Both sides of Mount Everest have hundreds of climbers on it right now and many are hoping to reach the summit this week. Newfoundlander Mark Ballard reached the summit on May 21 with dozens of other climbers.
Ballard is 31 years old, has been to 91 countries and credits his father as a major inspiration. In an interview with CBC, Ballard’s father, Derek “Doc” Ballard, said, “He’s amazing. I might be biased, but he’s done it. He’s not a dreamer, he’s a doer.”
A few days ago, Mike Mulrooney became the first Nova Scotia climber to complete the seven summits list with an ascent of Everest. He’s now attempting Lhotse.
Also on Everest are a number of alpinists climbing without supplementary oxygen, suck as Juan Pablo Mohr from Chile and German David Göttler. Nirmal Purja is on Everest and is hoping to quickly enchain all 8,000-metre peaks with the world’s highest peak then over to Lhotse and then a flight to Makalu. He’s already climbed Kangchenjunga, Annapurna and Dhaulagiri.
On the north side, Cory Richards and Esteban “Topo” Mena have started a summit push up their new route. There aren’t many details and no updates in the past two days.
And over on Nuptse, Tim Mosedale and Dorjee Gyalgen Sherpa are the first climbers to summit this season. They’ve been breaking trail to the summit for the past few weeks through unstable weather.
