Words from Wik

So a bit of a different topic today, but one that has an effect on my Everest preparation and climb. The company I have been working with for almost 4 years is trying to sell their Canadian assets, and so is slowly closing the Calgary office, letting people go. I got let go earlier this week, and even though I saw this coming for a while, it was still an emotionally draining day. Anyways, I won’t dwell on it too much, other than to say that I’m taking it all as a positive: I will have more time to prepare for my trip and make sure everything is in place that can be! I’ll re-focus specifically on the fundraising side to get people and hopefully companies involved in raising money for World Vision! Remember, you can donate here.

The other reason I bring this up is to lead into my next post, where I’ll talk about how I got into climbing and what experience I have that is now taking me to Everest. You might be surprised how recently I got into mountaineering, and it was almost all due to the opportunities that I got with my company. I can confidently say that BG (and the people I met along the way) have made me who I am today. Stay tuned!

For the last little while I have been reading the book “Into Thin Air” by Jon Krakauer, and I suggest you have a read of it. If you want to read about a real-life adventure, or if you want to learn more about climbing in general and high altitude in particular, or some of the history of Mt. Everest, you will find it all there. It’s a good book for everyone, as it assumes you know very little about the world of mountains and climbing them. Many people I have spoken with that have very little interest in mountains and climbing really enjoyed the book; it gives a very good description of what it’s like to climb in these high mountains, things I explain to people when I show them my photos and share my experiences. So if you have a read of this book you will know at least some of what I’m going through when I am on my trip this spring.

I thought it was a very good book, well written and a well told story. It’s not quite as epic as “Touching the Void” by Joe Simpson (read that one after if you want, it’s one of my favourite books ever), but good nonetheless. However, read “Into Thin Air” with a grain of salt, as there is some controversy over some of the things in that book, mainly the author’s guesses at people’s motivations for their actions. An entire book was written to tell the tale of that disaster from another point of view and question some of what Jon wrote, so just keep that in mind.

Let me know if you want to borrow my copy of the book. I will share some quotes to get you interested:

But at times I wondered if I had not come a long way only to find that what I really sought was something I had left behind.
– Quote taken from Hornbein, “Everest, The West Ridge”

Everest has always been a magnet for kooks, publicity seekers, hopeless romantics, and others with a shaky hold on reality.

The fact that a climber has paid a large sum of money to join a guided expedition does not, by itself, mean that he or she is unfit to be on the mountain.

People who don’t climb mountains – the great majority of humankind, that is to say – tend to assume that the sport is a reckless, Dionysian pursuit of ever escalating thrills. … At least in the case of Everest … the ratio of misery to pleasure was greater by an order of magnitude than any other mountain I’d been on; I quickly came to understand that climbing Everest was primarily about enduring pain. And in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above all else, something like a state of grace.

“If client cannot climb Everest without big help from guide,” Boukreev told me, “this client should not be on Everest. Otherwise there can be big problems up high.”

Mountaineering tends to draw men and women not easily deflected from their goals. By this late stage in the expedition we had all been subjected to levels of misery and peril that would have sent more balanced individuals packing for home long ago. To get this far one had to have an uncommonly obdurate personality.
Unfortunately, the sort of individual who is programmed to ignore personal distress and keep pushing for the top is frequently programmed to disregards signs of grave and imminent danger as well.

Bottled oxygen does not make the top of Everest feel like sea level. … 29,000 feet with gas felt like approximately 26,000 feet without gas.

Not only during the ascent but also during the descent my willpower is dulled. The longer I climb the less important the goal seems to me, the more indifferent I become to myself. My attention has diminished, my memory is weakened. My mental fatigue is now greater than the bodily. It is so pleasant to sit doing nothing – and therefore so dangerous. Death through exhaustion is – like death through freezing – a pleasant one.
– Quote taken from Reinhold Messner, “The Crystal Horizon”

In 50 days I will be on a flight leaving Calgary in what you can call the official start of my trip up Everest. I have just a few loose ends to tie up but most things are starting to fall into place. I have sent in my final payment for the trip; if you check the summitclimb.com website you will see that the cost of climbing Everest from Nepal is $27,750 USD (and prices are going up next year). I have also paid for 5 oxygen bottles valued at $510 each (they are cheaper if you buy them in Kathmandu, but that $510 includes transport by Yak then porters then Sherpas up the mountain to the high camps where we’ll actually need the stuff). I’ll leave you guys to add that all up.

With all that money spent I thought I would take some time to reflect on my trip in the context of ‘commercial expeditions up Everest’. There are other expeditions that charge $65,000 or more for a similar experience, where does that difference come from? Well one big difference is that our trip with summitclimb is not considered a “guided” trip; there is a team leader but there are no guides that will be walking with us up the mountain. We are expected to know enough about mountaineering to make our own way up and down the mountain. That cost to pay IFMGA Certified guides a western salary and all their expenses adds up. Also, we have to carry a bit more of our own things. Some companies will place sleeping bags in the high camp tents, so people can arrive and have everything ready for sleeping; I will have to carry my own (surprisingly heavy) sleeping bag. Little things like that requires people employed to carry things up and down the mountain, which adds up quickly. There are other minor things too that add up.

I must say that from my experience it’s better to go on a non-guided trip such as this. It means the quality of people signing up is higher, and you’re expected to do more on your own, giving a better feeling of satisfaction at the end. Of course, there is a fine line before the support the group gives is not enough. Other companies charge even less, but give you even less. It may go unnoticed if everything goes according to plan, but if something goes wrong these groups seek help from the ones more prepared (because they are more financed). I think summitclimb finds a nice balance right where it should be in terms of support.

I guess the whole concept of the commercialization of Everest is a debatable one, but I would like to think that companies offering non-guided support are the ones doing it right, as long as they screen their applicants enough to make sure people are qualified to be on the mountain. Companies that rely on their guides to help people up the mountain are introducing people into circumstances where they cannot help themselves, and that’s where trouble can begin, for them and for everyone else on the mountain stuck because of a traffic jam or asked to help someone who should not be there.

Here’s to hoping that our group goes up and down the mountain with little fanfare or media attention, as that always follows people that get into trouble.

So my last post was just one big complaint. I realized that as I was writing it, and hesitated about 5 times before actually hitting ‘publish’. I hate complaining. I rarely complain. I always look for the silver lining on the cloud, for how I can make the best of any situation. And I think it takes a bit of that to be able to climb high altitudes, to be able to enjoy the fresh air and the beautiful views and the relaxed people, rather than focus on the shortness of breath and the monochromatic rock-snow landscape and the lack of luxuries. However, in the interest of sharing as much as I can about what I go through as I prepare for and attempt Everest, I feel it’s best to share those bad moments and bad thoughts as much as the good. It would be a little too easy just to publish the good.

To those ladies that I have explained what high altitude mountaineering is about, several have drawn similarities between it and childbirth: you go through a lot of pain and during that pain you swear you will never do it again, but once you’re done and you look back at the result of all that pain, you barely remember the pain, in fact you start planning the next one. So it’s easy for me to just wait a few days after I go through some tough moments and forget about them, but in my attempt to share what it’s like to prepare for and attempt Everest I will try and capture all those negatives as well as positives. So please, when I complain, now or in the future, take it all with a grain of salt, appreciate it for what it is, and know I’ll get over it.

Concerning my last post, I have already decided that I’m going to focus less on the weight lifting side, start doing more body weight exercises to keep the muscle I’ve built; also I’ll start walking with weight on my back to get the muscles I’ve built used to working the way I’ll need to use them on the mountain. So I already have a bit of a solution in mind.

Hopefully I’ll post some more updates soon on my other preparation activities. All the best!

The training I have been doing to get myself into shape for Everest is starting to weigh on me. Not sure exactly why but I am really starting to not like it. When I go to the gym I am tired of feeling pain and burn from the weights, and as I keep upping the weights that burn is not going away. I find I need to take longer breaks between sets, and mentally I’m just not into it as much. I’ll keep going for a while still, though I doubt I’ll reach my weight goal I specified in an earlier post; but no matter, that was just an arbitrary number anyways. Regardless I am glad I’m getting stronger and I can quite confidently say I am in the best shape of my life. And I definitely have an appreciation for those guys at the gym that are totally bulked up, not so much for what they achieve but for the dedication and discipline it takes to achieve it. Though I wonder if I could get as big with my current schedule if I was on steroids? Just a thought, not something I’ll ever find out.

Anyways, this mental challenge in my training I should take gladly, because it’s exactly these kinds of feelings that I will have on Everest. It will be a case of my body not wanting to do what I must convince my mind to do. However, two months of that on Everest will be more than enough and if I have to put up with it starting now I wonder how I’ll fare once on the mountain.

Hi all, I’ve been meaning to update on some of the goings on of my preparation for Everest, unfortunately those very preparations have kept me busy enough that I find little time to compose my many thoughts and feelings as I prepare and go forward. I will take this opportunity to share that my endeavor has got it’s first media exposure, the Calgary Sun has an article online about my climb, and you can look for it in tomorrow’s paper. Check the link here:

http://www.calgarysun.com/news/alberta/2010/01/26/12620871.html

“The toughest thing is preparing to do things your body doesn’t want to do — it’s more of a mental challenge than physical one, if you’re physically prepared,” he said.

I wanted to also give an extra special thanks to the many people that have already donated to World Vision in support of my endeavor, thank you very much!

UPDATE: Just checked the print version, the article is at the top of page 17 with a nice big headline. Thanks Bill Kaufmann!

Happy New Year everyone! Now that it’s 2010 and I’m deep into my preparations to climb Mt. Everest I thought I’d share some of them.

I am now training what I consider to be full time. I am lifting weights at least three times a week, swimming at least once a week (for an hour), and trying to get out into the mountains for ‘real-world’ exercise on the weekends. I’m learning about training techniques and strategies, and I am learning a lot about fitness nutrition. There is a lot to it, and there’s a lot of information out there to digest, but I am enjoying it! I enjoy learning new things and I am getting an appreciation for how professional athletes train, how diligently they have to eat, etc. There’s some really cool people who are helping me out which should make it a little easier.

I guess just to summarize what I am doing: when at high altitude I will lose weight, a lot of it being muscle, so with my build I need to build muscle to be better prepared for when I start losing it on the mountain. Maybe I could get away with what I have, but I am taking this trip a little seriously and I want every advantage I can get. My goal is to get to 200 pounds (91 kg), where the most I have ever really weighed is 185 pounds (83 kg). While gaining weight can be easy, gaining muscle is not!

I was looking into satellite phones to try and see if I can get one to stay in touch with people while on the mountain, when I remembered someone saying that Everest Base Camp has cell coverage. So I looked into it further and it seems that Nepal Telecom wants to expand that to give the entire south side of the mountain cell coverage! Click here to see the story. Anyways, I’m hoping that system is working and hopefully I’ll be able to keep in touch with a normal cell phone! How times have changes since Hillary, no?

Another little bit of preparation I did today: I sold some stock in AMD that I had bought previously, I’m starting to get the money together that I need to fund my trip. It was a stock that did not too bad between when I bought it back in November 08 and now.

That’s it for now, take care and make the most of 2010!

Today I am launching a campaign through which I hope to raise money for the charity World Vision by attempting to climb the world’s tallest mountain, Mt. Everest. It’s called World Peak for World Vision, and my goal is to raise money for two projects in the developing world. Have a look at the website at www.worldpeak.ca, and if you are able to donate please do. Or simply pass this message along to others who may be interested or may want to donate.

The plan is to train for the next few months, and in the spring head to Kathmandu and start my climb. I will be writing on this blog a bit more regularly to keep people informed and share what it’s like to be training for and then trying to climb the world’s tallest mountain. If you want to stay informed you can subscribe to the RSS or sign up for email updates (top right corner from main page).

Thanks very much for your support and feel free to drop me a line anytime with any questions or comments!

Now that I’m back in Calgary I have some time to write down things I wanted to pass along before. One of the things I found interesting was the type of people that were in our group, to maybe illustrate how diverse we were, let me list the professions of all the clients attempting the summit: Lawyer, Farmer, Engineer, Military man, Ex-Bouncer, Diving Instructor, School Teacher, Trainer/Public Speaker, Unemployed.

One of the best moments of the trip for me, other than the summit, was when we were leaving for the summit. Coming out of my tent to a sky full of stars that almost lit the way, walking in the absolutely still air to the path, then starting my journey up with my headlamp lighting the way, oxygen on my face and flowing, giving me the life and energy that I need. It was a very cool experience that made me smile, though it was full of many unknowns: first time on oxygen, first time on this path, and the unknown of what the night’s hard work will bring.

Summit day for me was very long. At about 1:34 am I started my stop watch, and stopped it seven hours and six minutes later on the summit. About 50 minutes I spent on the summit, and then it took me 3h10m to get back down to Camp 3 where the day started. Here some people rested, laid in the tents, made some water. I still had half a liter of water left of the two liters I started with, so I just spent 50 minutes packing all my stuff, and continued down to Camp 2. From Camp 3 to Camp 2 took me 30 minutes (compare that with 4h15m on the way up!) as it is a pretty short distance, plus I slid down half the way on my bum! Reason being was I still had my down suit on and I started getting hot, so rather than stop on the semi-steep slope and start undressing, I decided to slide the rest of the way down! Best idea I ever had!

Packing the rest of my stuff at Camp 2 took an hour, after which I was the first one to set off for Camp 1. This part of the trip took two and a half hours, at which point the walking part of my day was over.

Add all that up and it means in 16 hours of hard work, breathing some of the driest air possible, I drank less than two liters of water. (For comparison, when resting at ABC I would easily drink 5 or 6+ liters of water in a day.) What this means is that upon reaching Camp 1 was the point where I had lost the most weight. My estimate is about 10% of my body weight, so 20 lbs or 9 kilos (most others on the trip estimated similar percentages). I would say 5 pounds of that came back with simply hydrating over the next few days. Another 5 came back after eating big back in Kathmandu. The other 10 I am still missing and working at getting back, and since most of that is probably muscle it will take some time.

It was nice to get back to Kathmandu where there are enough places that serve western food that you can really get whatever you may want. After losing as much weight as we had, everyone eats quite big on every meal. For me, a lover of food, it is one of the fun parts of mountaineering! I remember one breakfast I had a big plate of eggs, beans, cheese and salsa, prepared as Huevos Rancheros. Then I had dessert of apple pie with ice cream. Dessert after breakfast! It was absolutely lovely.

Now I’m back in Calgary and I am slowly trying to get back into the groove here. But it’s tough. For some reason I feel a little bit weird here. People ask me about my trip and I have a hard time just talking about my trip, there’s so much to say. Then they ask what’s next, while honestly I’m just trying to let this trip sink in, which I don’t think has happened yet. But I’m sure after a couple of weeks it’ll all be back to normal, as is always the case with life, so I’m not too worried.

That’s about all I wanted to get off my mind. I posted some more pictures, bigger than Facebook allows, you can find them here. Take care!

The summit was reached on September 27 by our group, at 8:40 am Tibetan time by me! We are now safely back in Kathmandu, have a look at the few pictures I posted on facebook by clicking here. See you all back home soon!