Trip Reports

Mera Peak - 14 Oct to 6 Nov '16

Written by Leader Mungo Ross, November 2016

6 out of 10 on top, never even opened the medical kit, used the ubiquitous umbrella for a brief 20 minutes, trekked on paved trails and stayed in lodges that weren’t there 18 months ago – a Mera Peak trip at its merriest best. O.K., so we lost two of the group in the first two days, each realising for personal reasons that they had got themselves on the wrong trip. Few, if any, of the rest of the group were calling this a holiday in spite of the blue skies, three (admittedly carbohydrate loaded) meals a day, the attentive professional services of our Sherpas, cook team and porters and conditions underfoot that were as good as they get. It’s still a demanding walk in to and out from a mountain that’s nearly 6,500 metres high, where there’s less than half of the oxygen that we’re used to – so it’s never going to be “easy”.

Mera Peak might be described as the easiest Trekking Peak in Nepal, but both “easiest” and “trekking” are misleading adjectives. It might be a technically-straightforward walk in the conditions that we encountered this autumn, but it’s always going to be “mountaineering” with all the ingredients of altitude, weather, snow conditions, boots and clothing, rope-work, personal organisation and teamwork to consider.

For Gordon this was an opportunity to make amends for our last attempt together, which was thwarted by too much snow on the hill, then by being caught up in the earthquake of April 2015. For Neville it was a chance to return to altitude after a long absence. For Stine and Soren, our Danish contingent, the opportunity to prove that coming from sea level need not prejudice success at altitude (after all, I just spent most of the summer windsurfing off Tiree – much of the time on, or even slightly below!, sea level). For Ailsa and David it has provided the challenge of bettering their previous altitude PBs and (along with myself) moderating their Scottish wit and repartee to compliment the refined and genteel humor of the rest of the group (ha ha). For the team from Scunthorpe Mountaineering Club a huge amount of effort was put in. John got to within sighting distance of the summit before turning round due to cold toes and Martin achieved a high point at Khare, supporting the team from there on their summit bid.

Each of us will be taking home personal highs and lows of these three weeks together in the high hills of Nepal; if what brought us together was wanting to climb a mountain, what we have shared is our achievements and disappointments with good nature, good humor and good health. Thank you to Jagged Globe, Tenzing and all our Nepali team, and to each of you for making this such a fun and successful expedition (- it’s definitely not a holiday!).

Mungo Ross, Expedition Leader « Previous report | Next report »

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