Dave Hahn

Right now, with our first forays of climbers and Sherpas up at ABC and even working the route [Click for map] to Camp IV at the North Col, things have quieted considerably at base camp. Just a few of us attempting to get rid of the colds we picked up on the way in. Wait too long to get well, and you may miss out on an Everest climb. Don't wait long enough and you may push something so far into your lungs that your climb will be over before it starts. The waiting is one of the hard parts of climbing that usually doesn't make it into the best selling books and movies. For good reason: it is dull... and essential.

A walk across the valley to "memorial hill" is one of the things we all do before heading up the mountain. There are about a dozen stone tablets there with names carved in them. One can hype one's climbing prowess to the rafters while home talking about the upcoming climb on the big E, but then one should go to the hill for some much needed reality before taking a serious step uphill.

Seeing Marty Hoey's stone is quite sobering for many of our team. She fell from the Great Couloir in 1982 on an expedition made up primarily of Mount Rainier guides. Marty Hoey was a Rainier guide and so are five of us. She is a legend on "our" mountain, and beloved by the people who taught us what we know about big mountains. To remember that this is her final resting place because of an accident makes us all more careful. To look next to her stone for the one dedicated to Peter Boardman and Joe Tasker has the same effect. They were the best of their day; hard, strong, gifted and lucky climbers... but even that was not enough against their 1982 disappearance on the Northeast Ridge. And we can't avoid Rhineberger's stone and wouldn't want to, despite the painful memories it brings. Michael Rhineberger went to the summit on our 1994 expedition after coming close on seven previous trips. Mike was always so careful and conservative that none of us knows yet what made him gamble his life away for that 1994 summit. He didn't have the strength to make it down, and in the end, after many people made great sacrifices in a vain attempt to help him, we could only add another stone to the hill. Reminding ourselves of a man we loved and reminding ourselves to watch every step of our own.

Looking up from that same hill of solitude and introspection, it is not hard to be wildly inspired and excited for the adventure to come. Mount Everest's North Face [Click for map] tells many heroic stories of success. The Hornbein Couloir on the right, for instance, how could Tom Hornbein and Willi Unsoeld possibly have done such a thing in 1963? To do it today with all of the advantages would still be the climb of a lifetime, yet they did it virtually onsight and alpine-style to the top.

The Great Couloir had it's heroic first ascents in 1984 when the tough Australians pushed through obstacle after obstacle to make the top, followed just weeks later by the only American to get up the face, Phil Ershler.

Looking farther left, the mind can barely take in the magnitude of Rheinhold Messner's solo, monsoon, oxygenless ascent of the North Ridge and Face, but it happened there nonetheless. And finally to the North Ridge proper, rich with climbing history. The first known attempts on Mount Everest were along the North Ridge, reaching amazing heights for those, or any, years. The stories of the first success on the North Ridge in 1960, when the Chinese climbed it, are remarkable. That a man took off his mittens and boots to climb the Second Step at 28,500'... well, perhaps that is more inspiration than we need. I don't want any of my team to do something so remarkable, just climb up and down safe.

— Dave Hahn, International Mountain Guides' Expedition Leader

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