Click to hear Greg Wilson's audio dispatch recorded over sat-phone.

Greg Wilson

From Wilson's Satellite Call:
Hello, this is Greg Wilson reporting from Base Camp. We are slightly encouraged by a weather report as of yesterday. Promise that there might be some improvement in the high winds that have been really the nemesis of the past week and a half or so. We spent the morning packing our packs, and we're getting another weather report around 2 o'clock this afternoon, and if that report reinforces yesterday's report -- a drop in the winds -- why, it looks like we'll give it a shot. Take off early in the morning enroute to Camp II [21,500'] which means getting up really early and try to get to he Ice Fall by 4 o'clock in the morning before the sun hits it and while it's still stable.

Wally Berg and Todd Burleson after a week of reports forecasting constant high winds.

Get to Camp II, and we'll just work our way up the mountain again paying attention to the 2 o'clock weather reports and... will continue on our way up to the summit. We have hopes of summiting on about the 23rd of May. So, everyone is in good spirits today given the good news. And we're really looking forward to that 2 o'clock report, as I say, but nonetheless, all systems are go. Everyone is healthy. People are really looking forward to laying down this last piece of the puzzle. Namely, summiting the mountain in good form.

Charles Corfield packing for the climb

I'm personally anxious to summit from the south. I've been on Mount Everest three other times, but all of my expeditions have been to the north side. [Click here for an account of climbing on the north side.] I was fortunate enough to summit in 1991. The idea of coming to the south side and stepping into the footsteps of Sir Edmund Hillary and Jim Whittaker and all the notable historical figures that have come up this valley and climbed the mountain from this side was really attractive. And the idea of being able to climb the mountain from both sides -- the north and the south -- is an added attraction. So, hopefully we'll have the good weather and make this thing a go. So long.

-- Greg Wilson, Climbing Guide