Beyond Everest
The events of this spring are still with me, and each day this spring my mind would wander to where I was expecting to be around that time. In fact, I was planning on returning from the trip a just few days ago. I took some much needed time for reflection and finally got back to the mountains. Our research group spent a week doing fieldwork together in Wyoming, after which I stuck around the Tetons to do some climbing with my old friend Mike. We did a few alpine classics, an alpine not-so-classic sufferfest, and a day of sport climbing on spectacular conglomerate in Maple Canyon, Utah.
This summer, I'll be going on some spectacular adventures, lesser than Everest only in elevation. They will be in wild places. They will be shared with good friends. And they will be awesome. Since I hardly got to show any climbing with the Everest video series, here's the first installment of this summer's stories...
Everest: The Lost Episode
Well, I got lucky and was finally able to retrieve photos and video from my broken computer. Here's the final installment of the Everest video series, which chronicles a visit with Lama Geshe and the second half of the trek to base camp. Also, here's a piece on my teammate Mattias, who assisted in avalanche rescue efforts by treating some of the most seriously injured, visited families of the victims and is currently raising money for Sherpa relief (details at the end of the article).
Sea Level
This past weekend, a few friends and I caught up with my good friend Zach, who's currently on his way to Alaska the not-so-easy way. Part celebration (he just finished his PhD), part promotion for his dream to build and operate an earth system science experiential learning paradise near his home in southeast Alaska and part personal journey, Zach is walking from Stanford to Port Angeles, Washington, then kayaking the Inside Passage back home to Glacier Bay.
We drove up to share a day on the trail together in northern California's fabled Lost Coast and bring him some much needed camping fuel (and leftover pizza!). You can follow his five-month journey at inianislandsinstitute.org and check in on Zach's exact whereabouts here.
Everest Ep. 6: Up and Down
This episode covers a dayclimb of Lobuche East in the aftermath of the avalanche and my subsequent trip down the Khumbu Valley. I climbed from the village of Lobuche to the summit and back to Everest BC in most of a day, then spent a couple days there coming to terms with the certain demise of our expedition. After packing my bags, I jogged and hiked down to Pheriche, spent the night and scurried all the way back to Lukla the next day.
BC and Back
Here's a quick cut of base camp life along with my first trip back down. With the dissertation madness and trip cancellation, I ended up essentially making one and a half Everest base camp treks!
I am going home
The tragic events of April 18th and the sorrow, complexity and tensions that have followed have led my team and I to abandon our expedition. It’s been rather easy to say goodbye to Everest itself. Frankly, I haven’t had much interest in even looking at the Khumbu Icefall this past week. What has been difficult is bearing witness to the confusion and conflict of the past week as local workers grieve, organize and demand labor rights, the government scrambles, and hundreds of climbers cling to their dreams and business interests. A few days ago, as if to respond to those of us consumed with our wide array of human problems, the mountain produced a tremendous icefall eerily similar to last week’s disaster. Whether out of support for the rights of the Sherpa people, respect for the sixteen lives lost, political instability, climate change or the mood of Chomolungma herself, climbing Everest does not feel right this year.DonationDelivering aid to struggling families here is quite difficult and complex. There will be pujas (blessing ceremonies) for 49 days, and lump sum contributions would be quickly spent in pujas with the best intentions of the devout Buddhists living here. I am confident that the American Alpine Club’s Sherpa Support Fund will provide for the thirty-five children who are now fatherless through long-term stipends.The trip from hereI am an alpinist, and spent the last week not only dealing with the uncertainty of Everest, but also exploring other options. Logistical issues, route conditions, Chinese visa problems and high permit fees have thwarted my ability to continue this trip in some capacity on Ama Dablam, Cholatse, Khumbutse, Cho Oyu, Makalu and other nearby peaks.A few days ago I did “solo” (it’s a popular route) 20,075 ft Lobuche East in a light and fast style. It was great to get out of base camp for a day, but upon return to base camp the sadness and structural problems of this year were palpable. More on this climb and my complete thoughts on this year’s events will follow.I ran fortyish miles down the trail in just over a day, waited a day in Lukla for good weather, and flew to Kathmandu. Now I’ll spend a few days here and return to the US within a week or so. I am well physically and mentally.Take care,Hari
Things Fall Apart (With Humor!)
I leap out of the chopper, rotors still spinning, onto the dusty ground. The Italian pilot, breathing bottled oxygen, flashes three fingers and a Sherpa quickly begins refilling the stripped-down Eurocopter for a rescue mission. “Dhanyabad dai,” I exclaim as the craft lifts into the Himalayan sky.I inventory the situation: I’m immediately overwhelmed by the warmth of the air at 13,000 ft in the Khumbu countryside. I begin to sweat in my layers of down and Primaloft as I bound down the trail towards Namche. My pack is burdensome and poorly packed, containing a couple broken laptops, a bunch of dirty laundry, some toiletries and all of my remaining Rupees. My mind and body are focused on a single, essential mission: run 15 miles down valley before nightfall, catch a flight to Kathmandu and submit my PhD.Wait, what?!? Why don’t I bring you up to speed with my last week of internet hell.So my daily routine last week at base camp (aside from shivering, coughing and trying to force down soup, rice and carrots) has been to wake up, fill a hot water bottle, wrap said hot water bottle and my laptop in a down jacket, wait for an hour, charge on marginal solar power for a couple hours, and attempt to establish a secure connection during a snowstorm on a satellite-based internet connection on a flowing river of ice at 17,600 ft.
Typical days at BC this year have been “colder than a polar bear’s toenails” (Outkast, 1996). Nighttime lows I’d estimate at slightly below zero, which feels quite a lot colder when you’re still acclimatizing by the way. Mornings in the Khumbu are often sunny, but don’t get suckered, it’ll start to snow before lunchtime most days.Then a couple days ago, my laptop fully died. Slightly rattled, but still with my eyes on the prize, I tried Damian’s laptop. After a couple hours of login hell, Everest claimed yet another victim. Digital tragedy struck in the Chilean camp next to us. I was running out of options. Even if we’d been lucky enough to have working comms and a solid internet connection, temperatures and the charging situation were dire enough that I’d unlikely be able to submit the documents before the sun set and WiFi signal faded. By this, I mean, unlikely to submit by my June deadline. The time had come for radical action.Two days ago was surprisingly clear, and a chopper was busy ferrying loads for one of this season’s many film productions. This meant they were flying empty downvalley. A few phonecalls were made, I desperately threw what I needed into a pack and ran to the helipad as the weather closed in. I jumped from the ice and rock platform into the running beast, tossed my pack on the aluminum floor and crouched in for the ride. These specially-modified B3e’s are marvels of modern engineering. Last year, I watched from above as one of these machines performed the highest rescue in history, longlining a climber off Everest from over 25,000ft. The Italian pilots who fly seasonally in Nepal are some of the best mountain aviators in the world and playfully dance the aircraft in and out of crevasses and river valleys. There were times I felt I could touch the ridges as we raced downvalley. Frankly, I think they do it just so they can see the look on our faces.I thought we were going to Lukla. That was the plan. But plans are only things that haven’t changed yet...especially in Nepal. In fact, expeditions in general are guaranteed to have problems, often serious, but often with solutions. Unfortunately for me, I was nowhere near Lukla, laden with useless items, and lacking such trail essentials as a headlamp. But I was gonna catch that flight. I checked my watch and realized I had only a few hours of daylight to cover over a third of the standard Everest base camp trek. Time to get moving! I hustled, running much of the trail, scrambling past yak trains on cliff faces when necessary, and generally looking out of place. Sherpas laughed at my hustle. I made it to Lukla not long after nightfall and met Lhakpa who helped me get set for the morning. Everyone had written me off as a no-show. The next morning, I managed a seat on the last flight out of Lukla before the weather closed in, hopped in a taxi and went to the computer repair store. I spent the day there working on tech stuff (I also got to know Robert at Apple tech support quite well!) and starting to get my new files working. Early yesterday evening, I submitted (the work was done, but getting my backed up copy offline and uploading it was quite entertaining).Tomorrow, I’ll try to reverse the process and get back up to Everest as fast as possible. It’s equally uncertain where I’ll wind up, but we’ll just see what happens. My health has improved substantially in the warmth and oxygen-rich air of Kathmandu, but I’m not yet 100%, so we’ll just have to see where this trip goes from here. It’d be hard to get much weirder. At least I’m happy to have an opportunity to reboot, get a fresh start on this trip without external stress and distractions. Everest will require a new focus. It’s time to return to the mountains and the trip I’ve dreamt about for so long. hmix is back!Note: I realize the absurdity of this modern situation, but it was a reality of my trip this year. I’ve never before brought such important work on an expedition, but forces out of my control made it the case.Now I’m getting started with another laptop. I lost all of my data from this trip, so the videos and photos you saw on the blog are it for now. More to come in the future, but if communications are anything like when I left, we’ll be limited to stories and some photos. I’ll release the videos this summer, including a missing episode from the trek to BC that I’m hoping to recover later. 
Stormy start
Bad weather has affected things here in many ways. While it's good to know there are still some places in the world where our human desires are subject to the day to day constraints of the natural world, the last few days have taken their toll. Some specifics:Our bags were delayed with the weather, so our warm clothing and climbing gear are not yet here. Result: We're freezing! I have hardly slept the past two nights and now have a cold and cough. Can't wait for my -40 bag to arrive. Even with hot water bottles my current setup isn't getting the job done in the early season Khumbu weather. We are sleeping on ice at 17,600 ft after all! Hopefully night 3 will treat me better.Snowfall has hampered our ability to charge electronics off solar so posts will have to be dialed back for the time being. I've spent the last two days unsuccessfully trying to submit my phd online and making some revisions for a scientific article. Work takes priority here!The snowfall also means I haven't had a shower or been able to do laundry in quite some time. Thankfully if you're reading this you don't have to experience the consequences of this firsthand!First world problems, I know, but the cell tower in gorak shep isn't functioning so I haven't been able to talk with my family which is a bit of a morale drag.Realistically, we probably have a few more days here acclimatizing and doing some training climbs before anything major happens. Hopefully that will give me time to bounce back in time for our first climbing rotation on the mountain. The adventure continues!Hari
Made it to BC!
I'm typing as fast as I possibly can because i'm on 3% battery and it's snowing out so our newly rigged solar setup isn't jamming! I'm totally healthy and the team is all well, even though it's quite cold at the moment. Here's just one photo from the hike up here. Much more if we get some sun tomorrow!!Hari
Plugging away
A few more days on the trail has brought our team to Pheriche, a spectacular village located at about 14,200 ft below the sacred flanks of Ama Dablam. I have quite fond memories of my stay here last year...the apple pie is out of this world! While we're nearing Everest base camp, the name of the game at this point is SLOWLY! We'll spend 3-4 more days covering the 10 miles and 3400 vertical feet to our home for the next six weeks.TembaAt breakfast this morning, I met Temba, who will be my climbing partner this spring. Temba is one of the strongest members of our team, and has already been working the route to camp two. He stopped in briefly on his way down to Lukla from base camp to take a few days of well-deserved rest with his wife and four children. We'll link up again in a few days at base camp.
Here are some more images from the journey so far: 
In the Mountains
"We are now in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us" -John Muir
Bonus: Just spotted this in The Onion haha. There are actually quite a few film crews this year...should be a bit of a scene at bc as always.
Bumpy
My time in Kathmandu has been bumpy, but all is well. Kathmandu reminds me why I'm not much of a city person. Everyone is here, all the bags are packed and, weather-dependent, we fly up to Lukla and begin trekking to base camp in a few hours! Here's a quick cut of the last few days...
Anatomy of an Expedition
How does a modern Everest expedition work? There’s quite a bit of travel and adjustment coming in the next nine weeks. Here’s a mock up of what I'll be doing this spring:
- A graphical representation of the travel, trek, acclimatization, and summit attempt. 100% guaranteed to change…plans all depend on weather, health and a million other factors.
Travel: A few days of flying and a few days running errands and getting my bearings in KathmanduTrek (Early to Mid April): The trek to base camp begins in Lukla at about 9000 ft. Over the following week and a half, we’ll trek to base camp at 17,600 ft on the Khumbu Glacier.Acclimatization (Mid April to Mid May): About a month of hard training climbs, caching gear at progressively higher camps and recovery in base camp. I’m planning on making 3-4 rotations up and down the mountain.
Recovery and summit (Mid to Late May): I may return to a 13-14,000 ft village to recover and “touch grass” before the summit bid. After that, we’ll target a narrow window of good weather in mid to late May. There are many extra days built in to the schedule so we can target the best opportunity.Descent (Late May to Early June): Turning the whole train back around and returning to civilization always takes a bit of figuring out. We’re likely going to try to hike down valley a bit and charter a helicopter back to Kathmandu as the monsoon will be beginning.
Tune Up
"In the mountains I celebrate creation. On each journey I am reborn" -Anatoli Boukreev
The reality of this spring is beginning to set in. I've been running quite the operation out of my apartment...arranging everything from visa applications to heli charters to cataloging, inspecting and stockpiling a manmade Everest of equipment and clothing. I'll to use this post to relay a few things...First off, I leave for Nepal a week from today. This year I'll have better communications than ever, so I'll be sharing the adventure as it unfolds. Feel free to drop me questions, comments or anything you'd like via email, the contact form or comments on posts and I'll get back to you. I'm hoping to show a little more of what an expedition is like behind the scenes.PreparationI'm often asked about training these days, so I'll shed a little light on my preparation for this spring. I'm a bit unusual in this regard given my background as a runner. I think the single most important physical element in high altitude climbing is cardiovascular fitness. These days, I'm mostly taking walks (about 6 miles a day) to be gentle on my back, but I'll run up to a few times per week, usually no more than 5-6 miles. Occasionally, I do a little check up with my fitness. Two recent tests have me confident that I'm stronger than I've ever been going into previous expeditions:1. On several recent occasions, I've run about 5:10ish/mile for 5-6 miles. Something in the 32-33 min 10k range wouldn't be too much of an issue at this point.2. Stair climbing over 6000 vertical feet in an hour without too much trouble, so the leg strength and endurance parts of the equation are right where they need to be.I lift weights twice per week and have definitely added significant muscle and functional strength. This should definitely help me handle the day to day abuse of climbing with a pack (I'll carry 40-50 lb loads and cache gear up the mountain). In order to climb without oxygen, I'll have to handle several multiday acclimatization climbs up the mountain that definitely beat you up.Most importantly, I'm trying to come into starting with a solid foundation. There's plenty of time to get fit during the two month expedition. Endurance athletes often frame training into cycles that last up to six months. One of the most common reasons for a flop at the end of a season would be to be to peak too early. Last year on Lhotse I lost 25 pounds and gained a ton of fitness during the trip itself, leaving me pretty close to being "peaked" during the summit bid. Now, I'm hoping to put a bit of weight on before I leave, and on the trip I'll just focus on staying patient and healthy.In short, I'm healthy and in solid mountain shape. The hay is in the barn.
sometimes
"He is lucky who, in the full tide of life, has experienced a measure of the active environment he most desires. In these days of upheaval and violent change, when the basic values of today are the vain and shattered dreams of tomorrow, there is much to be said for a philosophy which aims at living a full life while the opportunity offers." -Eric Shipton, 1943
Sometimes life presents moments of unique opportunity. This spring, between defending my dissertation and starting a dream position at Santa Clara University, I am returning to the Himalaya.
Two months. One historic route on the world's highest mountain. No supplemental oxygen.My journey to Chomolungma...Goddess Mother of the Earth...Everest...begins in earnest March 27!
Winter traverse of the High Sierra
With all of the recent polar vortex talk, it could be easy to conclude that winter, glaciers and climate as we know it are here to stay. Well, out here in California, my good friend Zach and I just crossed the Sierra Nevada. In sneakers. In two and a half days in the heart of "winter." California, if you haven't heard, is in a ridiculous drought right now.Zach and I were excited at the prospect of this unique trip and a chance to visit some of California's threatened glaciers in winter. Borrowing from the light is right, alpine-style ethic, we stripped down to the bare essentials and rock hopped, plunge-stepped, and slipped along icy trail from the Eastern Sierra to Yosemite Valley.
Thanks to Brad and Matt for dropping us off in style, and Seanan for the unlikely encounter in Yosemite and company on the way home!
Rising mountains dried out Central Asia
Something has come of those two summers spent bouncing around Mongolia in Russian vans! Work led by my fellow grad student and travel companion Jeremy Caves has been presented, submitted for publication, and picked up by a few science news aggregators. This piece, written by Stanford's earth science writer Ker Than, puts some of our findings into English...-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Rising mountains dried out Central AsiaA record of ancient rainfall teased from long-buried sediments in Mongolia is challenging the popular idea that the arid conditions prevalent in Central Asia today were caused by the ancient uplift of the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau.Instead, Stanford scientists say the formation of two lesser mountain ranges, the Hangay and the Altai, may have been the dominant drivers of climate in the region, leading to the expansion of Asia's largest desert, the Gobi. The findings will be presented on Thursday, Dec. 12, at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in San Francisco."These results have major implications for understanding the dominant factors behind modern-day Central Asia's extremely arid climate and the role of mountain ranges in altering regional climate," said Page Chamberlain, a professor of environmental Earth system science at Stanford.
Scientists previously thought that the formation of the Himalayan mountain range and the Tibetan plateau around 45 million years ago shaped Asia's driest environments."The traditional explanation has been that the uplift of the Himalayas blocked air from the Indian Ocean from reaching central Asia," said Jeremy Caves, a doctoral student in Chamberlain's terrestrial paleoclimate research group who was involved in the study.
This process was thought to have created a distinct rain shadow that led to wetter climates in India and Nepal and drier climates in Central Asia. Similarly, the elevation of the Tibetan Plateau was thought to have triggered an atmospheric process called subsidence, in which a mass of air heated by a high elevation slowly sinks into Central Asia."The falling air suppresses convective systems such as thunderstorms, and the result is you get really dry environments," Caves said.This long-accepted model of how Central Asia's arid environments were created mostly ignores, however, the existence of the Altai and Hangay, two northern mountain ranges.Searching for answersTo investigate the effects of the smaller ranges on the regional climate, Caves and his colleagues from Stanford and Rocky Mountain College in Montana traveled to Mongolia in 2011 and 2012 and collected samples of ancient soil, as well as stream and lake sediments from remote sites in the central, southwestern and western parts of the country.The team carefully chose its sites by scouring the scientific literature for studies of the region conducted by pioneering researchers in past decades."A lot of the papers were by Polish and Russian scientists who went there to look for dinosaur fossils," said Hari Mix, a doctoral student at Stanford who also participated in the research. "Indeed, at many of the sites we visited, there were dinosaur fossils just lying around."The earlier researchers recorded the ages and locations of the rocks they excavated as part of their own investigations; Caves and his team used those age estimates to select the most promising sites for their own study.At each site, the team bagged sediment samples that were later analyzed to determine their carbon isotope content. The relative level of carbon isotopes present in a soil sample is related to the productivity of plants growing in the soil, which is itself dependent on the annual rainfall. Thus, by measuring carbon isotope amounts from different sediment samples of different ages, the team was able to reconstruct past precipitation levels.An ancient wet periodThe new data suggest that rainfall in central and southwestern Mongolia had decreased by 50 to 90 percent in the last several tens of million of years."Right now, precipitation in Mongolia is about 5 inches annually," Caves said. "To explain our data, rainfall had to decrease from 10 inches a year or more to its current value over the last 10 to 30 million years."That means that much of Mongolia and Central Asia were still relatively wet even after the formation of the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau 45 million years ago. The data show that it wasn't until about 30 million years ago, when the Hangay Mountains first formed, that rainfall started to decrease. The region began drying out even faster about 5 million to 10 million years ago, when the Altai Mountains began to rise.The scientists hypothesize that once they formed, the Hangay and Altai ranges created rain shadows of their own that blocked moisture from entering Central Asia."As a result, the northern and western sides of these ranges are wet, while the southern and eastern sides are dry," Caves said.The team is not discounting the effect of the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau entirely, because portions of the Gobi Desert likely already existed before the Hangay or Altai began forming."What these smaller mountains did was expand the Gobi north and west into Mongolia," Caves said.The uplift of the Hangay and Altai may have had other, more far-reaching implications as well, Caves said. For example, westerly winds in Asia slam up against the Altai today, creating strong cyclonic winds in the process. Under the right conditions, the cyclones pick up large amounts of dust as they snake across the Gobi Desert. That dust can be lofted across the Pacific Ocean and even reach California, where it serves as microscopic seeds for developing raindrops.The origins of these cyclonic winds, as well as substantial dust storms in China today, may correlate with uplift of the Altai, Caves said. His team plans to return to Mongolia and Kazakhstan next summer to collect more samples and to use climate models to test whether the Altai are responsible for the start of the large dust storms."If the Altai are a key part of regulating Central Asia's climate, we can go and look for evidence of it in the past," Caves said.
More thankful than ever
I live a charmed life. Occasionally I’ll be stopped in my tracks when I stumble upon an old photo…was I really there? Did I actually drink fermented camel’s milk in Mongolia?!?This year, I have even more reason to be thankful. It’s also the main reason I haven’t posted in a while. Next year, I'll be an assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Studies and Sciences at Santa Clara University. It’s an absolute dream for me to make this next step, and I couldn’t be happier at the prospect of joining such a wonderful group of people.
I wasn’t able to get out much this fall as I was super busy with the job search and PhD work. I also messed my ankle up really badly in late September. I’d never rolled my left ankle before but I tore pretty much everything. I’m in really good running shape now and lifting as well, but mountain trips were off limits this fall. I did sneak off to Yosemite Valley for a quick weekend with my good buddy Mike. He led all the hard pitches and I climbed pretty poorly but loved every minute. Found a great veggie burger and milkshake on the way home too…Hula’s in Escalon is tasty!
Bugaboos Part 3: Big Day on Bugaboo Spire
We saved the best for last…after a few marginal weather days, we finally had a perfect window on our last day.
Climbing the Northeast Ridge of Bugaboo Spire is really only the start of this adventurous day.
After twelve or so pitches, one reaches the north summit, but the traverse to the south is wildly exposed and a bit complicated…requiring a cheval technique—scooting along the ridge as if you were on horseback.
Then comes the descent of the Kain Route, a long and complicated traverse of the entire mountain before returning down the Bugaboo Snowpatch Col.
Natalie and I had no issues, but it certainly took a full day to figure out the little tricks of the route.
After returning to the Kain Hut, we gathered our things and hiked out by headlamp. Thanks Bugaboos--you're the stuff dreams are made of!
