Kingdoms of Experience

by Andrew Greig

  I met them next morning shortly below ABC, stumbling slowly down the rocky moraine. Andy said next to nothing but gave off waves of pain while Urs explained. With about ten per cent vision and no depth of field, he was going to have a harrowing time getting to BC. He was expected to recover in a few days, but their early departure was a blow to the Expedition.

  Later in the day, reinforcements in the form of Jon and Rick arrived at ABC. They did not look greatly refreshed after four days at Base, but they felt they had to get back into action. Rick wearily slung his sack in a corner of the Mess Tent and announced, ‘I wish to resign my membership of the Boy Racers … Can I be an Old Fart, please?’

  Bob and Allen were the only ones working on the hill, shuttling the remaining C1 loads up to the 2nd snow cave, and intending to find a site for the elusive C3. But once again a pairing was split by the divergence of climbers’ performance when load-carrying above 7,000 metres.

  Bob Feet completely numb by 7090 so I have some food and take a Ronicol before continuing. My energies seem sadly depleted for some reason, and after a few hundred yards I grind to a halt, panting and dizzy. I sit for a while but to no avail, so I shout to Allen and with a heavy heart turn and carefully pick my way back down the Ridge, feeling the huge masses of Everest and Makalu mocking my puny efforts.

  Allen Took an hour to 7090, then along the Ridge for the first time – two hours to the foot of the 1st Buttress then up fixed rope. First ones are OK but the upper couloir full of slabby powder, which is very hard work and really cold. Blasted the last 20 feet and lay gasping and panting in the snow at the top. Bob was nowhere in sight and weather had clouded in. Then went to foot of 2nd Buttress and probed the snow for a snow-hole site but max. depth was only about four feet. Going OK at about 7,600 metres, but I’d forgotten my hill-food and finished my water. Tempted to go higher but weather still cloudy and snowing.

  About 3.0 pm made my way slowly down after leaving some lengths of fixing rope. Very slow on the Ridge – visibility v. poor, difficult to see old steps and now very conscious of the size of the Kangshung Face cornices having seen them from above. Had a bout of dry retching on the way to C1, but saw one possible tent site and one possible snow-hole below the 1st Buttress … Actually felt quite good and pleased, Bob though is really down.

  The 5th of May brought little action. Allen and Bob came down from C1. The latter took his first brew and promptly staggered outside to throw-up. Blue at the lips, he somehow managed to joke, ‘I knew I shouldn’t have had all those beers last night.’

  The Basque team passed through on their way to their ABC further up the moraine. This time they intended to go for the Summit from their camp above the North Col. We wished them luck, slightly doubtful of their success and safety, for there was still a lot of fresh snow on the sloping slabs below the crest of the summit ridge.

  Sandy arrived from Base Camp, in good spirits but looking tired. By now no one looked fresh on returning to the fray.

  Rick was in a talkative mood, psyching himself up for the critical period ahead. The weather had to give us a break; we had to establish a Camp 3 and Camp 4 in the next few days. He too was concerned about the way the pairings, which had worked lower on the hill, were now beginning to fall apart. ‘There’s a big difference between climbing once a 7,000 metre peak, and sleeping and carrying loads repeatedly above 7,000 metres. That’s where people’s performance diverge.’ He could see us having to postpone our exit and climb into June, if the weather permitted.

  And the lads spoke increasingly of having to partly abandon the original limited oxygen plan, for the O2 loads were becoming a monstrous logistical problem due to lack of time and manpower. Instead, Rick suggested, we needed ‘a pair who are willing to put their necks on the block and go for the Pinnacles without oxygen. I’d try it – it’s the only way to find out.’ I noticed Allen Fyffe listening attentively, and Sandy nodding agreement. Jon was silent. Bob sat in a trance of fatigue and depression.

  Only Mal and Chris were on the hill, having set off through snow flurries that morning with Mal determined that the time had come – long overdue – to set up a Camp 3, probably before the 1st Buttress. That was much closer to C2 than he’d wanted, but from Allen’s report there seemed little alternative.

  Mal In CB’s cave. Chris’s turn for the cooking so an opportunity to read and write, snug as a bug but tired. Whole of fixed ropes needed cleaning, and soft snow. Going well despite this, however. Chris swearing because he’s just made a meal of cheesy milk powder instead of potato! Met Kurt and Julie on their way down, surprisingly both said it was colder than they’d ever known on the hill (and Kurt’s had 27 expeditions!). Radio fucked – I’m really destined to be out of contact – I transmitted in the hope that ABC could hear. Hope message got through as some important points: need food bags, Jon to come up, Liz and Andy not to attempt the traverse yet.

  Jon and Rick are talking in the Mess Tent next morning, Rick is concerned about the current weather (more snow and high winds, will we never get a break?), the shortage of time and progress. Jon, ‘You’re just too impatient, mate, that’s your trouble. The one thing that controls everything is the weather, and there’s nothing we can do about that. So just relax and do what we can each day and see what happens.’

  Rick laughs, ‘I guess you’re right. But there’s no way we’re going to get all the loads up there that were planned.’

  ‘I could have told you that three months ago, mate!’ Laughter.

  They plod off across the glacier. If all goes well and Mal and Chris finally establish Camp 3 today, Jon and Rick hope to sleep there and go on through the Buttresses tomorrow and try to dig a snow cave within an hour of the 1st Pinnacle. If they succeed we’ve made a big leap forward. If, if … Sandy wonders if Jon will be able to stay with Rick – he was coughing even as he set out and looked drawn though still game.

  Bob, Allen and Danny set off down to BC for a much-needed break.

  Meanwhile Mal and Chris have appeared at 7090 and we can sit and watch them slowly dragging their suffering bodies up the gradient towards the foot of the 1st Buttress. A ringside seat for the Sultans of Pain Show. We urge them on across the mile of thin air between us. They arrive there two hours later, find the site Allen had identified, and start digging a platform out of the slope for the tent they’d carried up. This as always is exhausting work and takes much longer than expected. After two hours the platform is nearly finished when they hit the inevitable ice; they pitch the tiny two-man tent anyway with one corner of it hanging over nothing then lash it down. At last: Camp 3. The news, relayed by radio down to ABC, brings smiles all round and a perceptible lifting of spirits. We’re finally moving forward again; we are still in the game.

  May 7. I lie listening to the snow swishing on my tent overnight and as usual think part, ‘Oh, no!’ and part ‘maybe I won’t have to climb tomorrow’. Up at 8.0 into an exhilarating morning – blue, very cold, white, our tents half-buried. Brews with Sandy and Liz, mentally rehearsing the day. Wish this was second nature to me as it is to the lads. I have to concentrate so hard, and not let up till I get back here tonight. This time I’ve got to make CB’s. Load some hill-food bags and a shovel in my sack; feel alert, excited, geared up, fully engaged with myself and the world around me. This is much better than lying around waiting and wondering. This is the hour when the adrenalin kicks.

  Impatient to be off, Sandy breaks trail alone across the glacier – a bit dodgy because the crevasses have been opening up and are now covered in snow. Only a few inches of it, but enough to make a big difference with every step. The initial pyramid looks smaller every time I return to it. I know I can do this if my commitment and weather conditions hold. Let’s put it to the touch. …

  Clip in jumar, add safety krab, peel off the top of my windsuit and start jugging up. Not thinking much, just counting steps up to 100, checking on Sandy above and Liz below. The loose snow becomes a problem, my feet and the iced-up jumar are slipping and sli
ding. Slow down, adjust to it. Easy, easy. … Aim for the first snow-stake, then the next.

  Maybe one and a half hours later the ice-bulge looms, making the heart beat a little faster and sharpening concentration. Out with the axe and do it slowly, methodically. Either I’m more at ease, or simply too tired to make a big deal out of it. Still, nice to clip my krab into the anchor at the top. And now into new ground, working across and then up the far side of the rock rib. The snow is loose and awkward here, beginning to swirl back into my face.

  Finally reach the beginning of the traverse, clip in and look around. Back down to ABC, across to the Karma valley, way over towards Kangchenjunga and Jannu. Feel HIGH in every sense. Look at the traverse up and across the couloir before me: this is my moment of truth. I’ve seen this section months before in Bonington’s Unclimbed Ridge and worried about it ever since: awkward traverse, steep enough, exposed, avalanche-prone snow underfoot and big seracs poised overhead. They’re the real danger, but nothing can be done about that.

  Sandy’s waving and shouting from the far end of the traverse. Fragments reach me, ‘Okay … be very careful. … Weather … if you feel strong enough. …’ His concern heartens me. Snow falling now and the birling spindrift reminds me of Scotland and my very first day’s climbing with Malcolm in Glencoe. Only 16 months ago and here I am. …

  So I set off into new territory, stepping carefully into old footholes or making my own where they’re broken away. Very aware that four of the lads have taken falls here, so do it by the book at each snow-anchor: clip the safety sling to the stake, un-clip jumar, re-fit above the anchor, then add the safety sling then move on. It’s a slow fumble with gloves on, skin sticking to the krab when I take them off. Concentrate. Feel exposed. I’ll never like heights. Only concentration drives out this mental and bodily unease that is as all-embracing as sea-sickness. Snow’s slabby in bits – a couple of sections break off at my feet and slither down into the white – powdery in others. End of the traverse. The line steepens up the bank out of the couloir. Everyone says this section is much longer and more exhausting than it appears. They’re right. Down to ten steps at a time now, something part grin and part snarl on my lips because I’m suffering and I know I’m going to make it. I don’t encourage this thought but feel rising exhilaration. Come round a corner, see a big sling round a rock outcrop, lots of gear and stuff-sacks clipped in, a profusion of rope: CB’s.

  Last few steps, clip in, for Sandy warned me this is a place to be careful, the slope drops down steeply from the lip of the cave. Sack off, clip it, slump at ease at the mouth of the cave. There’s no one here – Sandy must have gone on. The solitude is wonderful, my pleasure is all my own. 6,850 metres, a new height, a contribution however small to the Expedition, and a personal goal. I simply sit awhile, a solitary dot in the Himalayan vastness.

  Back to business. Finish my flask and munchies, dump my load in the cave. It looks neat and spacious. Very secure-feeling in here, watching snow swirl by the door. … Weather’s clagging in fast, better get going. No one to keep an eye on me, it’s only the second time I’ve been alone on a mountain. Anxiety is there, but also the pleasure of self-responsibility. Get to my feet, suddenly I’m wobbly and a little light-headed. Find it hard to care to go to the bother of setting up a friction-brake on the fixed rope, but do so, ordered by some objective and critical little observer sitting at the monitors in the back of my head. He’s about one inch high, looks like Malcolm and speaks like Sandy. … Light-headed, yes.

  One hand on axe, other holding the friction-brake, I step carefully into the remains of my old footsteps. Round the shoulder, into the couloir. See Liz motionless across the traverse, wave through the driving snow, go for it. …

  Make it across in quick dream-time. Liz kindly congratulates me through her own disappointment – she’s too tired to go on today, and the visibility’s very poor now. We both know that our own goals are nothing compared to the lads’, but that they are emotionally significant to us.

  So we set off down, myself with increasing confidence and speed. Now I’m not always clipping in at the anchor-points: a black mark. She’s a slow descender. At the bottom we rope together and set off across the glacier for ABC, both suddenly near our limits, stumbling, veering through the other-worldly world. We end up counting steps on the flat, feeling sick, and dry-retch a few times. Halfway across Liz stops and looks at me. One of us is swaying slightly. ‘What am I doing here?’ she asks in honest bewilderment. There’s no answer to that, so we plug on again. A vacant clarity now, nothing remains but the effort and crunch of the next footstep, snow tickling as it melts on the face, and the bitter taste of altitude. Half-dead yet so directly alive; no barrier now between self and world. We’re too exhausted to divide experience into ‘me’ and ‘not-me’. On the endless final upslope to ABC Mal and Chris come up behind us through the gloom; they’re done in too but pleased with life, as well they might be. They’d gone back up to C3 with hill-food bags, gas and oxygen cylinders and left them with Rick and Jon, who were now ensconced in the tiny tent.

  Finally off the glacier, take three rests getting up the 20-foot moraine bank, sick again. Liz and I sit in the Mess Tent like the grey dead, scarcely able to speak and certainly not up to smiling, the slightest movement is too much effort. A brew and slowly the greyness lifts, leaving only a weariness and peace. And some satisfaction too. One of the Sultans of Pain for a day. I’m more astonished and impressed than ever at the lads; it’s humbling to realize they keep doing this over and over. They must surely feel as bad as I do – yet continue. This impresses me more than any nail-biting vertical derring-do. The lads are so used to this that it scarcely enters their conversation or diaries. But I’ll put it in the book, just to say: This is how it feels, this hurts.

  We mumble through soup and some other inedible substance. Mal’s in good form, pleased to have set up Camp 3 and finally coming into his own. ‘I’m going a lot better now than I was. At the moment most of it depends on the weather. I’m beginning to think we’ll have to adjust the oxygen situation. …’ Liz, part amused and part affectionate, says wryly, ‘You’re beginning to rev, aren’t you?’ ‘Yeah, I suffer from low-altitude paranoia – I’m no good below 6,000 metres Every day and every load counts now.’

  With Sandy sleeping at C2, and Jon and Rick in the dubious comfort of C2, it feels like we’re moving forward. We are. But the arithmetic is becoming cruel. Mal points out several of the lads are well below their best, time’s running short, and we’ve some 20 loads to go to C3, which in turn need to go on to a C4 before we can really hit the Pinnacles. That means several severe altitude carries for everyone who’s capable, and then we need a couple of still-strong pairs to fix the Pinnacles, then probably another pair to go for the summit after that. …

  Bed early. I fall asleep or unconscious, wake up middle of the night with my head-torch still on. Switch it off, see a huge white moon glow through my tent. Asleep again. …

  May 8. Once or twice in a lifetime you may witness something for which there is no explanation. Or rather, there are explanations, but they are too disturbing to contemplate for long. Today we saw a man who wasn’t there.

  I was sitting outside my tent after a late, leisurely breakfast. It was a fine morning, the best since we first set up ABC, blue and still. Visibility was perfect and I watched with casual interest a figure moving up the ridge between 7090 and Camp 3. He was clearly silhouetted against the snow, arms, legs and everything, and was going very well. It would be Sandy, on his way from Camp 2, where he’d slept the night before, carrying a load to C3. Mal and Liz sat outside their tent, checking on his progress with binoculars … a red windsuit, must be Sandy.

  We watched the figure on and off for an hour, looking really for Rick and Jon going over the Buttresses on their way to find a Camp 4, but there was no sign of them. We went into the Mess Tent for more brews – then Sandy turned up.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  Sandy seemed t
aken aback. ‘Well, I kept being sick during the night and this morning, so I came back down.’

  ‘You mean you didn’t go along the Ridge to Camp 3?’

  ‘No, I told you, I was sick. I didn’t even go up to 7090, just came straight down. What’s the fuss about?’

  We told him about the climber we’d watched on the Ridge, went back outside to look but no sign of him. We looked at each other. Jon and Rick had slept at C3 and gone on, so it could not have been either of them. And no one else was on the hill.

  Liz and Mal thought instantly of the red windsuit, Pete Board-man’s windsuit that we’d found in CB’s cave and now hanging in a corner of the Mess Tent. I was too dumbfounded to think coherently at all. If anything I thought not so much of ghosts as of a kind of visual echo or recording; I felt we’d been watching for an hour an event that had happened three years ago and was still somehow imprinted on the Ridge itself. Sandy remembered cases of previous such sightings, like F. S. Smythe’s in 1933, or Doug Scott’s, Alex MacIntyre’s, Nick Escourt’s. …

  ‘Well,’ Mal said at last, trying to be jocular about it, ‘I don’t care who he is as long as he carries a load!’

  It’s something we still think about, once in a while. Mal, Liz and I were rested and well; perfect visibility; binoculars and the naked eye. … And for an hour we saw a man who wasn’t there.

  Sandy Me, I’m from the Highlands and I believe in such ‘imaginings’. What happens to people’s souls and spirits? Where’s Haston, Boardman, Tasker, Pete Thexton, Brian Sprunt, Rob Bruce, all the lads – where are they?

  Don’t fully comprehend why I am here. I have a feeling that I ought to be, that it was intended for me to come to Everest, by some authority. I never imagined being here, the idea of actually lying in a tent at ABC still takes me by surprise.