Jon Krakauer turns his eye--and lungs--toward Everest

When did you get to base camp and what have you been doing since?

We've been here five nights and yesterday we went up the icefall for the first time. And for the first time it felt like we were on the mountain.

Any altitude problems?

I've felt out of breath at the least effort. I've been kind of lucky. I've had the usual intestinal stuff for 24 hours, at the lovely hamlet of Pheriche. So I got off pretty lucky. A number of our team got pretty sick, intestinal stuff.

But everyone seems to be acclimatizing pretty well. Before this trip, I had never been higher than 17,000 feet. Base camp is higher than that at 17,200 feet. On Denali I got to (17,000 feet) in a failed attempt to climb it. So I had no idea how I'd do at altitude. And I still don't know how I'll do higher up. So far so good.

Going through the icefall, I was impressed. Everyone says this side of Everest is the yak route, and there are all these guided teams. But the icefall felt pretty serious, and this in a year when Everest veterans say that the icefall is easier and in better shape than it has ever been, or better than it has been in recent memory. And I found it harder than I thought.

There are some clients here who don't have a lot of technical climbing experience and there are a couple of places where you have to use Jumars to climb near-vertical ice. It's just a Jumar but at 18,000 to 19,000 feet, it demands some effort. And crossing the bridges. It's sort of amazing, there's one dangerous section up there. The icefall is pretty safe, but there's one hanging serac that's huge, the size of a mid-sized office building, hanging over the route. And when it goes, anyone that's below it will be dead. You're only under it for 20 to 30 minutes on the way up, and maybe 10 minutes on the way down. The average person here will go through the icefall eight to ten times, so the odds are good. It's still something to think about.

Your initial impressions?

It's Everest. It's a weird scene. There's hundreds and hundreds of climbers here with varying degrees of experience, some of the best climbers in the world, some people who don't even know how to put crampons on. So it makes for quite a mix. They are all on the mountain at the same time, sort of under foot. You have to cooperate, have to get along.

Earlier, three pairs of crampons were stolen from the base of the icefall. Sort of unheard of, you kind of wonder why. People are being more careful in their camps, hiding valuable gear. It's sort of strange to climb a mountain and worry about having your gear stolen. It's all part of what Everest has become.

Have you been here before?

This is my first time. I've been to Bhutan, but not really mountaineering, just trekking. So this is my first time in the Himalaya, first time at altitude, first time in this corner of the world.

It blows me away, the trek in. Before I left I had dinner with Tom Hornbein and Pete Schoening. It was interesting because Hornbein was here in '63, more than 30 years ago, and to hear his impressions of what it was like then and what it's like now. And it's just relatively overrun now. But still it's just beautiful. That hike when you come out of Namche and around that corner and you can see Everest and you can see Ama Dablam--I mean, I've read about this stuff since I was a kid and it surpasses my expectations. It's an incredible place.

Your thoughts on base camp?

Two or three days ago, before we went up the icefall to acclimatize, I hiked up this ridge above camp to about 18,500 or 19,000 feet and you can look down on base camp and it's just this sprawling city of tents. There must be 600 people here.

I just spent yesterday afternoon just wandering from camp to camp and I didn't get to all the camps because there are so many. So it's surreal. It's this very serious mountain, this very big mountain, and you have this little city where people have amenities like showers and satellite telephones and the food is great.

The trips I've done before have always been me and a friend or two, or me alone. And you carry everything on your back. And there's never enough food. And you go a month without a bath or changing your clothes.

And here at base camp, at least it's quite comfortable. I mean, the food's great. On Rob Hall's team, his clients pay a lot of money and they like to be comfortable in base camp. But there's plenty of misery. When I came down off the hill yesterday I got some sort of a heat stroke thing, out in the sun. I had a migraine headache for a few hours. And you're reminded that trips like this, it's just always part of the package that you're going to be miserable for 25 percent of the time or more, and during those times you wonder why you're doing it and you want to be home. Then it passes and you forget.

I'm just excited. I was thrilled to be on the icefall. You feel like you're finally on the mountain looking up. You know it's hard to be patient. This is all about being patient, about acclimatizing. It's a marathon, it's not a sprint, and you want to marshal all your energy. And that's hard for me. The kind of climbing I've done before has been sort of sprint climbs, two or three days at most, technical, low peaks. So this is totally different.

I mean I probably have more climbing experience than many, if not most, of the average clients here, probably a lot more. But I have much less altitude experience than probably anyone here. I mean, I don't know anyone who has less altitude experience than me that I've met here. People say, "What, you've only been to 17,000 feet?" So that previous experience, I don't know what good it will do me. But we'll find out.

What are your thoughts about seeing these Sherpas working to support the expeditions, risking life and limb?

As Rob Hall said at the beginning of the trip, without Sherpa support our chance or anybody else's chance of getting to the top of Everest would be absolutely zero. And that's so true. Everest has been climbed twice that I know of without any Sherpa support, by Reinhold Messner and by Erhard Loretan. So basically the Sherpas make all this possible. They take many more risks. The one really dangerous part of this climb is the icefall. You have to go through it. The clients go through it maybe eight to 10 times, the Sherpas probably go through it maybe 40 to 50 times. So I don't know how you reconcile it. They're risking their lives. I mean from their point of view, it's a great job. In Nepal, I think the fourth poorest country in the world, their pay is phenomenal, relatively speaking. It gives them prestige. It's a great job for them. But it's hard to get used to. This idea of bed tea. In the morning, Sherpa comes by, "Good morning, sir. Tea?" So it's very strange, but you get used to it. Bed tea is nice in the morning.

It's very strange to see the impact of not just climbers, but trekkers, on the local culture. It's a huge impact that has transformed these pastoral communities into something that is sort of tourist-oriented. But on the other hand, everyone says "Oh, you've wrecked these towns, wrecked this unspoiled, pastoral landscape." But that's sort of condescending. I think that given the choice--you go to other parts of Nepal where there aren't trekkers and it's much poorer, they can't afford health care, they can't afford many things--I think most of the Sherpas, if you asked them, in this part of the world, are happy for the trekkers and climbers. It's a huge boon to the economy. So it's a complicated question. You need to remember that the Sherpas are doing most of the work. I mean the Sherpas set up the whole route before any of us get there. They set up the camps. They haul the loads. I've never done climbing like this, where you don't haul your own loads. It doesn't seem like really climbing to me. And in a sense it's not. But that's what Everest is. I mean most of the people here wouldn't have a ghost of a chance to get up here.

Have you met the Swedish climber going solo?

What he's done so far is impressive. If anybody can do it, I'd say he can do it. It remains to be seen. He's just gotten to base camp. He's a great guy, he's got a good spirit, but he's got a huge task ahead of him. He says he's doing it alone, but those Sherpas put all those ropes and ladders through the icefall--there are 40 ladders--and he's using them. So right there is a little asterisk that you need to put. That was a lot of work, and it's dangerous work, and the Sherpas maintain it every day. So even this guy is going to benefit from the Sherpas.

Have you met many of the other climbers?

It's really appalling. There's a lot of inexperienced people here--and many people would say I'm one of them--and that's sort of scary. There's a lot of people here who shouldn't be here. And maybe I shouldn't be here. But the guides and the Sherpas make that possible, which is kind of neat in a lot of ways. People who wouldn't have the time and the experience--but they have the money--they can do this, so it's neat. But it's a challenge. I don't care how much you paid or what kind of guides or Sherpas you have, it's not going to be easy, I can tell that already. It demands incredible determination and physical reserves. If you can get to the top of Everest, I say more power to you.

And if you think it's not challenging enough, do it without oxygen. I don't know how many people have done it, 40 or so. And 12 of those died on the way down. So if they think it's all too easy now, there's other mountains to go to, there's ways to make Everest plenty challenging. Everest is what it is. It's not what it was when Hillary climbed it. It's not what it was when Hornbein climbed it in '63. It's something very different and maybe that's sad, but that's the way of the world. It's still Everest.

Being here, I'm pretty humbled. I think I'll be very lucky if I get to the top. I think it takes some luck, a lot of determination. A lot of it is in your head, a lot of it is hereditary, how you do at altitude. I'll be thrilled if I get to the top. I'm not going to denigrate this peak or what it's become. It's a big deal. Without Rob or guys like Scott Fischer, I wouldn't have a chance of climbing Everest. I don't have the experience, despite my technical skills. No one would ever invite me on an Everest expedition. I don't have the means, it's an incredible amount of logistics to pull something like this off. It's mind-boggling. Like one of our Sherpas fell in the crevasse, so this big Russian helicopter was chartered to come in.

Climbing is dangerous, and statistically, nothing is more dangerous than climbing 8,000-meter peaks. There are some sections that would be nothing at lower altitudes. There's a 50-foot section of vertical ice you've got to Jumar up. And if you haven't Jumared before, it's just going to exhaust you. And these ladders, I'd never crossed a ladder before, I was pretty shaky the first time. The Sherpas, Mal Duff's team, or whoever rigged the route through the icefall--it is pretty sketchy in places. It's this mentality of safety in numbers. If any of these teams were alone here, and they crossed some of these bridges or used some of these ropes--with the anchors sort of funky and bad ice screws--they would never use it. They would stop and say, "Wait a minute, we've got to fix this." But because there are hundreds of people going up and down, it's just this mentality, "Oh it must be cool," and people just traipse across and it blows me away. Maybe it's just my first time in the icefall. I don't want to pull on these ropes. When I have to, I do. But otherwise... A lot of people just haul on them without even thinking about it. If you fell on one of these ladders, it's a long way down. It would be serious.

But maybe a few more times I'll be ho-hum. I was impressed going through. I was excited. It felt great. The guys on our team were doing well and everyone seemed very strong. The Japanese woman on our team, she's amazing. I guess she's going for six of the seven highest summits. She speaks a little English, but she's not very talkative. She's very quiet. She has her noodles for breakfast every morning. And she's just this very tiny woman--90 pounds at most. She's quiet, determined, focused.

You sort of look around and say "Who's likely to summit and who isn't?" On our team there's Doug, he's one of the stronger members. And there's a guy, Frank, who's really strong. If anybody summits, it will be Doug and Frank. Beyond that, it's really interesting. You sort of look around and say, "Hmmmm, this guy is strong." But none of that means anything. I've heard over and over again that how you do at the beginning of the trip means nothing. It's a long haul and there are so many other things in play other than energy. It's very interesting to play this game. It would be fun to have a pool and bet who's going to summit and who isn't. And see who does. I'll bet it's pretty surprising.

This dinner I had right before I left with Hornbein, the west ridge of Everest that Hornbein and Willie Unsoeld did in '63, that's one of the five greatest feats in world mountaineering ever. So I'm asking Hornbein the expert, "Tom, help me. How can I acclimatize better? What's going to get me to the top of Everest?" And he just says, "It's all in your head, it's all in your head. It's all desire and sort of focus and single-mindedness and how badly you want it. And everything else is secondary." And I think there is a lot of truth to that, a whole lot of truth to that.

Did you always hope to do Everest?

Everest to me was always something I dreamed about, but I always thought it was beyond my means. It's not the kind of climbing I do. I do steep, technically difficult ice and rock climbing. It's what I like. I can afford it. It's cheap.

Everest is something I would have loved to have done, but I never would have dared to dream about it. So when Outside asked me to do it, it was like wow, who's going to say no? A year ago, five days before I would have had to depart, they asked me if I wanted to go with one of the north side teams. I wasn't fit. If I'm going to invest two months of my life, I'm not going to go over there and sit in base camp.

What will you be writing? A book?

Just one article. I have published a collection of climbing articles called Eiger Dreams. I can already tell it's going to be a good article, rich materials. So I'm sure it will make it in the next collection. Maybe in another year or two another collection will come out that will include this. This is rich material, so many people, so many characters--the Swedish guy, and Petra, this Norwegian who's trying to climb the southwest face alone. It's a big mountain. It's scary. There's risk. There's weird personalities. There's conflict, this whole deal with the South African team. There's interesting stuff going on.

It's sort of hard for me, because usually when I'm on assignment I'm just gathering material, but here I'm probably putting more energy into the climb than thinking about going out and gathering material for a story. And that's sort of weird, but that's the way it has to be.

What does your family think about this? Your wife? Do you have children?

No kid. A wife. I've been married 15 years. Going on 16 years. Linda. We've been through a lot. When I got married in 1980 I'd done some pretty hairball climbing. She met me when I was a climber and I'm sure that was part of the appeal. But when we got married I promised I'd quit climbing and a few years later when I started climbing again I came within a millimeter of wrecking our marriage.

So, then we went through a bunch of years where climbing was a big issue. Now it is less of an issue. It is how I make my living, to no small degree. Probably less than half of the stories I write are climbing stories. It's a huge part of who I am and I wouldn't be a writer if it wasn't for climbing and Linda understands that and she accepts it. One good thing about this trip, even though it is longer than any I've ever done before--I've never been away from her for this long before--is there are phones and faxes, and that makes a huge difference, if I can contact her. Like when I went to Patagonia for six weeks or two months or whatever, it was no contact, zero. So your imagination can get carried away. It's not easy for her or me.

When I met her, she was a brilliant rock climber. She's one of these people who, if she did it she would be one of the best, 5.15. She was a natural. She had only been doing it a couple of years and she was bouldering and she popped off and broke her arm and hurt her back. And all of a sudden the light went on in her head and she said, "Wow, you can get hurt doing this." Before that, it was just a game. And she's not a physical risk taker. So that was it. She loves the mountains. One of the big things in our relationship is just being outside together, in the mountains. Marriage is one of those things, it's a mystery.

What will your team be doing next?

The next trip up we'll stay at Camp I and Camp II for a little while and come down and then go up again for even longer--five, six, seven days--at Camp III. We'll spend the night there and come down and the next time through the icefall will be the final.

Some people feel if you go down to Pheriche, you recover more. The thinking is if you have some bronchial infection or are really hurting, it might make sense to go down to Pheriche. But from my point of view, it's not worth the energy I spend to go down there to those shitholes of Loboche. We spent three days down there and I never want to spend any more time down there again. So someone's going to have to do some serious convincing to get me out of here during that rest period to go low. Already after five days here it feels pretty comfortable, so I imagine after being up at 22,000, 23,000, 24,000 feet it will feel like the beach. Unless I have some real serious respiratory problems that won't heal here--I notice that cuts and things don't seem to heal here very well.

But I don't know, I think all these best laid plans, you know, so many days of rest, I think a lot of it will hinge on the weather in the end. Maybe you don't have as much rest as you should but if the window opens up, man, you're not going to waste it. You're going to go for it.

It's interesting for me, because from here you're four days to get to the South Col, so trying to predict what the weather is going to do four days in advance... It's going to be Rob and Scott and those guys who have experience. For these guys it's just gut and we're lucky to have their lead to follow. But it will be interesting to see. In my climbing experience, you can make all the plans in the world but it's just not going to work out like you expect. So you just have to be light on your feet and go with the moment.

Things are never perfect. You're sick. You're not feeling well. Not enough food. Not enough oxygen. Some Sherpa didn't make it. Or stuff just doesn't work. In the end you just have to do it anyway, assess the risk and possibilities. Climbing is not a sure bet. It's all about sort of winging it. Sort of operating out of intuition and instinct. Himalayan experience, there's no substitute for it. You can be the best climber in the world on rock and ice, in the Canadian Rockies, but it's just a whole different thing up here. Technical skill doesn't really amount for much here, aside for the icefall, which is all fixed. It's nice to know how to use Jumars. You don't have to be a technical climber, that's the least valuable skill to have. Just big lungs and luck with the weather.