Day 9: toughest day thusfar… Kala Platter peak (5550m)

Today, I suffered the most, really. We got up just after 4 AM to climb Kala Platter and reach the peak before sun rise. The climb is only 400m up but STEEP. I recommend the Oxford ditionary to use a picture of KP to visually  explain ‘steep’.

There were two more reasons for the suffering. Firstly, I had some light altitude disease and -I now can pledge for that- that makes things exponentially more difficult. Secondly, the cold. O my, it was cold, minimally -15 degrees and without sunlight it felt even much colder.

Nontheless, Ian, Ashley, Prem and I started our way up around 5 AM. Some small groups had already started; we could see torches ahead. The next 2 hours to the top were ultimate hardship. We ran out of breath multiple times, but could not really stop since it was too cold. At some point, Ashley, who had an off day that day, decided to abort and go down. Prem and Ian continued at their (higher) pace and I did an ultimate ‘sherpa shuffle’; I think I broke the world record for ‘slowest shuffle ever’. Not that I cared, I simply wanted to reach the top and succeed. Have a look at the aweful picture that proofs success, omg, I was sooo tired!

First beams of sun light on Mount Everest. Gotcha!

What I didn’t realise when climbing Kala Platter was that this day would be epic in both distance and height meters…. After the strenuous summit, we first had to walk back to Loboche (where Jody and Adrian were waiting; roughly a half day hike) and from there make our way up to Lobuche high camp at 5,500m, which was another super steep hike/climb of 500m (in one go). Hmmmm, tiring. Oops.

All in all, it went rather well, the hike up was super interesting because there was no longer a path anymore. It was more jumping and crawling from one rock to the other trying to make our way up. We had one scary stretch where we had to rely on ropes on an slippery icy track of roughly 30 cm wide but we managed.

Can you find the high camp in the below pic (four yellow tents)?

And now?? Focus just under the middle

Here is a confession, I never have been so cold in my life as the evening and night at the high camp. When the weather came in and the sun got blocked/set, the temperature went down, down, down (and did I say down? Yes, down).

We were served our diner in the tent, and we ate in our sleeping bags whilst wearing every piece of cloth that we had. I slept in: 3 pair of socks including one pair designed for -20 and one pair of ski socks, an angora thermo base layer pants plus same top, two t-shirts, one long sleeve, a fleece jacket, a light down jacket and a heavy down jacket, two pairs of gloves, my beany and my Everest yak hat, a silk buff and a fleece buff (and remember, my sleeping bag was supposed to be -20 degrees too, you know, the mummyfication bag with the scarce space). And yet, I was still cold! Unbelievable!

Our summit attempt started at 2 AM. I promoted myself to chief photographing officer, since I had decided not to summit.

I think this was one of the finest decision in my life. I may have been fit enough, but there were too many signals on red. Firstly, my shoes were no longer waterproof due to some tear on the way, implying that  I would have had to climb the first stage of the summit trail (icy rocks) with my climbing boots (similar to ski shoes) and that I deemed too dangerous. Secondly, my 10 minute mounteneering training was by far not sufficient to have me safely cover 2x 600 meters of ropes with 2x 32 rope change points at a 80 degrees angle in 25 degrees below zero. Adrian said later that the ice was like razor blades and the  rops were frozen into the ice due to the cold. Both very very tricky for inexperienced climbers such as myself.

For me, the decision to say ‘no’ was a greater victory then saying ‘yes’ irrespective if followed by a succesful summit. Until recently, I would have just not been able to say no in this unique situation that I could actually DO it then and there.

In the end, Ian and Ashley also decided not to summit, and Jody unfortunately had to turn around because of her bug issue. So only Adrian went the whole nine yards and succeeded;  he is our hero!

Adrian and Judy getting ready. Shoe replacement short before departure because of cold feet issues.

Off they go, best of luck! I quickly ‘stole’ their sleeping bags since Ash was freezing and dug back in my, ehmm, bed. Not that there was much bed, we had 1 cm thick matrasses that only seemed to transport the cold to our bones 🙁

Below, Adrian and the climbing sherpa are about to reach the summit. Mabruk!Group picture. Everyone was happy with their decisions made…

Our way down was more difficult then up, as usual. Ian almost fell off the ropes, but luckily nothong serious happened.

Going down when it is still sunny gives easy reasons to celebration… For example by enjoying a short rest ☺️

One of the many ice lakes. Gorgeous!

So, here is an interesting fact. Our route was roughly the same down as up, yet the down views were more stunning. My hypothesis is that pleasure of scenery has a strong inverse correlation to the inputed efforts; down is half as hard work as up, so double the pleasure… Lol

Finally, after two long days we reached Dingboche again. Back in ‘known territory’, we headed straight to the French bakery that sells the best cakes, pies and cookies in the area (yes, Claire, they are French worthy…). Yummy!!