Lobuche Peak Expedition Dispatch
October 26, 2011 – The Team Reaches the Summit!
The radio all came in at 8:25am this morning from the summit of Lobuche Peak. Denio, Raquel, DaSona, and Mingma have made it to the top. It is a beautiful day! The team started climbing at 3:30am from Lobuche High Camp, which is at a beautiful small lake at 17,060ft/5,200m. They took off under starlight and, obviously, they climbed very efficiently through the night and into the early morning hours.
Raquel called on the radio about 45 minutes before they reached the summit to very excitedly report how beautiful it was to be reaching the top. From the very top, Denio made a radio call that sounded reminiscent of the call that Wally made from the summit of Lhotse in 1990 – he withheld information and spoke for about 2 minutes before finally announcing that they had reached the summit of Lobuche Peak. We will update you as they advance down the mountain to High Camp, then Base Camp and then down the Khumbu.
Congratulations Denio and congratulations Raquel for an excellent summit climb today!