ICE AXE

23 September 2005
The unexpected happened for us yesterday. We'd all spent the night at Camp 3, hoping for a summit attempt the next day, but things weren't looking to hopeful. We were all tired and we went to bed with a lot of wind and heavy snow. Our first weather check at 1:30am showed the mountain socked in and still snowing. The same at 3am and again at 4am.
Finally at 5:30 the weather looked to be improving enough that we thought we should go for it. We were rewarded with a most beautiful day! Of course, there was a major downside to all the snow and wind from the night before- major trailbreaking, post-holing you name it! With that said we have to gave a huge thanks to the sherpas in a friend of ours' group, because without them an already hard day would have been unimaginable!
Three out of four of us summited- John madeit to about a thousand feet below the summit, amajor accomplishment for him! The rest of us summited in about 7 hours from Camp 3, Willie and I did not use oxygen.
The summit was warm and calm but, unfortunately a bit foggy so no Everest views for us.
Of course, the stormy weather from the day before sucked for the way up, but it was pretty fun for the way down. If we hadn't been so tired it would have been incredible powder skiing! As it was, it didn't take long before we met up with John who still had some strength in his legs and was able to make some beautiful snowbord turns.
Willie gave up on the skiing pretty quickly as powder turns in soft boots at 8000m isn't quite in his bag of tricks just yet!
Kasha and I kept plugging away and, after breaking down Camp 3 found our best turns between Camp 3 and Camp 2- pow-pow!!
Willie,he who has apparently bottomless resoures of energy, decided to hoof it all the way back to basecamp last night, while the rest of us stayed at Camp 2. I think we are just hoping to rest our legs a bit so we can enjoy another couple thousand feet of skiing.
We are all healthy and happy and feel so lucky to have summited this mountain andeven gotten to ski powder on the way down. I doubt that happens every day!
We've been so lucky to have met great people and the wonderful sherpas who have helped us along the way.
Thanks again everyone,
We'll keep you posted on the next few days of wrap-up!
Hilaree and the TNF crew..