Diary

Saturday 25th October 2003

17:10 local time

This entry is sent from Tingri which is our last stop before arriving at Rongphu and Everest Base Camp tomorrow.

Backtracking slightly - as we left Lhasa we managed to give the backup chair a go in the foothills of the Himalayas and were astonished to find that as a second chair it performed admirably, very similar to how the actual Everest Chair performs.

We spent two days in Shigatse which again is a much more modern town than I anticipated. It's at an elevation of just under 4000m and is quite strange, very busy, lots of hustle and bustle but with tremendous food!

We left there this morning and made our way to Tingri. On our way we crossed over two passes, one of which took us up to a height of 5225m. Unfortunately with the conditions with they are at the moment, very cold and cloudy with snow, we were unable to get our first glimpse of Everest and the Himalayas.

The team's doing well, we have some minor illnesses and a few sore throats, but that's quite normal at this sort of altitude. Nothing to worry about.

We've just checked into the local hotel for our last night before camping. It's now a question of focussing on Rongphu tomorrow and then onto Everest Base Camp.

That's it for now, the next update will be from the foot of Everest.

Glenn