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Expedition         Pro's and Con's         Recommendation

My Mount Everest Experience

A personal experience. Recommendations for climbers who are
thinking about joining a commercial Mt. Everest expedition


The Mount Everest Expedition:

Mt. Everest expedition guided by Kari Kobler: in spring 2007 I attempted a Mount Everest expedition guided by Kari Kobler of Kobler & Partner company. We approached Mt. Everest (8,848m/29,028ft.) from the Tibet side (China). The whole expedition was supposed to take approximately 8 weeks. We needed a visa for the entry into China and a climbing permit for Mt. Everest.

This expedition takes a lot of training and preparation. The experience having climbed other difficult and high-altitude mountains is mandatory. Attending a commercial expedition is an expensive endeavor and for most people a once-in-a-lifetime adventure using life savings to make their dream possible. During this expedition I got to know great people such as the members of the French Monaco expedition and Thomas Bubendoerfer. With Simen from Norway, Thierry, Ludovic, and Lionel from France I have met several nice and smart climbing colleagues who where to share the adventure. The following is my personal evaluation of this expedition and its quality of guiding.

In order to acclimatize well we have started the tour in Lhasa (Tibet) and along sightseeing went step-by-step higher to finally reach the Mt. Everest base camp (5,300m/17,400ft.) where the real experience was about to begin. There it normally takes a few days up to a few weeks to adjust to the altitude. Once the acclimatization process is in progress the next step is to go to the advanced base camp (6,400m/21,000ft.). The vertical difference in altitude (1,100m/3,600ft.) and the horizontal distance (20km/12,4miles) are big. This step is critical and has to be considered carefully. Unfortunately, Kari Kobler sent the expedition members up at the same time despite myself and others not having adjusted to the altitude yet. Looking back now, this has caused an enormous risk on me. I can recommend to everybody to rather take an additional day, which a considerate guide should support. In my case I had to go down again, acclimatize, and then I fought my way up to advanced base camp. However, the guide's seemingly wrong decision had a big impact on my schedule and energy level, having lost far more days than initially taking more time to acclimatize in base camp the right way while Kari Kobler has pushed further along with two other climbers.

Every climber should be aware that the less comfortable advanced base camp is the real base for weeks of the high altitude climbing on Mt. Everest. From here a number of load delivery trips to higher altitude are necessary in order to completely acclimatize and to get ready for the summit push. The high camps are at 7,000m (23,000ft.), 7,500m (24,600ft.), 7,800m (25,600ft.), and 8,300m (27,200ft.). Once the acclimatizing process is completed the climbers usually go all the way down to base camp in order to recharge their body before they push for the final summit approach.

At any time it is critical for the success of the expedition not to catch an infection or a diarrhea. Hygiene is very important! Despite the sometimes unsatisfying situations in the camps every climber has to keep high standards of personal cleanliness.

In my opinion it is another critical part of a well guided expedition to keep a group together as long as possible. People can support each other and share their experience. However, in his own quest for success Kari Kobler has preferably pushed himself and a Swiss climbing member of our expedition. I had the impression that his decisions where mainly focused on his third summit success and the summit success of the Swiss member. Along with another climber they were using the sherpas with summit experience for their final push for the summit on May 16, 2007. Other members of the commercial expedition, at this point about to get ready for their summit push a week later, however, could not expect well-rested sherpas anymore since they already were used by the expedition leader himself. I personally have not heard of sherpas having been able to summit Mt. Everest twice within a week or so. As a matter of fact, to be on the save side I even had paid extra for a personal summit sherpa before the expedition started, to make sure not to be on my own at summit day as this would be too risky for a climber. Another team member and myself finished acclimatizing later. It certainly was not a good feeling staying in base camp for a few days, getting ready to go up, and hearing that Kari Kobler has been using the experienced sherpas for his own summit success on client's expenses and not leaving additional rested sherpas for the rest of the group. A responsible guide on Mt. Everest should, in my opinion, consider all possible safety standards for every client's well-beeing. To me it seemed very irresponsible that clients had to go up with already tired sherpas on such a tough mountain!

The following reflects the positive and the negative parts of this expedition guided by Kari Kobler from my point of view.

Pros of the expedition:
Cons of the expedition:

Final conclusion and recommendation:

For me personally the final conclusion and recommendation for non-professional climbers is to think more than twice about joining a commercial Mount Everest expedition. Fine if you are a professional climber and are invited by a professional expedition. If you are not, but are so obsessed about going and joining a commercial tour, then there are a lot of things to consider. My recommendations are based on my own experience, on my observations during the expedition, and on conversations with other climbers:

It is very critical to intensively check the credibility of different commercial guiding firms and their guiding at Mount Everest. You have to be aware of the fact that this is an industry in which, like in any other industry, profit has to be made. Important factors are reliability, quality, safety(!), and costs in order to select a commercial mountaineering company on Mt. Everest.






Good luck from the deepest of my heart! Make sure you survive. Do not forget safety and humanity up there! Think clearly. Congratulations if you then make it to the summit and safely back down.
 
 
 

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