Mt. Everest Update- November, 2005

Dropping a line to say hello from Nepal...Had to cut a 15 day trek to the base camp of Everest short due to pretty heavy case of ams-acute mountain sickness that hit me hard at about 14,000 feet....Incredible culture but Everest is pretty serious stuff...Was not mentally prepared for the extreme elements- very cold at night felt like below freezing temps with the wind-chill and air is so thin, half the normal oxygen- ...Nonetheless, an incredible experience...Totally new appreciation for basics: heat and electricity. These people are incredibly strong...Carry 140 pound loads up these very steep mountain sides for miles at altitudes with 1/2 the normal oxygen...Guys that climb this place are passionate but a little insane...So much physical pain and mental anguish with ams at such high altitudes...I keep trying to compare to our passion of surfing...Just pure joy in surfing vs. the symptoms of dealing with the cold/thin air. Katmandu is a fun/chill city that felt like home after coming down from the Everest region...Heat, hot water, electricity. It's one thing to deal with the cold, but after trekking for 7 hours day in day out, and not having a warm shower, much less no heat and little electricity, for days on end, at 14,000 feet, my body said "get me the #$%& outta here"...Spent one night vomiting, dealing with the runs, headache, no electricity/no heat with a hole in the ground for a toilet....Add in 20 deg. temps..... And felt lucky to get out in one piece being 3 days trek away from even the ramshackle airport that flies you back into Katmandu...Will remember that night for the rest of my life. Very vivid, crazy dreams at those altitudes too...All I could think of was getting down to tropical white sand beaches in Thailand/Vietnam...Will have a new appreciation for that now. Sounds like a bit of drama at my house -tenants said my furnace was condemned and needs replaced...Home seems about ten million miles away from here...

Tony