Sept 23rd - up to Camp 3 (6850m)

I had what is becoming a typical first night at a new altitude, headache and pounding in my ears. It's becoming more annoying but also does something to the confidence of ascending, not knowing if it will get worse. Funny, as soon as I get up and walk around, it seems to go. We left at about 9 am for C3, a straightforward climb on the skis with little in the packs. There are three Swiss guides in another expedition who were just ahead of us and broke a nice little trail. They were aiming to sleep at C3. I set myself a new goal which was not to stop, I would slow to a snails pace, literally taking steps of 10 cm or less, but not stop unless it was to drink or eat. I was really feeling the lack of oxygen. At one point, I'm not sure what possessed me, but I tried to jump onto some hard snow to break through the crust, making it easier to climb through. I did have to stop here because I felt like someone had tried to rip my lungs out through my nose. The last 100 m up to the pass was tough, this is where the tropical sun gives way to high altitude winds and you finally feel like you're up high in the Himalayas. When we arrived, we had a prime piece of real estate at 6850 m. We crawled inside the tent and after a little snack, actually had a nap. As the saying goes, what goes up... The ski down was funny, well funny now. I was typically all over the place. The high altitude boots have more support, but you do buy them big thinking your feet will swell so my heels were lifting constantly and I was all over the place. The snow was a mix of powder, crust and solid wind blown. I decided to practice my traverses, stop, switch directions, then continue. Even on this programme, I was out of breath until about 6500 m, below that I was just gasping. We rolled back into C2 for the night.




We managed to kill both of our headlamps today, amazing really. It meant for an early night. After the typical gourmet dinner of soup and noodles. I ran my iPod battery into the ground watching "A Fistful of Dollars" then drifted off wishing for a peaceful night of sleep and looking forward to getting back to BC.