First Ama Dablam summit of the season! Big Congratulations to Kristin Bennett, Aang Phurba Sherpa and the rest of our Sherpa team on Ama Dablam! They pushed through tough snow conditions and fixed ropes to get to the top on October 10th around 6:00PM local time! 20 hour summit day. Way to go team!!
Kristin on Ama Dablam
Due to the unsafe route conditions in the Khumbu Icefall, expedition leader, Garrett Madison, has today called off the expedition and has started making the preparations to pack up and head home. Many thanks to our entire Nepal-based staff and to our climbers and trekkers – and good luck to Kristin who is making her attempt on Ama Dablam:
Hello this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition 2019.
Well, The Serac is still up there and despite the decent weather, we are going to call off the Everest Expedition. Even if The Serac came down, our climbers were able to return to base camp in a few days, and we had perfect weather and route conditions to climb, it would take us over two weeks beyond our orginial end date to climb the mountain. So, we are going to conclude the dispatches for the expedition.
Everyone is safely off the mountain at this time and we’re looking forward to Everest Spring 2020! All the other teams have gone home, climbers are off the mountain and I’m the last one here. Looking forward to great season next spring. Thanks!
Kristin and Aang Phurba approaching Ama Dablam
Autumn Everest Base Camp
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, reports that the great weather is continuing at Everest base camp:
Hello! This is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition here in Nepal. Today is October 5th. Great day here at Everest base camp — sunny day, great views, nice people around.
The Serac is still up there so we’re not heading up the mountian anytime soon. Everyone’s doing well and we’ll check in soon. Thanks.
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, and team are still hanging tight at Everest Base Camp, waiting to see who will blink first, the team or the massive ice serac that continues to precariously hang over the Khumbu Icefall:
Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedtion. Today is October 4th. It’s a beautiful day here in Everest base camp – the Sun is out!
We have our fingers crossed that the serac comes down and we can give it a climb. But, for the time being, we are just hanging tight so we don’t feel that it is safe to climb up with the serac looming over the Icefall.
Everyone’s doing well and a beautiful day here in Nepal. We are just thankful to be enjoying this great weather. We’ll check-in soon. Thanks!
The sun rises above Everest base camp
Everest pokes its head out
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, reports in on another nice weather day at Everest base camp and still waiting on that hanging serac…
Hello, this is Garrett Madison calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition here. Today is October 3rd and the weather’s great here in Everest base camp — nice view of the mountains. Everyone’s doing well and we’re just waiting and watching to see if the serac will come down.
Fingers crossed for more good weather. All’s well here at Everest base camp. We’ll check in soon! Thanks.
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Under nice weather at EBC, expedition leader, Garrett Madison, reports in about today’s relaxing day visiting with friends:
Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition. Today is October 2nd. A sunny day here in base camp and just hanging out, enjoying the nice weather, organizing camp a bit, and we had a few friends and visitors swing by. So lots of happy, smiling faces!
Fingers crossed, hoping the serac is going to come down in the next couple of days. Everything’s going well here. We’ll check-in soon. Thanks!
Prayer flags and Nuptse behind from Everest base camp (📸: Philip Preiter)
Everest in the distance
Guests in our base camp: Philip and Carole
Sunny skies over EBC
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Finally today there was some sunny weather at Everest Base Camp. Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, reports on the weather, the route, and the team member status in today’s expedition dispatch:
Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Mount Everest Expedtion – Autumn Season 2019. Today was a sunny day! Finally the sun came out – it was beautiful.
Kristin is doing well; she’s in Pheriche on her way to Pangboche tomorrow, heading towards Ama Dablam for an attempt on Ama Dablam with our team. Zac is back in Kathmandu. Our friend Kilian Jornet is up at Camp 1. He is spending a couple of nights up there. We’ll see what his plans are, but he’s doing well.
We’re still waiting and watching the serac hoping it’s gonna come down and clear the way for a safe route up through the icefall. Meanwhile, we are looking forward to more sunny weather, hopefully in the future. All’s well here at Everest Base Camp!
Our Sherpa team in EBC today – we had some sunshine! (and a little bit of thumb 😀). Everybody decked out in their Mountain Hardware Ghost Whisperer/2 Down Hoody jackets.
Our Nepal team in their Mountain Hardwear down suits
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, and the climbing team headed down to Gorak Shep for lunch today under the continuing snowy conditions. Here’s Garrett’s update:
Hello! This is Garrett calling in for Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition. Today is September 29th.
Another snowy, cloudy day in base camp. Woke up to a few inches of snow and it kept snowing throughout the day. Myself, Kristin, and Zac hiked down to Gorak Shep this afternoon where we saw some friends – Kilian and company – and then Zac and Kristin along with one of our sherpas and porters headed down to Pheriche for the night.
I’m back in Everest base camp and hopefully we’ll have some good weather tomorrow. All’s well here!
With Kilian and team at Gorak Shep
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
On a snowy day at Everest Base Camp, expedition leader, Garrett Madison, has this daily report:
Hello, this is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition. Today is September 28th and we had a rest day in base camp as it snowed outside all day and fairly cloudy.
We were very happy to see our friend Kilian Jornet and his friend Carlos come into our camp for a few hours this afternoon and have lunch with us. Kilian’s just back from Namche and planning on heading up in a few days, weather pending.
We heard a big boom today in the icefall, it might have been the serac that we’ve been waiting to break loose and fall down. We won’t know until we get a good view when the weather clears up in a day or two.
But, we’re doing great here in base camp. Everyone’s doing well and just enjoying being here at Everest Base Camp.
[photo above: One week ago at our Camp 1 looking up at Lhotse (📸: Kilian Jornet)]
Recent photo of the serac approximately 1 kilometer above the central portion of the Khumbu Icefall (📸: Andrezj Bargiel)
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map:
Expedition leader, Garrett Madison, recaps tonight’s dinner at the neighboring Polish team camp and an update on the serac looming over the Khumbu Icefall:
Hello! This is Garrett calling in for the Madison Mountaineering Autumn Everest Expedition.
Today we had dinner with our Polish friends over in their camp, which was a nice contrast to our camp the night before. We had a fun evening with everyone; got to talk about about different cultures and also took a look at the looming serac above the Khumbu Icefall through their telephoto lens and drone camera. It definitely looks like the serac is moving, leaning more towards the icefall and hopefully falling soon.
Both teams, the Polish team and our team, have decided not to go through the icefall until the serac comes down because we do think that the blast from the ice and the wind would definitely clear an area from one side of the icefall, the West Shoulder, to the other side, the Nuptse wall.
So, we’re just hanging at base camp. We had a great night and hopefully we will get some sunshine tomorrow.
In addition to these expedition dispatches, you can also follow the team as they trek to Everest Base Camp and then make their attempt to summit the world’s highest mountain on:
– Amazon Alexa devices with the Madison Mountaineering Flash Briefing skill:
– Instagram:
– our Garmin inReach Mini powered real-time tracking map: