Wednesday, 5:30 pm

Chris calls from Camp 3 ½.  From right out of the gate the climbers were forced to break trail in snow over one meter deep, which Chris described as "abysmal."  After 3 hours they had traveled about 300 meters, which put them at an altitude of 7,700 meters.

At that point it became obvious that they would need to stop, so they pitched a tent and will head to Camp 4 tomorrow.  While pitching the tent, the Russians continued to make an effort getting another 50 meters past our climbers before retreating themselves back to C3.  Earlier, the Korean women's Sherpas also turned back.  At Camp 3 ½, along with the Americans are Joao Garcia, from Portugal, and his associate Amin.  The three Italians are expected to arrive at C3 as are the three Korean climbers and their Sherpas.  This is welcome as Chris parted with, "We're going to need a lot of people to break trail tomorrow."

(All times are local, UTC/GMT +5 hours.)