Man, how did I miss this? Aparently there’s a Canadian company that is about to make summiting Everest a whole lot easier, and safer too! Looks like they’ll be doing a pilot project this year, seems like I just missed it! Here’s the scoop:
Summit Air: New system for breathing oxygen high on Mount Everest
Note: see the date the article was published.
Thought I would share a tool with you guys that I found for stitching photos together. I personally love to take a whole bunch of photos with the hope of later stitching them into a panorama. I think a lot of people that visit the great outdoors do the same thing, as it’s impossible to fit all of nature’s beauty into one picture frame. Though no panorama can ever do the original justice, we try!
The various stitching tools I have used in the past have been hit and miss. One I found just recently, called Hugin (link), which also happens to be absolutely free, seems to work the best for me. See an example below of something I threw together while experimenting with the program. I just left almost everything default, though later on I will dig more into the options as it seems like quite a powerful tool.
This picture is a view of Everest (the black pyramid that does not look like the tallest of the bunch) and the surrounding mountains (Nuptse is the one in the foreground that looks the tallest, hiding behind it is Lhotse), as seen from Kalapathar; most people that hike into base camp make this one of their objectives. As you can see, there is an angel standing there, watching over all that happens on the big mountain. I am sure the safety of a lot of people, including myself, can be attributed to this guardian that watched over us all. It was placed there by the UniteHopeProject, which placed them in various locations around the world.
Anyways, if you’re like me and have a bunch of photos from many trips that need stitching, try this program out! (I know the latest Sony cameras can create stitches just by panning, but I’ve heard mixed results with that. And this is for all those stitch pictures that you’ve already taken with old cameras!) Specifically what I found it did a good job in was correcting the vignetting on my individual photos that my lens always makes when zoomed out.
So there you go, give it a try, enjoy, and give me feedback if you have any comments or tricks with using it! I’ll also be posting more panoramas as I get them made, so stay tuned!
For those that have wanted to see my presentation, but have not been able to make it to one, now is your chance to plan ahead a little. I will be doing a slideshow and talk about my Everest climb on Saturday, 14 May, 2011, in Downtown Calgary. Further details will be revealed later, but that should be enough to allow anyone to plan that wants to.
A little bit about my presentation. And why I do it. The reason I do it is because people ask me to, and when I’m done the feedback is usually quite positive. And I like to give the presentation because I can walk people through the entire journey, from start to finish, and I know I have their attention all along. And I think that way people appreciate it more for what it is, an entire journey, an expedition, an experience of personal development, so much more than just a mountain climb.
Based on the feedback I’ve gotten, most (normal) people enjoy it, some get something out of it. I’m sure there are some that don’t think much of it, but I guess I’ve never heard their feedback. Some feedback I’ve gotten: “Okay, now I understand why you climbed Everest, it makes more sense knowing what you went through”, “That was an emotional presentation”, “You’re crazy, your parents must have been so worried while you were gone!”
And all that is a reason why I have been hesitant in writing down all my stories in this blog. When talking to people casually, socially, answering their specific questions, I tell just one small part of the story (to be honest even in my 45 minute monologue I only tell a small part of the WHOLE story). If you just take any small part of it, it’s almost nothing extraordinary. Out of context. Same would be on this blog. It would be quasi-Everest. It would be the margarine of Everest. It would be the Diet Coke of Everest. Just one calorie, not Everest enough. 
So the presentation seems the best way to pass it along. The invitation is there. And to be honest, when I show my pictures and tell my story, I feel like I’m just showing slides from my last vacation to [insert comfortable beach destination], sharing my experiences with those that care to hear. And who doesn’t like to talk about their travels? I guess the only difference is the choice of vacation spots.
As the next batch of adventurers get ready for their own attempts at Mt. Everest, I find myself asking them how they train for “the big E” (as some people call it). When I was preparing and training I did all the research I could, asked all the people that might know, so that I would be as prepared as possible. Looking back on it almost one year later I thought I would list the things that I thought helped me the most, and in general they can be applied to other circumstances also. In order if decreasing importance they are:
1. Listen to people that have done it before.
The fact is Everest has been climbed by thousands of people. Chances are if you are at all entertaining the idea of climbing Everest you’ve met someone who has done it. Hopefully you’ve climbed with them. Ask them all they know and take it seriously. I attribute a lot of my success to picking the brains of Ryan Waters at Mountain Professionals, who I climbed Aconcagua with, and Arnold Coster, who I climbed Cho Oyu with.
2. Climb an 8000m mountain before attempting Everest
One of the things I learned from point (1) above is this point. The company I climbed Aconcagua with stated that climbing Aconcagua was enough to qualify for Everest. However I was convinced by others it would be better to climb Cho Oyu first, and I’m glad I did. Aconcagua to Cho Oyu was a step up, a predictable one to be honest. And Cho Oyu to Everest was of course a step up also, but more that I thought it would be.
I have since developed my own reason for recommending that people climb Cho Oyu first. The straight fact is that nobody knows how their body will react to elevations of 8000m. And to put it bluntly, it’s much easier for others to drag your unconscious or otherwise disabled body from or near the summit of Cho Oyu than from most points on Everest. So as you learn how your body reacts to 8000m, do it in a place that has more room for ‘self discovery’ than Everest.
Another, less important reason, is to prepare one’s mind to long expeditions. Going from a three-week expedition like Aconcagua or Denali to an eight-week Everest expedition is a big jump. Most people that don’t summit Everest are not turned back by bad weather or from being too tired or not having enough technical experience. They choose to go home early because they don’t know how miserable an Everest expedition is, how taxing on the mind and body, how much they’ll miss their families (keep all family contact to a minimum when on the expedition to help with this point).
I have met a bunch of people, from marathon runners in tremendous shape to true Alpiniste mountaineers who make first ascents in the Alps and Andes, decide to go home early. And there’s nothing wrong with that, I also wanted to go home early at various points. But there is a way to be prepared for it.
3. Train Mentally
I could write a lot about this but I think it has been said better by Ice and Mixed Climber extraordinaire, fellow Canadian Will Gadd on his own blog Gravsports. An excerpt is below:
Nobody wants to think about mental fitness. It’s a lot easier to keep track of physical improvement than mental improvement. To become stronger mentally you have to look inside yourself and realize that, even if you can do a one-arm pullup with an engine block in the other hand, the ultimate limiting factor is your head. And most people are simply too weak mentally to actually get stronger mentally. For many people the area between their ears is completely dark, off-limits and filled with soul-twisting demons that just can’t be faced much less slain. But, unless you know how to hit your ideal mental performance state, all your training is quite literally a waste…
How did I train mentally? By climbing Cho Oyu first (see point above). By going (several years in a row) on a ski trip with friends, which involved a profane amount of drinking all night, followed by extreme hangover pain the next morning, but going skiing anyways when I felt like dying, feeling that nauseating sting of yesterday’s alcohol still in my system course through my veins as my heart rate climbed as we skied. By following a strict diet in my training, eating things that were good for me but rarely good tasting, often the same thing day after day.
(Just to elaborate on a couple of those points above, my training specifically for Everest involved a strict diet and no alcohol at all, with the exception of that New Year’s ski trip I mention above. I jokingly called it part of my mental training as I took those few days off, but there was a lot of truth to it. Also, the discipline I learned from my diet of eating the same thing day in and day out helped me to eat whatever was available on Everest, to wolf down that tasteless bowl of Dal Bhat in Camp 2 and ask for another as I watched my companions play with their first serving even though I was sick of eating it as much as they were. I lost 25 pounds on Everest so eating all you can plays a big role.)
4. Everything Else
After those three points above comes the thing that most people focus on, the physical training, technical climbing ability, mountain experience, etc. I think they are still quite important, but there are enough other people that have written about them that I will defer to them. I say quite often, you have to come to Everest prepared physically. But once you show up physically trained, climbing the mountain is 90% mental.
That’s all for this post, I think it came out a little longer than expected. But I cannot finish before saying that this is just my experience and opinion. Your mileage may vary. Because honestly, what do I know; I have only summited Everest once, and I consider myself lucky to have done that. So chances are I might have no idea what I’m talking about.
Hello all, it’s been a while since I’ve written anything, and even longer since I’ve written anything meaningful. Now that my life has come into some sort of order post Everest I think it’s a good time to start putting thoughts on [digital] paper.
I have been thinking about this blog and my life and I asked myself what topics this blog should cover. I am definitely into climbing, but I am also into many other things, trying to fill my life and be useful wherever I can. So for now I think I will stick to the climbing theme, but don’t be surprised if once in a while I post on things completely on a different topic. FYI, other topics I am into: charity work, photography, computers, energy industry. Maybe when I post on these other topics I will try to tie them into the climbing / outdoor theme.
It is now February 2011; people that are going to attempt Everest this year are in their final weeks of preparation. I personally know three people that are heading there this year, and I’ve exchanged emails with another few. It’s an exciting time for them, and I know what it’s like to be nearing such a big adventurous expedition. In fact, I find myself being a little envious of the big journey they are about to embark on; I find myself thinking that I would also like to be a part of an experience like that again.
This makes me remember a little conversation I had at the Calgary Airport with Calgarian and Everest Summiteer Andrew Brash. It was the day I was leaving for my Everest trip, we were on the same flight to Vancouver. When I told him I was heading to Kathmandu to start my Everest journey, he said how nice it would be to go and do the same, head back to Everest and go climb there. I thought little of it at the time, but later on as I hated my life in Everest Basecamp, I wrote a blog post where I wondered about people like that:
We all discuss and wonder about those people that climb this mountain more than once, or those that hear about us going and say “Oh wow, I’m envious, you’ll have such a good time, I wish I was back on Everest!” Maybe it’s the fact that after a period of time all the hardships selectively leave our memory, and only the good memories remain. Well let me go on record while I still go through all the bad things and say those people can go knock themselves out and have this mountain when we’re done with it. There’s not much fun to be had in climbing Everest.
Well, isn’t it funny, what goes around comes around. I am now one of those crazy people that, knowing how much pain and suffering is involved in climbing Everest, I find myself missing it (or certain parts of it).
For those interested in following along with the latest Everest climbers, here are some links:
http://www.everestnews.com/ News items are posted along the right side of the main white column. Everest and associated climbing news.
http://www.weclimbforkids.com/ Two fellow climbers I met on Cho Oyu that have established their own charity to raise money for Greg Motenson’s Central Asia Institute with their Everest climb. Best of Luck Patch and Eric!
http://sethwolpin.blogspot.com/ Seth Wolpin from Seatlle, Washington area.
http://www.borgerpeakandpond.com/ Bill Borger from Calgary, who swam the English Channel in 2000, is attempting to climb Everest while raising money for Calgary Handibus.
http://gavinvickers.com/ Gavin Vickers, fellow climber from Cho Oyu, is not actually planning to go up Everest (he’s already done that), but is leading an expedition up Lhotse, which shares the same route as Everest from Nepal up to Camp 4, where it splits off.
Since coming back from Mount Everest, I have managed to keep quite busy with life and haven’t written anything for a while. I have given a few slide shows to friends and family, and passed along some of the stories, but I’m now doing one as an open event! I will be doing a talk and showing pictures from my trip this Thursday, I encourage everyone to come out! But this event is not just about me, it’s a little different than the other presentations I’ve done; this event is organized along with World Vision, there will be printed pictures from my trip, and it will all be tied in to the larger picture of my fund raising efforts and World Vision as a whole. So even if you have seen my pictures before, you haven’t seen it like this!
If you’re at all interested in my Everest adventure, or in my fundraising campaign, come on out! The official invite can be seen here, or read on:
You’re invited to an inspirational photo exhibit. This one day, open house features photos by Wiktor Mazur, a local World Vision Child Sponsor, who climbed Mount Everest.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Open House from 6:00 – 9:30 pm, with Wiktor sharing his story at 6:30, 7:30 and 8:30
Health Sciences Centre, by Foothills Hospital
Theatre 3 (2nd floor, elevator available upon request)
3330 Hospital Drive NW
Calgary AB T2N 4N1Back from his climb, Wiktor wants to share with you – through photos and stories – the challenges he endured and the triumphs he celebrated. Inspired by the children who live each day in poverty, Wiktor took on the grueling journey of climbing to the world’s peak, Mt. Everest; hoping to help these children enjoy life to its fullest.
Come see what he saw from the top of the world – see his photos and hear his story about climbing Mt. Everest.
SPECIAL FEATURE for Calgary: Seeing life through the lens of a child is a powerful experience.
Using a photography workshop, sponsored children, in Bangladesh and Zambia, learned basic composition and photography techniques. Then they took the cameras into their world – offering a rare photographic insight into the lives of sponsored children. They captured images of things they want to change and things they are proud of. The result is a celebration of their vision and their enthusiasm.The children were also asked to photograph what they want to share with the world. Now you are invited to share in that experience with them – and see how the children look at their world.
Visit www.worldvision.ca/Events for more information (including map and parking information).
I managed to post some pictures from my trip, have a look at them here:
http://pics.wiktormazur.com/wikOnEverest/
Don’t have much time to write more right now, but as the weeks go on I hope to write some entries here where I elaborate on some of the points mentioned in the captions.
Enjoy!
For those who may not have been reading my blog too much, I often talk about how much suffering is involved in mountain climbing. What we have to put our minds and bodies through in high altitude mountaineering is not easy; you can’t quite train away the suffering that will have to be endured while acclimatizing on the mountain. It is the main reason I did this climb for charity, it was my way of putting myself into the suffering of those most needy in the world. On that note, there is a quote I heard just today that might put that suffering into a bit of perspective, for why people do it:
“We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us.”
Maybe if you’re ever going through some tough times yourself (climbing your own internal Everest) keep the above in mind.
Below, a couple more pictures from the summit, holding flags of the Knights of Columbus. My fellow Knights supported me on this climb both in moral support and donations, so much thanks to them all!
I do not feel like writing too much right now, so I will post another couple of pictures that might tell their own story. While going from Camp 3 to Camp 4 I got sunburned on my cheeks under the sides of my eyes. That is what caused the scabs on my face. Also, while coming down from the summit I got mild snow blindness, which lead to my eyes and upper face being swollen. All together it looked like I got into a fight with the ugly stick and lost badly.
Making little mistakes on Everest like I did does have consequences. It’s an unforgiving mountain. Now things are better, I am in Kathmandu, once again back in civilization, enjoying it tremendously. My face seems to be healing well; while I still had scabs on my face it was a definite conversation starter. I got myself a haircut, now all I need is a real job.
Take care everyone and see you soon!
Here are a couple of pictures from the top of the world:
Also a few thoughts on making the summit. A lot of people who have never been on an expedition such as this place a lot of emphasis on reaching the summit. And don’t get me wrong, that is the goal. But the fact is that there are so many things that need to line up right for a summit, that sometimes it’s beyond the climber’s control. I myself thought that I wouldn’t make the summit many times, in fact I was expecting to be turned back on summit day. Why that was I will get
into in a later post. But right now I just want to say that anyone that went up to Camp 4 at 8000m and slept there waiting to get their chance to go up should get the same treatment as anyone that made the summit. We all went through all the same things together, for some it ends in a summit, for others not. I do consider myself lucky in making the summit on my first attempt.
You can ask me more details about this in person if you want. In the meantime take care everyone and see you back at home soon! I still have a full day of walking left tomorrow before I am near motorized transportation. Later!
