Maybe the idea of excitement mounting when we've done little on another rest day seems a little odd to you? But that's how it is really. You can sense it all around, not just in all our climbers in camp, but emanating from the several hundred others surrounding us in base-camp. It's certainly not just about the impending summit attempts, though that might seem the most obvious source. It's also very much about going home after so many weeks away, whoever you are, and wherever home is. This type of trip REALLY makes you aware of the good things at home, at all levels, be it warmth, bed, food, drink, fridges, toilets, and perhaps most of all, people! In some, the urge to get home begins to dwarf the desire to continue climbing the hill, with all it's discomforts and risk, and I know that many will have turned for home already. Not us, of course. Though the thoughts have more than crossed all our minds, that's for sure. Obviously, if one weakens and comes home "early" it makes our early efforts and suffering pretty meaningless, and we don't want that. So here we remain, summoning our reserves over the next few days for the last stage of our trip, the final (we hope) push towards that elusive summit. It's very "mental" this battle, I see that more clearly than ever. Don't let me mislead you, one look at our somewhat ravaged bodies would reveal a physical cost, for some much more than others...but for most of us the difference between summitting or not will be between our ears. This is what we'll be working on in the next few days...not JUST eating down valley, though that's going to be important too!
How much do we really want this summit?
I can tell you something. We want home very, very much indeed. So if we do get our summit eventually, that should tell you something of how much we wanted it. Don't doubt that.
That summit possession will be so brief, so transient. Home is forever though, the place from where we may have the luxury, if we're very lucky, to reflect on that brief time up there from time to time, and make of it all what we will.
And home will be there for us whether we summit or not. Home is people more than bricks, of course.
Home is where it's at.
Hopefully.
I want to come home so much. Right now. I'm about to walk ten miles downhill in the direction of home! I COULD keep on walking, there's the rub!
I know I won't do that, but it's very hard. It'll have to be a determined man walking back up the hill in a few days time to re-engage with the mountain...otherwise there's no point.
Ooooh, chicken and chips! Do your magic.....

Messages:

Tom and Di(and Sebastan), thanks for all that love and support (and directions!). All your good wishes passed on. We'll soon be doing all we can to finish the job off, and you Tom know better than most what it entails.
Luck with the conditions is a crucial start, and it's looking promising at this stage, which is all we can ask.
David H, thanks for the good laugh, had by all here. I apologise to your dear wife for my cold hands, I didn't realise I'd made such an impression! I'm always saying my room's the coldest in the building, and perhaps when we eventually move I'll get a warmer one, for all our benefit.
Jacq, yes it IS tough, and as for seeming positive, well I'm surprised you think that, as that's not often a word linked with me I'm sad to say! But I'm trying my hardest not to be overwhelmed by the negatives, let's put it that way.
Sandrine: Nadir tells me you're watching this, and he sends his love....as do I !!! He misses you lots.

Responses from Greg:

To Finbar Saunders aka Steve Hope; thanks for your message matey, we all enjoyed the double entendre!, doing my best to keep all my extremities warm, the hardest part is adjusting clothing to the extremes of temperature. Presently, Mike, Ray and myself are nursing fried faces and swollen lips after being caught in the sun on the Lohtse face, all part of the experience I guess! Best wishes, Greg.

Jo and the team; thanks for your message, good that everyone is enjoying the site, topic of conversation here ranges from philosophy to nuclear physics to the extremes of human endeavor, but that is only when I am out of the mess tent! Hope all is well with the rrrt but not too well or that may mean that I am out of a job when I return! Best wishes, Greg.