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| Teen climbs 7 highest summits | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 19 2007, 07:34 AM (128 Views) | |
| TribbleMom | May 19 2007, 07:34 AM Post #1 |
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link: http://www.comcast.net/news/national/index.../19/667405.html LOS ANGELES - An 18-year-old woman has reached the summit of Mount Everest, becoming what is believed to be the youngest person to scale the highest peaks on each of the seven continents. "We made it to the top!" Samantha Larson, of Long Beach, gasped to her mother in New York via satellite phone from the top of Everest on Thursday, the Los Angeles Times reported Saturday. According to 7summits.com, a Web site that tracks those who have accomplished the feat, completing the climb in Nepal makes Larson the youngest person to have completed the "seven summits" challenge, breaking a 2006 record set by then-20-year-old British climber Rhys Miles Jones. Larson, who graduated last year with a 4.43 grade-point average from Long Beach Poly High School, put off going to Stanford University for a year so she could scale some of the world's tallest peaks with her father. The Nepalese government said Friday she was the youngest foreigner ever to reach the 29,035-foot summit of Everest, though some climbing Web sites claim a 17-year-old boy from France did it in 1990. A 15-year-old Sherpa girl from Nepal was the youngest ever to climb Everest. Larson has been climbing sky-high mountains since she was a child. She reached the summit of South America's Aconcagua when she was 13 and Africa's Mount Kilimanjaro when she was 14. "She's just amazing," said her mother, Sarah Hanson. She said her daughter has "a kind of stamina and persistence that just seems to be part of her nature, and it has been since she was little." Hanson said her daughter was only halfway down the mountain when she heard from her Friday. Larson and her father, 51-year-old anesthesiologist David Larson, planned to reach base camp on Friday and Nepal's capital, Katmandu, on Monday, then return to Southern California on Wednesday. Since New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay first conquered Everest on May 29, 1953, about 2,000 climbers have scaled the mountain. -------------------------------------------------------- Wow, this young woman sounds like she may be able to accomplish any goal she sets out to. And with that grade point average in high school, she must be smart as a whip. I wonder what else she coul do by the time she graduates Stanford. |
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| 24thcenstfan | May 19 2007, 04:15 PM Post #2 |
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Wow indeed. Tribblemom, have you ever thought about making a trek up Mt. Everest? I know you love to hike mountains. |
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| TribbleMom | May 21 2007, 07:19 AM Post #3 |
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Everest is twice as high as I've ever gone. And the air at only 14,000 feet is thin enough! I would have a lot to learn about climbing with ropes, ice axes, and crampons, and I would probably have to quit a full-time job to devote all my time to getting into physical shape for it. Not to mention that I'd have to be independently wealthy in order to pay for all the supplies, travel expenses, hiring porters, and equipment it would take, as well as the support team to help me haul all the stuff and monitor the weather conditions.By the time I would get all that arranged, I could be the oldest person to ever climb Everest ... if I could figure out how to get my wheelchair up there. |
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| 24thcenstfan | May 21 2007, 01:20 PM Post #4 |
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![]() I suppose you can dream. Climbing Mt. Everest is too dangerous IMO anyway. |
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| TribbleMom | May 21 2007, 10:40 PM Post #5 |
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I sure do enjoy reading books about those who have climbed Everest (and pretty much any other mountain). Reading is as close as I'll ever get to it. You're correct that it's a very dangerous place. Most of the deaths on the mountain occur as people are on their way back down, unfortunately. Climbing to the summit is only half-way there to a successful trip. |
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| 24thcenstfan | May 22 2007, 07:19 PM Post #6 |
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I admire the strength one must have to climb mountains. Rock climbing too. This reminds me of the movie Vertical Limit. I thought that was a really good movie. Fictional, but a very good dramatic movie that involved rock climbing and trekking up K2. Alexander Siddig had a bit role in the movie too. |
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| TribbleMom | May 22 2007, 10:45 PM Post #7 |
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Yes, I remember that movie, and Alexander in it as well. I believe he blew up in that one. Have you ever seen a movie called "Into Thin Air" (based on the book, written about an Everest climb)? I think the most difficult part of climbing large mountains like that would be the part where you are laying out your fixed ropes on the route. Lots of free-climbing, trying to pick out your route as you go, dragging along heavy rope and pounding the anchors into the rock (or ice screws into the glacier) to fix it in place, hoping you don't fall into a hidden cravasse. Next day, same thing with another length of rope, and so on. Then having to establish each camp along the way, estimating where all team members can climb to in one day, and supplying them all with food stashes, oxygen canisters, cook stoves and fuel, sleeping bags and tents, and doing it in a relatively flat place that avoids any potential avalanche route. And hoping that the next snowstorm doesn't either blow it all away or bury it. And hoping that you can overcome any altitude sickness during all that work. All that kind of takes away the charm of just climbing up the mountain. I think I'll stick to day trips. |
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| 24thcenstfan | May 23 2007, 08:56 PM Post #8 |
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Nope, haven't seen it. I'll keep an eye out for it though.
When you put it that way, I'd stick to day trips too. One would have to be in peak shape to haul that kind of load. I don't know how that kind of adventure could be considered fun. Maybe have a sense of accomplishment once completed. However, people must find some joy in it though if they are doing it. |
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| TribbleMom | May 24 2007, 08:50 AM Post #9 |
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Good pun ... was that intentional? Yes, I think there's a lot to be said about the sense of accomplishment when you know you've gone as high as you can on a praticular mountain. I've never quite been able to explain why I do these long, high hikes, other than I just plain like it. The views from the top are exceptional. And the scenery sure beats going to the gym for exercise. Oddly enough, I suffer a bit from fear of heights. It only bothers me when there's very little surrounding me to make me feel secure. I'm OK in an airplane because there's the psychological comfort of the plane walls around me. But high suspension bridges are another matter. In some places in the mountains, you can find ridges that are wide enough to safely walk across, yet they feel very "airy" and I have a little psychological trouble getting past them. It depends on how much I can see in my peripheral vision. If I can see ground around me, I'm very comfortable. But when the ground slopes away on either side, even when the slope may not be very steep and when it's 6 feet wide where I'm standing, then I start to tense up. I have to force myself to logically remember that a 6-foot wide ridge is more than adequate to walk on and try to put on some mental "blinders" to get past the tough part. Once I've reached the top, I can feel that big smile spread across my face, and it's all worth it. |
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| 24thcenstfan | May 24 2007, 06:44 PM Post #10 |
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That pun wasn't intentional at all.
I have never had a problem with heights. I have never climbed a massive mountain either. The effect could be totally different. |
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Everest is twice as high as I've ever gone. And the air at only 14,000 feet is thin enough! I would have a lot to learn about climbing with ropes, ice axes, and crampons, and I would probably have to quit a full-time job to devote all my time to getting into physical shape for it. Not to mention that I'd have to be independently wealthy in order to pay for all the supplies, travel expenses, hiring porters, and equipment it would take, as well as the support team to help me haul all the stuff and monitor the weather conditions.
8:03 PM Jul 10