A Long Day Descending to Chinese Base Camp

It wasn't a good night at Advanced Base Camp on the north side of Mount Everest. 

At 21,000 feet of elevation, there is only about 50 percent of the oxygen one is used to breathing in the Twin Cities. The lack of oxygen can make it tough for one's body to generate heat, and I was often cold throughout the night. Another side effect of sleeping at high altitude is disrupted sleep, and I slept very poorly, not more than an hour at a time.

Waking up on the morning of May 6, my head was pounding with an altitude headache and I was breathing very hard just trying to get dressed. After getting my cold boots on, I stumbled out of my tent with the idea of taking a short walk to the dining tent for some hot tea, but one of the people in my trekking group was calling for help from his tent. I asked him if he was okay and he asked me to get our guide, Raj. I yelled for Raj and got him to come over. He found our trekking mate in poor shape and having trouble breathing.

Raj and a sherpa in the camp checked him out and quickly gave him some oxygen. The rest of us in the group couldn't help, so we gathered in the tent and ate a light breakfast. My appetite was still nonexistent, so I drank as much tea as I could and nibbled on some dry toast. The plan for the day was to drop off our heavy bags for the yaks and then head down the East Rongbuk Valley to the Rongbuk Valley and Chinese Base Camp at 17,000 feet. The drop in elevation promised to be nice, but we had walked the 12 miles up and knew it would be a challenging, long day.

By the time we got our bags packed for the yaks, we learned that one of the sherpas had already left with our trekking mate - the two were walking down the mountain together, with the sherpa carrying an oxygen tank for our trekking mate. With extra oxygen, he was fortunately able to walk on his own. With that cheery update, I threw my rucksack on my back, grabbed my hiking poles and headed out of ABC about 9 a.m., with one last look over my shoulder at Mount Everest in the bright morning sky. 

The morning went well and the weather was good - sunny, but not too hot. I felt strong and kept a nice, steady pace that got us to our halfway point - Intermediate Base Camp - at about 1:30 p.m. The cook at the camp served us some hot noodles and we refilled our water bottles. Shortly after 2 p.m., we departed on the second half of the hike as the clouds slowly came into the valley.

The hours went by slowly and by 4 p.m., I was feeling low on energy and my legs were tired and rubbery. The other three trekkers with me slowly pulled away from me, but I knew were I was going and wasn't worried. It was actually peaceful hiking along by myself. Raj passed by later and checked on me as I made the turn into the Rongbuk Valley and headed north towards Chinese Base Camp.

After another hour or two, I felt elation at finally catching a view of yellow and blue tents. At about 7 p.m., I finally made it into camp, dumped my rucksack by my sleeping tent and joined the others in the dining tent. It was great to sit down and simply drink some hot tea after the long day. We traded stories and ate some snacks while we waited for the others to come in. Overall, we looked tired and worn out, sunburnt and dirty. 

The yaks arrived with our bags and I got my sleeping bag set up. After dinner, I caught my second wind (or maybe it was the 'extra' oxygen) and joined the others in the dining tent where we watched a movie. One of the climbers had brought along a laptop, small projector and a white sheet for a screen - a bit surreal, but it was a nice way to relax. After the movie, I went to my tent and crashed in my sleeping bag - no problem sleeping through the night.

Next up: My last blog post on the trek. We take a 1.5-day drive across the edge of the Tibetan Plateau, cross the border into Nepal and have a great ride into Kathmandu.

Download the movie