When Everest was climbed first in 1953 Chris Bonington was a young English mountaineer of 17 years. Later he did historic climbs like the first ascents of Annapurna II in 1960, of the Central Pillar of Freney on the south side of Mont Blanc  in 1961 and of the 7285-meter-high Ogre in the Karakoram together with Doug Scott in 1977 (the second ascent followed only in 2001). But Bonington also proved to be a great expedition leader. In 1970 he led the successful expedition to the South Face of Annapurna, in 1975 the expedition to Mount Everest, during which Doug Scott and Dougal Haston climbed the Southwest Face first. Bonington himself reached the summit of Everest in 1985 as a member of a Norwegian expedition. He was knighted by the Queen in 1996 for his services to the sport. I met the 78-year-old climber last week at the diamond jubilee celebration of the first ascent of Mount Everest in the Royal Geographical Society in London and asked him – of course – about his thoughts on Everest.

Sir Chris Bonington, 60 years after the first ascent of Mount Everest, how do you feel about these pioneers? 

I’m a great believer in the heritage of our sport, looking back, enjoying and learning from what our predecessors have done. In a way that first ascent of the highest point on earth is one of the very, very great occasions. I think it’s story. How they succeeded and worked together, it was a superb team effort. It’s something very special.

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Mount Sherpa. That would be a better suited name for the highest mountain of the world, which instead was named after Sir George Everest, a Surveyor-General of India in the 19th century. The history of Mount Everest is also a history of the Sherpas. The „eastern people” who had fled from Tibet to Nepal in earlier times were engaged for the early British expeditions in the 1920s. One of the two climbers who scaled Everest first in 1953 was a Sherpa: Tenzing Norgay. At the latest since commercial climbing was established on Everest sherpas have become indispensable. Without their support most of the clients wouldn’t have any chance to reach the summit. Due to this important role sherpas have an excellent reputation all over the world, many have achieved modest prosperity. Sherpas are also working as successful entrepreneurs, doctors or pilots. They know that these achievements are due to Everest. „As a Nepali, Mount Everest is my identity to the world. As a Sherpa, Mount Everest is the reason we have education, health care and prosperity”, Dawa Steven Sherpa wrote to me. „As a mountaineer, Mount Everest is the playground where I learned to explore myself, my limitations and my abilities as a person.” 

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Perhaps I have exaggerated. Following my request to send her comments on Mount Everest 60 years after the first ascent Elizabeth Hawley replied: „Your questions seem to anthropomorphize Everest, and I don’t see it that way at all.” The world’s preeminent chronicler of Himalayan mountaineering is already 89 years old. For more than half a century the Amercian, living in the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, has been documenting expeditions to high Himalayan mountains. It’s an unwritten law that you haven’t been on the summit until Miss Hawley has confirmed that you really have been on the top.

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End of February. It’s still quiet at the foot of Mount Everest. The calm before the storm. Or should I say before the rush? There will be again hundreds of climbers who turn the basecamp on the Nepalese south side into a small town, with helicopter base, mini-hospital and wireless internet connection. It’s time to call my friend Chomolungma on his mobile phone – before she is stressed out.

Namasté, Chomo! Stefan speaking.

Oh no, you again.

Take it easy!I haven’t woken you up from your hibernation, have I?

Look at your calendar! Pre-season. I’m still on vacation.

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Bernd Kullmann has a unique place in the annals of Mount Everest. When he stood on the summit on 8850 meters on October 17,1978, he wore an original Levi’s blue jeans. „I wasn’t only the first, but probably the only one, who ever did it”. Kullmann, now aged 58 years, said, at that time it was common to wear knickerbockers in the Alps. „We as young people wanted to provoke. We climbed the north face of Eiger in Jeans. So I found it logical to use Jeans on Everest too.” Above Camp 3 at about 7000 meters Kullmann covered his jeans with padded overtrousers. „We had not enough money for down garments. I didn’t even have long johns beneath.” Kullmann wore his jeans for all seven weeks they spent on Everest – with consequences: „In Kathmandu I could put it literally in the corner of my hotel room.” Kullmann didn’t dispose his durable trousers even then. „Later it was washed and I used it again. Jeans were simply my favourite garments.” 

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In sports the second is often seen as the first looser. On May 17,2010 Edurne Pasaban from Spain finished the climbing of all fourteen 8000ers. But up to now it’s not clear whether she was the first or second woman who achieved this. Oh Eun-Sun completed the 8000ers three weeks earlier, but it remains disputed, whether the Korean really reached the summit of Kangchenjunga. When I talked to Edurne at the trade fair ISPO in Munich, I felt that the 39 years old climber is in harmony with the world around her, with the mountains and herself:

Edurne, you completed the fourteen 8000ers in 2010. Have you been in the Himalayas since then?

I came back to Everest in 2011. Everest was my first 8000er in 2001, I used (supplementary) oxygen for the summit. So after I had finished all 8000ers I wanted to try Everest without oxygen. But we didn’t make the summit. 

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Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner is still dreaming of Mount Everest. The 42 years old Austrian has not yet given up her plan to climb through the north face to the summit on 8850 meters via the so-called „supercoloir“-route, although she failed twice. In 2005 and 2010 the conditions on the wall hadn’t allowed to climb this route. „In my eyes Mount Everest is still a beautiful mountain, especially from the North, when you stand directly at the foot of the north face”, Gerlinde said (you can read and hear her statements on both Everest-60-pinboards on the right side of the blog). „Nevertheless I won’t return to Everest in the near future.” 

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Mount Everest is celebrating a 60-years-jubilee. Not concerning his real age. Chomolungma counts millions of years, not decades. 60 years ago on the 29th May Edmund Hillary from New Zealand and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay were the first to set their feet on the the highest point of the earth. Since 1953 Mount Everest has been climbed more than 6000 times, about 4500 times in the last ten years.  

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