Every dead body on that mountain once belonged to a highly motivated person.
It’s really a shame that nearly the only good job opportunities in Nepal involve ferrying tourists up and down a big icy rock, some of whom are so poorly prepared that the Sherpas spend most of their time on the climb keeping the tourist from killing himself or the entire group.
Every Sherpa is more of an adventurer than any Everest mountain climber these days. You don’t have to figure out how to get there, what to pack, where to stay, or even need a Tibetan phrase book handy, the tours take care of all of it. You just hand over your credit card and step where the Sherpas tell you to step until you either die from exposure or take a photograph with your cell phone.
“Every Sherpa is more of an adventurer than any Everest mountain climber these days.”
My son, an ardent climber (just left for the Pacific Northwest to climb) said one of the climbing mags claims many of the ‘climbers’ need help putting their crampons on!
This was before this season.
I gifted him my crampons and the rest of my gear a few years back, after many years on rock and ice.