I slept well and have to chance to reflect on the previous few days rotation climb to camp 3 as I get myself ready for breakfast today, amazingly I feel surprisingly ok (my back aside which I’m keeping in check with some super strength painkillers), I’ve been doing fluids since I got back to try and re-hydrate as much as I can do and I think I’m starting to balance up again, I must remember to drink more during the summit push or I’ll be in all sorts of trouble.
I’ve exchanged a few messages with Nims when directs us to stay in basecamp at least 48 hours to get the benefit of the rotation altitude before we head down to Kathmandu, he’s heading back from Kanchangenga tomorrow so hopefully we will get chance to meet briefly before we head off. There is such a thing known as reverse altitude sickness, although little is known about it, but high altitude de-acclimatisation syndrome (HADAS) can induce oxidative stress which can cause cell and tissue damage so a 48 hour adjustment from 7,150m basecamp and then onto Kathmandu at 1,400m is probably a wise move so we settle in a bit longer.
Most of the day is spent resting, catching up on other’s stories of the rotation climb and dealing with any basecamp admin that needs doing - the hours tick by surprisingly fast and it’s soon dinner and Bimal from Elite is going from group to groups trying to co-ordinate who is going where the next day or day after - it’s a logistical nightmare for them organising helicopters up and down the valley (inside of a fairly chaotic system already in terms of transport), hotels and lodges to book, understanding who is staying at basecamp and still has to be fed and watered as normal and somehow maintaining team communications and focus on the main task is still ahead of us, I don’t envy them.
A group of us head to the cafe dome tent and manage to set up the projector to watch a film - Gladiator with Russell Crowe, appropriate as I’m sure each and everyone of us slightly feels the gladiator spirit within us after our accomplishment, for a 22 year old movie its still as good as the first time I saw it!
Not sure if its from the altitude gain we’ve had and our bodies reacting or not but it feels surprisingly mind in basecamp (in the context of EBC that is so -5 feels quite comfortable, not t-shirt weather, but certainly not something to complain about) as I head to my tent for bed, Bimal lets us know that Nims is coming in on the first heli at 6am so we need to be on the helipad, good to go, by then to switch helicopters with him - no lazy breakfast tomorrow for us then.
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