Worth the licence fee alone.............

Hi.

I have just watched a fascinating programme on BBC 4 (no, I didn't know it existed either) called "Everest - Journey to the bottom of the Mountain".  I have just returned back from running a small 5km evening race and am eating my pie and chips (actually a pretty ropey stir-fry edible only by the generous dolloping on Encona chilli sauce) and I have been riveted for an hour by this programme.

If my fellow trekkers get the chance I would recommend tracking it down on the various Plus 1 or iView doo-dahs that satellite TV now offers. It is a great insight into the history of the mountain. From a climbing perspective, it interviews many "household" mountaineers including Bonnington, Doug Scott, Reinhold Messner (who pretty much said bollocks to the established way of climbing when he did the ascent without oxygen..or clothes..and drinking a pint of Bavarian face-melter).  It also charted the history of climbing the mountain from Mallory, Hillary, Tenzing, and everything else all the way to the tragedies of the 10th May 1996.

It also followed various groups of trekkers from landing at Lukla, which looks hairy to say the least, and followed them all the way through to Base Camp; taking in Namche Bazaar, Tengboche, etc.  It was fascinating to see the landscape, the terrain, the clothing people wear for such a trip and as well as taking interest in the Sherpa people; the people that actually live and work in the shadow of such imposing landscape.  A piece filming one of the Sherpa guides breaking down at the memorials at base camp was genuinely moving.  

Gorak Shep was also briefly highlighted and the pitch looks good.  The groundsman were on the rollers drinking their coffee and smoking their roll-ups, the score-box was nearly completed and the second bar in the grandstand was nearly finished and it seems preparations are well on the way for next April.  If I get offered the cherry it's definitely the down hill end. Seriously, it was compelling and hugely useful to see what happens when one treks to Everest. 

They broached the environmental question and how places like Lukla are now "boom" settlements were the farmers are compelled to leave the slopes to earn more cash hiring themselves out as freelance porters to the 20,000 trekkers that land and take on this route every year. There seems to have been an explosion of bars, bakeries, internet cafes in Lukla and that Tengboche, being a monastery settlement, is stuck between the ancient past and the future; the monks all wear North Face gear and now have coke drinking races with the trekkers. A stark contrast with the clip they showed on Bonnington and his huge team in reverential praise to the Head Monk on their way to lay siege to Everest in 1971.

It is a programme that simply whetted my appetite and inspired me even more and it raised simple questions about why am I doing this and what I hoped to get out of it.  Every one interviewed said the trek was tough and that the secret is slowly, slowly, catchy monkey and the personal rewards, outside of the camaraderie and money raising aspects of our particular trip, are there to be seen all around you.  No-one said that it would be easy to get there.

It was just a good programme to watch from many aspects and I hope other inexperienced enthusiasts got to catch it...................................................Pink Floyd's also on the soundtrack.