Wet but warmer ....

8th January 2022 (Saturday)    09.00 .... Hmmmmm,....it’s not the most

cheerful looking  start to the day;  it’s raining, and though warmer, it’s not the kind of morning for moving far from the kettle.    It’s supposed going to brighten up by lunch time;  so plenty of time to do ‘ousework  computer stuff.    I’ve been out to feed and chat to ‘Blob’,..... I need another cuppa.   It’s one of those sluggish feeling kind of days

I found an interesting film, about a team of climbers that are searching Mount Everest for the body of mountaineer Irvine, who, along with Mallory, was last seen about 800 feet from the summit in 1924.    The team found Mallory’s body in 1999, below the North Ridge, from where he/they? fell in 1924 so have a rough idea where Andrew (Sandy) Irvine’s body might be.  This latest expedition found the high camp site used by Smythe and Shipton on the 1933 attempt to climb Mount Everest.  The 1933 attempt was defeated by similar conditions on the mountain that beat  the 1924 attempt, and took the lives of Mallory and Irvine;  the early onset of the monsoon, which on Mount Everest means severe gales and snowstorms.

Interestingly, Wyn Harris and Wager, the two climbers chosen for the first assault in 1933, found an ice axe (Willisch of Taesch, Switzerland) belonging to either Mallory or Irvine;  it had to be Mallory or Irvine’s axe, as no one had been on this route since 1924.   ‘Mount Everest Expedition 1933 – Hugh Rutledge’.

17.00   The day ended up bright and cold, and we’re to have a bonnie day tomorrow;   it was mid afternoon by the time the sun broke through.    It was still overcast with a mauchless feel to the air, when  decided to go for a walk after lunch.    For a change, thought I’d go up to the Pony Field and golf course.  Well, I don’t know what was in the air, but, by the time I got to the phone box... my tubes had tightened and breathing was uncomfortable, and this brought a change of ‘plan’.   I went across to the ‘Thistle Clubhouse’ had a couple of puffs of the ‘bloo puffer’ and decided to make for the beach, by way of Rotten Row and Siward Lane, thinking the air would be clearer that way.   It wasn’t.... so I made my way along the beach and up Ferry Wynd to Ivy, meeting Barbara and Alistair on the way;   I was glad to stop and chat to them, before finally getting back home.    I didn’t go out again;  and  my breathing is fine now.    Tricky business is the asthma.