17 days until departure

By: Dan Piccininni, Kamloops, BC.

I decided to start this up so that everyone can follow (hopefully) our trek to Everest Base Camp. I'm not sure how much it will get updated during the 3.5 weeks that we're over there, but I was bored at work today and figured why not?

So to fill everyone in: It is a 21 day trek starting from Lukla, up to EBC, then over to the Gokyo lakes. There are seven of us in the group. Mike Ferrara, from the University of Georgia, who has done most of the work putting the group together and researching the trip, his two kids Megan and Nick, Ron Courson also from UGA, and Mary Donahue. My Bro, Dave Wharrie and I will represent Canada. Dad has been an invaluable resource for trip planning and research from the beginning, and neither Dave nor I would be going, or feel as prepared without his help.

We are trekking with Above the Himalaya Trekking company, which is a Nepalese owned and run company. http://www.nepalhimalayatrek.com/ We just found out this week that our guide will be Shyam Shahi.

A lot of the preparation I have been doing in the last couple of days has been mental preparation. I have been going over checklists for gear, and last minute things to do before departure. I have also been following a number of the dispatches from the various climbing expedition teams already at Base camp. Most of the climbers arrived at BC last week and are now beginning their acclimatization cycles. It has been inspiring to follow these stories and learn about life at base camp, as well as to hear about some of the big players in the high altitude climbing world. There are 500 climbers on the south side of Everest this year, and if my math is right, and the mountain is friendly to those on it, we should arrive at basecamp around the same time as teams are making summit bids.