Kingdoms of Experience

by Andrew Greig

  However, they eventually agreed to round up their yaks, and then the pantomime began as they inspected our carefully weighed packages. Eloquent gestures of disbelief, despair, manifest impossibility. One of the yakkers was struggling to lift one of our loads, grimacing horribly, when Liz came along with a cup of tea in one hand and casually hoisted the package with the other. …

  So the yaks stood about resignedly and we lay back with equal resignation and let the yakkers, Jack and Urs get on with it. No point in getting worked up. The yakkers would know how late they could afford to set off and still make the first night’s camp site. But Urs was astonished at our laid-back attitude, and confessed that had this been a French, German or Italian expedition there would have been hysterics, shouting, rage and ‘the having of kittens’.

  Lunchtime came and went, and fewer than half the yaks were loaded. Endless disputes between the yakkers, each trying to minimize the burden of his own beasts – for now they actually own them rather than being part of a collective, they take great care of their yaks. And when we handed out their sunglasses, we saw another example of local egalitarianism: the shades had different coloured rims and each yakker coveted the same ones. So they took off a brightly woven garter they wear, laid out the shades and asked Jack to pair them at random with their identifying garter.

  Jack sat down beside Mal and I, complaining mildly about how hard it was to work with yakkers, partly because of the language problem, and also because they keep saying yes and then doing nothing, or they raise a new problem. We had to hide our smiles, because this was exactly how we felt about dealing with the Chinese.

  In the late afternoon they finally lurched into motion and the yaks drifted vaguely towards the glacier snout with the yakkers whistling, shouting and occasionally clouting them. One yak load fell off after 100 yards. They were moving very slowly indeed, and the lads obviously had some hours ahead of them. We stood and watched the Boy Racers, with Dave and Urs, Kurt and Julie, trail away. Bright yellow Libond suits, ski-goggles, ski-poles clicking among the boulders. We all rather envied them but there were simply not enough yaks in that part of the world to take all our gear up in one run. Anyway, it seemed more efficient use of time to have the team operate in two groups, alternatively being on the hill and resting at Base. This pattern was to determine the structure of all our efforts from now on, and probably had a decisive influence on the outcome.

  ‘Leave something unclimbed for us!’ Mal shouted.

  ‘Look after yourselves,’ from Liz.

  We watched till they disappeared round the edge of the glacier snout, then went into the Mess Tent, envious and restless.

  It would be another four days before the yaks would be back and ready to set off again with the remainder of our gear. In the meantime we took more walks, ate and drank as much as possible, and wondered how the Boy Racers were doing. They’d taken a radio with them, but we’d picked up nothing on our Base Camp, which surprised us. The Motorola radios had communicated across greater distances and out of line-of-sight on the Mustagh Tower – that’s why we expected them to work for BC/ABC contact. Perhaps they’d just forgotten to transmit at the set time, or the radio was broken. (It wasn’t. Despite setting up a Base Station with a more powerful receiver and battery-pack, we were never to have a radio link between BC and ABC. That lack of communication, with the logistical and psychological distance it created between the two camps, made impossible proper organization and utilization of our resources and was a decisive factor in determining the character of the Expedition and, finally, its outcome.)

  They were due to take three days going up to ABC, and there put up the Mess Tent and some personal tents. Dave Bricknell was in charge of setting this camp in order; it had to be a good one. Then, if they felt up to it, the lads would try to explore and wand the crevasse-riddled glacier across to the foot of the North-East Ridge and maybe even make a start on it. They’d do what they could then come down; we expected to meet them on our way up. It would be hard work for them, arriving unacclimatized at 6,400 metres. For both parties the first time up would be an acclimatizer and preparation for the serious assault the next time round.

  The weather began to deteriorate in the following days. Everest disappeared in cloud. Conditions could be rough at ABC – Bonington had told us it could be quite desperate in a storm. We’d have to wait a week to find out. But. …

  Allen Fyffe Surprise time! Two figures on the moraine. Urs and Sandy back down from ABC, Sandy with cerebral oedema probably caused by working too hard as the yaks kept shedding their loads. They went to ABC then back down some way; today tried again for ABC but Sandy bad again. …

  I think some people have had a rude awakening. Sandy’s always been the ‘strong man’ type and for him to fall ill is a bad sign. However it may wake everyone up to what this is all about; Everest is a dangerous place, even the bottom bits.

  Sandy looked deeply tired; his eyes were slightly glazed and his face was swollen with water retention. As we plied him and Urs with brews in the Mess Tent he tried to be cheerful and philosophical about it, but it wasn’t too hard to sense that he was deeply disappointed and shaken. He’d never thought himself to be a superman, but his body had never let him down like this before on occasions when he’d been higher.

  Sandy So we got all the gear loaded, leaving BC behind. East Rongbuk glacier is where we travelled, the yaks really sure of foot, some loads came off, naturally enough. One yak was ill so the yakkers unloaded it and carried half themselves! We moved on up a steep moraine bank of sand and small stones. Rick’s barrel fell off and I held the yak as Urs and the yak-driver re-loaded it. … We moved on up beside a frozen river and then had to cross over the ice. Kurt and Julie were ahead and filming the two yaks in front of me as they stepped really quite confidently on to the white, slippery and smooth ice. Then noses down looking for the rougher parts. Cows in Britain never walk on ice. One or two fell but managed to get back up on to their knees then their hooves and waddle on. Julie did not look really effervescent so I asked if she were OK. Unfortunately she had the runs and also felt very tired, I hope she’ll mend.

  So at 6.30 we reached the old Camp 1½ and pitched our tents. There was tension – no need for it. Nick, Jon and Dave were really quite annoyed at Julie and Kurt. As we had only three stoves and three billies, the lads suggested getting inside the Phoenix tents and brewing up in groups of three and four. But Kurt and Julie said no, we’ll wait for you guys then take the stoves. … I do not want folks to pair or triple off at this point in the trip, but it is the best way to cook and live efficiently when in transit.

  My head throbbed but I felt in control. Lots of brews and intermittent sleep.

  Round noon the next day we departed, and oh it took an age on the way. Yaks dropping loads, yak drivers trying their utmost to get the yaks to cross over ice bridges. Urs, Nick, Rick and I loaded, loaded and loaded yaks. Sometimes we had to carry loads across. Eventually Kurt and Julie helped too.

  We reached pre-war Camp 2 round 7.30. My head was really pounding with the extra work. Tony handed me half a cup of tomato soup, ‘Share it with Nick.’ I was most pissed off that the lads didn’t help with yak loads, etc. I said to them that ‘they had let the side down and they were a bunch of egotistical fuckers.’ Jon said ‘Well, do we get to speak in our defence?’ I said ‘No, fuck off – say fuck all!’ Went back outside to find Urs and Rick with a yak in a crevasse, Jon and Tony did not even help. Dave B. was out there, giving what little he could but he gave.

  I was knackered. Urs saw this. Jon obviously realized too as he came and helped Urs pitch our tent. Tony and Jon came later with our rations. Urs went for water and returned very annoyed. ‘Those young guys have not even cut a water hole!’ Kurt came and said he found it difficult to believe Jon and Tony had sat for three hours and had not found water. He was very wild.

  Jon Antxon, the Basque, had asked me to make sure the yak-men didn’t steal anything from the tent they had left at 11. Flo
gged behind half a dozen of them, in my exhausted state sensing a pinko conspiracy. Seeing double by the time we got to their amazing blue brolly tent, parked next to an ice pool. Luckily they’d left a store so managed to get some liquid. Tony and Dave staggered in. ‘Why do we do this?’ Much later the rest came in, having had an epic time with the yaks. Only Rick, Kurt and Julie civil, the rest blazing with self-righteousness and fatigue. Just cool out, we’ve got to live together for a long time yet.

  Sandy 30th March: up early. Urs did most of the work as I was out of it. Stepping along felt nice, following the yaks up the steadily steepening moraine, then the NE Ridge appeared. Ace, man! Really … Stopped for a brew, then another drink stop. Me, I’m saying to Urs, it’s fantastic, what do you think, looks hard but not impossible – but look, you can almost see the wind on it … Dave comes, sits on a stone, looks at the Ridge and starts to cry. Me, I think it’s altitude and pour him a cup of hot tea.

  Dave As the ridge came into view and the lack of oxygen made me lightheaded, the emotion of the last few months really got to me and I sat down and cried. What was an ordinary man with an ordinary job doing just below Everest Advance Base at nearly 21,000 feet? The years of dreaming and months of planning and the uncertainty all culminated in total emotion. Sandy, Urs and Jon were concerned, but it was hard for them to understand how a non-mountaineer could feel in this environment …

  Sandy When we decided on a site for ABC, we all went into the teams which were naturally formed on the route here. Urs and I constructed a good stone platform for the tent that we’d been using on the way up. Urs went to get the tent from the yak and it was not there – Jon and Rick had taken it. This did not appear to be a problem at the time, but once Urs and I got the other tent out, we found it was a completely different shape … This meant we had to reshape our base, which took a lot of energy, of which we did not possess any extra. I said to Jon that he should have told us that he was going to use ‘our’ tent, then we would not have spent so much time arranging a base to suit it. Jon said, well they were not allocated to anyone in particular. I agreed …

  We got our tent pitched about an hour later than anyone else, but it kept getting blown away as we had pitched it sideways into the wind to save totally rebuilding the platform. Kurt helped Urs build a wall to protect our tent from the wind, I crawled inside and made a brew …

  During the night my head became very sore. I asked Urs for a tablet, took one and my head went away but came back later, feeling about three feet thick so I took more pills. ‘I must go down, must go down’ going through my head. I was very uncomfortable …

  Morning came. Urs arranged all: radio, food, stove and Kurt and Julie’s high-altitude tent. We walked down the hill from ABC for an hour, then pitched the tent, brewed, etc. Urs did everything, I am grateful for his help. Dave Bricknell came down to see me. ‘Well, I thought it would be me who would have to go down,’ he said. ‘Oh well, a stitch in time,’ I said. He probably thought I meant the old proverb, but I meant, well, Everest has been here a long time and we are just the stitch, just a stitch in time …

  So they dossed about all day at their lower site, brewing, chatting and reading. A touch of cerebral oedema was Urs’ opinion; it might go away with a day’s rest. They both strongly wanted to return to ABC and get into the action. But Sandy woke next morning with a pounding head. He pushed away anger and despair, took some painkillers and waited. No improvement, so he tried a drug called Diamox – this was a major concession from Sandy and indicates that he was extremely concerned, because he’s not at all keen on taking drugs on the hill.

  Sandy I was not too impressed with it. Tingle, tingle, tingle went my body. The plan was to go back up to ABC, but inside my head I felt that it would not work. Urs was keen to go up, so at 4.0 pm we packed up the tent and headed for ABC. But I felt so bad, sat on a stone, said to Urs, ‘Sorry, but I know I’m going in the wrong direction. I’ve got to go down.’ And down we went ever so slowly …

  So that was that. Urs’ diagnosis was cerebral oedema, then some pulmonary oedema. Now Sandy was down at BC he felt much better, but would need some days to recover fully. Our first casualty among the lead climbers. Given my oedema on arriving at BC, I resolved to go very carefully up to ABC, drinking all the time, very slowly, monitoring myself. It was almost a relief not to be the only person who’d got ill.

  Bob I think it strikes a bit of a chill in us all, and I feel that this, this is the moment when the real expedition begins. A feeling reinforced by the deteriorating weather, snow squalls lashing the Mess Tent. So far everything has been rather casual, but suddenly the holiday is over. We are in for a hard couple of months and must hope that fortune smiles on us.

  The Boy Racers’ first night at ABC was wild. The site is exposed, perched on a long rib of rough moraine running all the way up to the foot of the North Col route. The surrounding hills seem to act as a wind tunnel rather than a wind break, but all the pre-war expeditions used this rib as their Camp 3, as did Bonington, for there’s no obvious alternative site.

  Jon Oh so impressed by the ridge. Is this the best unclimbed ridge in the high Himalaya? Dave burst into tears on arrival. My eyes were suspiciously moist …

  Put up the ABC MacInnes Megabox – a huge system of colour-coordinated scaffolding with a Vango orange outer slung on top. We felt much better after it was up. Later on Rick wandered in and said he’d found part of a body … It was a pure white piece of bone, part of a human skull.

  Rick Found the top part of a human skull 1,000 yards below ABC. Said a few words and dropped it down a deep crevasse. Mallory? Irvine? A yakherd? A reminder of our own mortality.

  Jon Nicko found another part a bit lower down the moraine. Took a photo for posterity, stood silent for a while thinking a few words, then Rick reburied it. We did not tell Kurt and Julie – they can play around as much as they like but our defences slam shut when a serious subject arises. We didn’t need to discuss this.

  So they spent the rest of the first day setting up the kitchen, the stoves, organizing the boxes, which the yak herders had dumped anywhere on the moraine, brewing and acclimatizing.

  Another rough and sleepless night, then the usual morning headaches, slowly clearing with aspirin and brews. Then they set off across the vast white bowl of the glacier that leads to the foot of the North-East Ridge. Nick and Tony led, placing wands as they plodded. These wands were used both to mark out the wider crevasses (often indicated only by a slight fracture-line in the snow) and to mark out the route, because there would inevitably be times when we’d be stumbling across there, exhausted, in a white-out. The others followed, Jon reflecting that it looked reasonably safe, but that there were some very hollow-sounding sections. We were always very watchful crossing it, and quite often roped up in pairs for additional protection. Why take any more risks than necessary? was the feeling, particularly among the Old Farts, who fully intended to live to grow older still.

  Yetis: something we’d often joked about, the majority of us sceptics. And yet, as they tramped across the great wilderness, they came to a line of large prints running across the glacier. They stood and looked at them in silence, knowing full well they were the first expedition there that year, and indeed the first since Bonington’s three years previously. The Basques were going for the old North Col route, and hadn’t come anywhere near here. So …

  ‘Saw what looked like Yeti prints,’ Jon noted casually, ‘and I ain’t a believer.’

  At the end of the glacier, just past the foot of the North-East Ridge, is the Raphu La pass, one of the great Himalayan viewpoints. After two hours of plodding they stood as near to the cornice edge as possible and looked out over Nepal … From right to left they could see Kangchenjunga (some 100 miles away, so thin and clear is the air), Jannu, Chomo Lonzo, Makalu, Lhotse Shar, Lhotse. Evocative names for anyone, but for mountaineers, visions that excited desires, dreams and plans for the future. From where they stood they could also see the upper part of the awesome
Kangshung Face (the East Face) of Everest – several thousand feet of wildly fluted snow, ice and rock that defined the far side of our North-East Ridge. Clouds and spindrift boiled up from its depths. Was that where Pete and Joe had gone, or were they, as Sandy feared, still somewhere on the Ridge?

  The wind was strong. They shivered and turned for home.

  The next morning Nick and Jon felt particularly rough, so it was Tony and Rick who set off back to the Raphu La to reconnoitre a route up the initial pyramid of the Ridge, accompanied by Kurt and Julie and their film equipment. They were filmed crossing the small bergschrund, the characteristic fracture-line at the bottom of a big face. It was crossing the Rubicon – a small but decisive act of commitment. They were finally on the North-East Ridge.

  A brief grin, then they began methodically climbing the snow and ice slope, most of it between 40 and 50 degrees, while the camera whirled at the bottom. Tony carried a coil of fixing rope and Rick some snow stakes in his sack. For experienced mountaineers it was reasonably straightforward, so they both soloed. The nevé was sound, there was little fresh snow and their crampons and a single ice-axe were quite sufficient. At intervals ribs of rock run up the face; they dumped their gear at the second of these and continued up to the crest of the Ridge, around 6,660 metres. The Kangshung Face, Tony noted, looked even more absurd from close up – but that didn’t stop them from at one point sitting right on the crest, one leg dangling over either side. Then they set off down, pleased and suddenly very tired.