Advance Basecamp, Mt. Everest (via satellite phone)
Elevation: 6350m/20,828ft
Low -10C/14F High 4.4C/40F Windy
9:20am

Eric Brown Describes The Trek to ABC.
Talli Leach Interviews Climber Ian Beaton

This is Eric Brown reporting for Patagonia Mountain Agency from Advanced Base Camp (ABC), Mount Everest. Today's date is April 27, 1999. We are at 6,350 meters which in American terms--20,828 feet (plus or minus)--that's higher than any place in North America, even higher than Denali/Mount McKinley. So we're...we're up here. It's very windy and has been since Talli and I arrived in Advanced Base Camp and it is windy pretty much every day, and during the night. The low this morning was negative 10 degrees Celsius, 14 degrees Fahrenheit. The high yesterday was 4.4 degrees Celsius, roughly 40 degrees Fahrenheit.

Most of us are in ABC or above ABC. Tadek, though, after spending three nights at ABC and one night at the North Col Camp, which is at 7,000 meters, left yesterday after lunch for base camp. Also yesterday, Jacek, Ryszard, Masaru, and Omar geared up and started to climb to North Col, which we also call Camp 1. Speaking of Omar, I misspoke the other day when I said it was the "squirts" that brought him back down to base camp on April the 22nd. It was a hacking cough, and he has recovered well and on the 25th made ABC from Base Camp in record time so he's doing much better. Also on April 25th, Jacek, Talli, and I, and the yaks and remaining gear, started our trek to Advanced Base Camp but with a one-night stopover at Intermediate Camp, also called IC, which is 5800 meters. The distance from Base Camp to Advanced Base Camp is roughly 25 kilometers (15 miles) plus you gain about 4,000 feet. It was one of my hardest treks--made me appreciate more the drive and stamina our climbers have. From IC to ABC I was able to find a slow, steady pace--breath in and out on each step. Yes--each step--I inhaled and exhaled. With this pace, I was able to cover decent distances with less frequent rest stops than the day before, although water breaks were often. Available oxygen at ABC is 45% of what you would have at sea level, so you do a lot of "sucking wind" as we call it up here. It took Talli and I six hours to reach Advanced Base Camp from Intermediate Camp.

ABC lends itself to the word "expedition" much more than base camp. The wind buffets our tents constantly and the nights are colder. We are camped on the East Rongbuk Glacier with only a thin layer of sharp rocks separating us from the ice. In fact, small crevasses, big enough for a leg or small child, crisscross the rocky site. So, much harsher conditions exist although our spirits are just as high, most of the time. No major sicknesses besides the usual headaches, coughing, and lessened appetites. In an 1800 hours call last night, Omar commented that Jacek is an excellent MRE (Meals Ready to Eat) cook! Other ABC tidbits: Omar claims a yak herder stole his pee bottle and Ian gave Omar his pee bottle for the trip up to North Col. And, Omar, in turn, let Ian use his stand-in pee bottle which is a two-quart Coast instant milk can--but it was full! Ian was not too happy.

Also in our camp site is a Pujah, a small rock Nepalese temple in the middle of camp with prayer flags extending 50 feet or so in all directions. It was set up in a special one-hour ceremony the first time everybody came up to ABC--to pray for success on the mountain.

Now for some movie trivia, that Ian and I will provide, and if you can guess the movie, send it in to James and Ian and I will decide on a prize. (laughter) Here we go:

Player Number One: "You expect me to talk?"

Player Number Two: "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die!"

(Must be the lack of oxygen...)

Okay, now for today's interview in our continuing series. Here is Talli Leach with an interview of Ian Beaton.

Talli: "Hello there, this is Talli and I'm talking with Ian Beaton, one of the British climbers. Ian, tell us about yourself."

Ian: "Yeah, Hi. Ian Beaton, British, and uh 29, and not quite sure why I'm up here. Feeling fairly ill. Married and proud owner of two legs but I'm not expecting any more.

Talli: "Alright. Thanks for that. Second question is what's the trek from ABC up to the North Col like?

Ian: "I guess um, the trek stops at ABC. ABC is, Brains [Ericıs nickname] or as Eric said, is a pretty shitty place. I just want to make one remark: our mess tent is actually called Colon Sport which i think is deeply ironic considering the state of the food we get and ease of the illnesses we pick up. So, from ABC you continue up some Tibetan mixed terrain, which is essentially rocky terrain, for about an hour. After that you don your crampons. And from there you keep on walking, it's pretty flat by then, across the col, or the flats just below the col. From there you will hopefully have remembered your jumar, unlike one member of our party who fortunately picked up a spare, and clip on to the fixed lines. The lines are actually fixed all the way to the top of the North Col now and it winds it way between several serac bands who are between 40 to 90 degrees. There is some pretty hard blue ice so there is a lot of kicking in and a lot of lugging up on the jumar, on the "jug" as we call it. And that will probably take you 4 to 6 hours by the time you get to the top, the North Col. The tents are nestled in, in a crevasse that is protected by the wind by a big serac band. By that time you're pretty much sucking the O's wishing you were on oxygen. But you're not and you won't be for another 1300 metres so you settle down into your tent with your pee bottle, or somebody elses as the case may be, and start brewing up your teas to rehydrate and your MREs."

Talli: "Alright, that was great. Thanks Ian. One more question before you go. What's your plans for the next few days? Are you going to hang out at ABC or tell us what you're going to do?"

Ian: "Uh, in truth I'm not really quite sure. Best acclimatization for us is probably going to be heading up to Camp Two, which is at seven-eight or 7,800 meters -- I'm not quite sure what that is in feet -- and we're going to spend the night there, really, before descending back down to base camp, probably to hang out for another week or so before we making the final push for the summit. At the moment we've yet to stock, or actually put up Camp Two. There are fixed lines going up the North Ridge up there but it's pretty windy and it's pretty hard to put it in. So I'll probably hang around here for a couple of days, make the push up to Camp Two before descending down to Base Camp. Anyways, cheers.

Talli: "Thanks a lot Ian"