a huge roll the size of a small car. I tried to get it down the route but it was too heavy to haul on to my back. David sighed with irritation and tried to lift it. No luck, either. So we dragged the great, baggy, orange roll to the edge of the North Col and looked over the edge. We could see Brian Blessed far below, waddling down the snow slopes towards Advanced Base Camp like a hungry bear. Or maybe the Abdominal Snowman. Carefully aiming the roller well away from him, we pushed it off. It started slowly, and then gathered speed, curving unerringly towards the small figure. We watched, silent and appalled, as it accelerated and started bouncing in great leaps. Then together we yelled, ‘Brian! Brian! Look behind you!’
Brian, who performs a lot of pantomime, seems to ignore shouts of this kind. The roll took one huge leap and burst above him, showering him with pots, tents and soiled clothing. Dragging a sleeping bag off his head, he slowly turned and shook his fist up at us with rage.
It was a great trip, but what was deeply frustrating was the fact that we were only hours from the spot where I hoped to look for the body. Then the next time I went to Mount Everest I was climbing from the south, Nepali side. And at last I succeeded in getting to the top.
12
High Mountains, Cold Seas
The north and south sides of Mount Everest are very different in character. My generation of climbers has been lucky to be allowed to climb on both sides, whereas the pre- and immediately post-war British expeditions had to make do with either Tibet or Nepal, not both, for political reasons. Air travel has been cheap and fast for us, too, whereas our predecessors had to spend five weeks or more at sea.
For me there are no ethical doubts about visiting Tibet, an occupied country with a terrible record of human rights violations. It is clear to see from the vast amount of resources ploughed into Tibet that China will never return her to the lamas. We, as concerned tourists, can do far more good by going to Tibet and reporting on any wrong-doing we see. For example, climbing friends of mine on Cho Oyu witnessed the shooting of fleeing Tibetan refugees by Chinese soldiers in 2006, and they published reports of this atrocity on the internet. I am convinced that closer ties with China are a good thing for everyone in the long run.
Because of the monsoon rain clouds that surge up from the Bay of Bengal and reach the wall of Himalayas every summer, it is rainy on the southern side, and dry on the north. The result is that the approaches from the south are a delight, with well-forested foothills sprinkled with colourful villages. There are many torrential rivers to cross on high, suspended foot-bridges, and there are fresh vegetables to buy in the markets along the way.
In contrast, much of Tibet is high-altitude desert – spectacular but hardly comfortable. Mallory loathed the country and its inhabitants. The difference in precipitation is seen on the mountain itself, as on the north side yaks are driven up the relatively dry East Rongbuk glacier to Advanced Base Camp at 21,300ft (6,450m). That is the height of Camp II on the south side, where you have a very active flowing icefall to contend with just after Base Camp.
In 1993 I was employed to guide Brian Blessed on his second attempt to climb the mountain, at an unusual time of year. Because of the difficulty of getting permission from the Nepali authorities we had to go post-monsoon, aiming to summit in early October. This isn’t usually a recipe for success. There are few post-monsoon ascents because of the extra snow deposited during the summer, and the less stable weather patterns make climbing extremely difficult.
Unlike the north side in 1990, where Base Camp was pitched on gravel, on the south side of the mountain in 1993 we were camping on a stream of ice. Here’s the description from my diary:
It is a stunning location. We are surrounded by the world’s highest mountains, and just above camp the infamous Icefall tumbles its way down from the upper slopes of Everest. This vast ice-stream pours over a 600-metre cliff, and its jumbled maze of tottering ice blocks and yawning crevasses is threatened by avalanches from the mountain slopes either side. When the Icefall reaches the valley bottom it becomes the Khumbu glacier, and that’s where we are camped.
My tent is bright orange, and therefore seems sunny inside. It is my home for the next two months, and is pitched on pure ice. Inside I have a thick mat between me and the glacier, and there is a double down sleeping bag, which I will use up the mountain. Otherwise, all I have is some clothes, a few books and climbing gear in two plastic barrels. I have an ice axe, a harness and a few bits of hardware to attach me to the mountain.
During the night the slowly flowing ice cracks and groans its way downhill. If you’ve ever broken a pane of glass by standing on it you’ll know exactly what this sounds like. Last night the temperature inside the tent dropped to –12°C, and both the water-bottle and pee-bottle froze solid. The pee-bottle is vital because you really don’t want to get out of your bag in these temperatures during the night, particularly high up.
In the morning the Sherpas arrive with bed tea. When the sun hits the tent the frozen condensation from my night’s breath melts and it starts to snow – inside the tent. Very soon, though, the temperature shoots up to around 30°C and it is impossible to stay in it. You can see these extremes of temperature on the washing line outside; at one end is a frozen sock in shadow, and at the other end is its companion steaming in the sun. Further up the mountain, above the Icefall, camp life is going to become even more extreme.
Things have changed since 1993. The romantic picture of climbing Mount Everest that I had as a boy has largely been destroyed by the sheer numbers that climb it now. There weren’t plastic flowers and hot showers at Advanced Base Camp commercial expeditions provide now – just a tarpaulin stretched over a couple of rubble walls. Nor was there a line of fixed ropes stretched all the way to the summit to climb up. We escaped three huge avalanches by the skin of our teeth. One of them swept down the Lhotse Face, gathering up all the oxygen, food and ropes we had deposited at Camp III, and burying them under thousands of tons of snow. We had carried the loads there a couple of hours earlier, and I counted that there had been 28 climbers on the route that day. It could have been an appalling disaster. As it was, our Camp III was completely wiped out, and we had to start again from scratch.
When I eventually got to the highest camp, on the South Col at 25,940ft (7,906m), we didn’t find the camp already set up by the Sherpas so I had to help the expedition leader put up four tents. As we put each one up, our fellow climbers gratefully slid inside. Steve Bell and I got into the last one, and I have to say that was my proudest moment ever on the mountain – helping to set up such a high camp. And to me that is mountaineering: solving problems and helping your companions to get to the summit.
It was two o’clock in the morning when we left the tents for the summit. There had been a full gale blowing across the South Col since we arrived, and I crawled out into the darkness of a blizzard. We were using oxygen masks, but my valve kept freezing up with saliva. Steve yelled, ‘Lead off, Graham!’ Stepping forward in a pool of head-torch light we all entered into our own private nightmares.
A couple of figures – Sherpa or Westerner, we couldn’t see which – dropped back and gave up during the night. Looking to my left down into Nepal I saw one tiny glimmer of light from the monastery at Thyangboche, down there in the real world. My torch was just giving up when I noticed a faint glow on my right, away towards Tibet. It was the dawn, the most welcome dawn of my life. I sat down on the Balcony – a ledge with a stupendous view at about 27,500ft (8,380m) – and tried to pull my oxygen mask off for repairs, but it was stuck to the beard I had unwisely grown during the expedition. I needed to get it off, though, and so had to pul
l off mask, beard and a large patch of skin. I then tried to have a drink, but to my astonishment and dismay the boiling water I had poured into the insulated bottle in my rucksack had somehow frozen into a block of ice. On we climbed, and I was surprised at just how steep it became.
The Sherpas are notorious smokers, and as I reached the South Summit I smelled tobacco smoke. There, leaning against a boulder, was one of the Sherpas, taking alternate puffs on his oxygen mask and his morning ciggie. I plodded around the South Summit to see the final obstacles – the summit ridge, the infamous Hillary Step, and then, in the far distance, the summit itself.
The step is a 30ft rocky hiccup on the narrow summit ridge, first climbed, to his eternal credit, by Edmund Hillary. It is a very exposed place, and I had been worrying about it since I was a boy. Just as I reached its foot my oxygen valve became completely blocked and I actually lost consciousness for a few moments. But I managed to get the mask off again and gasp my way up the faded and frayed ropes that weren’t hanging there when Hillary climbed his step. Three years later Bruce Herrod, a friend of mine, was to die on this very spot, and hung from those very ropes for months. As I jumared my way up them I wondered what they were attached to. This is what I wrote in my diary afterwards:
Once above the step I just kept teetering along that narrow icy summit ridge between Nepal and Tibet, between life and death. The sun was intensely bright and the sky was that deep blue-black of very high altitudes. All around were the icy fins of the world’s highest mountains. And somewhere along that ridge I experienced one of those existential moments that is the reason you gamble your life. The intenseness of the now, the sharp savour of living wholly in the present moment, no past, no worries. The chop of the ice axe, the crunch of the crampons, the hiss of breath – this is the very stuff of life. Eventually I saw a couple of figures just above me, a couple of steps … and I was there.
Last Hours on Everest Page 15