April
1999
THIRD POLE EXPEDITION
April
- June 1999
Friday
30th April 99
The
route off by heart…
This is what Alain Hubert wrote to us this morning in relation to
the way he has seen things going one in recent days. These few lines
demonstrate what state of mind a mountaineer is in on the eve of making
an attempt on the world's highest peak, ready to dice with what is
called the death zone. Tomorrow, we'll be publishing the remainder
of the e-mail sent this morning by Hubert. It deals with the way in
which the mountaineering professionals, the mountain and those tourists
looking for thrill all contrive to cohabit… It's every bit as interesting
as what follows… As I have said before, we have pitched a tent and
cached some equipment at 7 800 m on a little ledge on the North Ridge
shortly before it joins the North-East Ridge. This spot is called
"camp 5" in memory of the climb by Mallory and Irvine in 1924.
My plan is to get to this spot at about 3.00 pm when we make our first
attempt. We'll rest up for a couple of hours and then continue on
up, taking our small tent with us to 8 300 m (the so-called "camp
6" used by the British in 1924) where there are some better flat
surfaces that are more sheltered from the wind. There, we'll have
a bite to eat as we wait for midnight before making an attempt on
the summit; that is where we will leave the tent and pick it up on
the way down.
From there, we have to go along below the ridge a little among some
rather unstable slabs of rock that are sloped like the tiles of a
roof. We get back to this ridge just before the first projection at
8 560 m. Then, it shouldn't be too difficult to skirt this sharp rise
to the right and then make our way to the second projection where
the lowest extremity is at 8 650 m. This is a sort of large open corner
with all kinds of old bits of rope and an old metal ladder that the
Chinese put there during their fateful expedition in 1996 (note:
out of the 26 people who took part in that expedition, only two climbers
managed to make it back to base camp). Then we'll reach the top
of this corner at a height of around 8 700 metres.
Once we're there, we'll be at the foot of the final hurdle: the cathedral.
This has to be taken sideways on to the right until we reach a rocky
strip running from right to left and where we have to find a way that
leads to the top.
This final climb is very long, but climbing conditions seem to be
better this year, even though technically it will be more difficult,
because we have to tack our way round some quite difficult slabs of
rock, with the attendant risk of rock falls. From this point of view,
I feel good about the climb, which already a very positive point.
In fact, it's as though I'd made it!
What happens next? Make the most of the window in the weather that
the Americans have confirmed to us, who also have news. I think that
tomorrow, I'll go up to the ABC (6 to 8 hours of walking), then I'll
rest up for a day and also see how my cough reacts to the change in
altitude; I should then be in a position to know whether I'll be able
to make an attempt on the summit or not. If not, I'll go up to the
North Col the day after and ask my climbing companion to go and move
the tent from 7 800 to 8 300 metres before going back down to the
ABC, where we'll wait for the next gap in the weather. If the forecast
is good, i.e. if the fine weather is due to arrive quickly, we'll
stop at the ABC; if the forecast isn't good, we'll come back down
to base camp because it's not a good thing to remain at high altitude
for too long.
