t is now 10:00 am, May 23rd and John has just called in to let us know he and Darrel are off the Lhotse Face and ascending the Geneva Spur below C4. They anticipate being to C4 before noon local time. Rob Hill has been resting today up in Camp 4 at the south Col (7,950 meters) waiting for John and Darrel to arrive. The weather is looking good and everyone is strong and healthy, so they expect to leave for the summit tonight.

The only setback so far has been the theft of 5 bottles of oxygen from our Camp 4 cache. Rob arrived yesterday to find the cache had been pilfered (!!) – luckily another team (Asian Trekking) had extra bottles left from their attempt that they offered to leave with our team. This is our 2nd climb on Everest where our high camps have been pilfered of essential items – in 2008 we had food and fuel consumed by another team who did not plan well and fell short of supplies in the South Col.

The next 24 hours are going to be some of the most memorable hours for our team, we’ll be giving regular updates as we receive them here.

Brian Jones, Canada West Mountain School