Mustagh Ata Expedition at Base Camp

Thurs­day July 9, 2009 — Mustagh Ata Base Camp

Hi folks. Casey here, call­ing in from Mustagh Ata base camp. If you have been hear­ing about trou­ble in Chi­na, rest assured we are far away from any polit­i­cal ten­sions that you have been hear­ing about in the news. We are all hav­ing a great time. Today was an acclima­ti­za­tion day and work­ing on skills. We focused on fixed line trav­el, prepar­ing ropes and prus­sik cords for glac­i­er trav­el, and began prepar­ing loads for mov­ing up the moun­tain. Every­one is healthy and doing well. Tomor­row we will do an acclima­ti­za­tion hike. The fol­low­ing day we will make a trip up to Camp 1 and back down. The day after that we will make our move up to Camp 1 to set­tle in. We hope you are all well. It appears that the Chi­nese still have the text mes­sag­ing, inter­na­tion­al wire­less calls, and the inter­net down due to the riot­ing back in Urumqi. I have spot­ty cov­er­age with the satel­lite phone, so dis­patch­es may be a lit­tle brief until things are back up with inter­net and our orig­i­nal dipatch can be trans­mit­ted. We hope you are all well. Bye for now.

- Casey Henley