Kanchenjunga Expedition-Final expedition team arrives (Day 19)
The final members of the expedition arrive and we are all set to move up to Base Camp.
8Sep- Final expedition team arrives
The weather has been playing spoil-sport ever since we arrived in Tapleyjung. The helicopter has not been able to make a sortie since the last one on 5th sep in which I arrived in Ramche.
When they are not climbing the Sherpas are gambling.
Playing cards was a favourite pastime for us all. It was the only activity we could do here in the wilderness.
The Russian pilots are very reluctant to fly the chopper until there is no mist or fog at all. This is a receding monsoon and I think the army should have anticipated this. Instead they have been relying on a bright day when all the six sorties can be made.However only four sorties were made in all and some of the load will now have to be transported by porters.
This Yak-herd boy would come to the front of our tents once in a while and look at us with utter fascination.
They say Tapleyjung to Ramche is almost a eight day trek. The final fourth sortie was not as good or as bad as any other day. Today the Russian pilots have to report to Katmandu and Col Sharma and 8 or 9 team members who are holed up in Tapleyjung might have succeeded in persuading the pilots to make a flight. The chopper lands with all the slides and filters I had ordered and now there is no looking back to my shooting.
The yaks came pretty close to our tents at night the bull yaks fought for females and i feared they would run over our tents at night.
What spoils the shooting is the constant rain. It is a drizzle and sound pretty hard on our yellow North-Face tent. The evenings become somewhat dreary as the jawans crowd in the dining hall to watch hindi films. Today they have the projector and the big screen. But the most thrilled are the Sherpas, who watch the films with wonder and awe.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 at 5:06 am. It is filed under Kanchenjuna Expedition Diary 2004 and tagged with adventure in Himalayas, adventurous climb, army expedition, asia, climbers, climbing mountains, fields, glaciers, Himalayan mountain photographs, himalayas, ice, ice cap, india, Indian army climbers, Indian army mountain expedition, Indian army mountaineers, Indian Himalayas, kanchendzonga, Kanchenjunga, Kanchenjunga mountain, mountain climbers, mountain expedition, mountaineering, mountaineers, mountains, Nepal, nepal photographs, nepali sherpas, pasture, photographs of Kanchenjunga, rain, receding glaciers, Sherpa mountaineers, sherpas, snow, south east asia, third highest mountain, Yaks.
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Sanjay first I would like to say that you have a wonderful website…I am “almost in love with it”. I have always envyed yr kunchenjunga expedition,ever since early flickr days. These are amazing pictures..and I just love the way you describe the Sherpa’s love for watching films,and what spoil rain causes while photography. Real nice work
cheers.
Hi Rajat,
I am glad you liked my website. It is still under-construction as you can see. I still have to upload many of my images. There will be more written content in this website along with the images. The Kanchenjunga stories are cut cut and pasted.. i have to edit the stories yet… Will do so and inform you. Thanks again. I love your mountain pictures too.