Out of Pod Experience

Climbing big mountains has always been my sort of childhood fantasy - this is kind of hypocritical, however, as I suffer of acrophobia AKA fear of heights.
Considering that I'm gonna be rich enough to eat 10 pounds of caviar a day, I would really love to take on the mountain in the years that come, as I am afraid that a 15 YO kid like me cannot defeat such a colossus of the skies.
Everest has many perils. You could fall into a crevice, you can take a tumble down a cliff or you could get caught up in a demon's tempest and not live to brave it. Despite this, hundreds of people manage to summit Everest, trekking from the lowest city to the highest peak, with a 56% success rate as of 2013. But then again, the "friendly" Nepalese Government forces you to buy a permit for climbing Everest at the wondrous price of ONLY $10.000 (ten thousand dollars). Then you need to pay an extra ten thousand dollars for the trip - no hotels included.
Due to the arguments above, I have made a set of questions - some require only a mere answer, whilst others are of a debative nature and are seldom answered simply.

1) Is the climb worth it? With 20K worth of dollars for the climbing part alone, there's no going back once you pay the money. A bad way of losing cash, even worse than a middle-aged husband hitting the strip club every night.

2) Is it a worthwhile investment of your time? You could pride yourself with climbing the highest mountain, but there could be a chance that you'll pick up several sweet girls on your way: one of them is named Gravity, and the other is Hypothermia. Oh, and she also has a cousin: Hypoxia! Joke aside, should you run the risk of falling to one of these circumstances along the way?

3) Will Everest's rope-routes still be OK to use? - In the wake of the deadly avalanche that took the lives of 13 Sherpas in 2014, these Nepalese locals that pride themselves with an uncanny prowess in mountaineering now refuse to lead any group of tourists or repair ropes along the paths - provided that they do not use those, meaning that the white-boy's route will be littered with decrepit ropes.

4) How do you avoid overcrowding? The prime time for climbing is somewhere between the middle of April and the end of may (I think), and you can't go any other time because there will be those damned monsoons AKA demon's tempest. Standing for hours in a queue to wait for those slow-poked amateurs is a good way to get snowblindness or for your O2 tank to run out of juice.


Your opinion matters!

Why the Everest? It's not the more dangerous, not the prettiest, not the most difficult, and is overcrowded. It only is "the highest" (from sea level) but not the tallest (that's the Mauna Kea).

So, why the Everest?

OP has no climbing experience.
OP decides to make Everest his first mountain.

The best caviar goes for 3k+ per pound (so sayeth google, no personal experience here.) Or 30+k a day (at OP's 10 pounds a day.)
Why is OP quibbling over the 20k for the fees? Or does OP not understand how rich you have to be before you're considered rich?

OP is 15 years old.
I know a little old lady who's 99 years old.
I think about everything I've learned and done and seen in 40+ years. And then I think of what I can do with another 40. Then I realize that that little old lady already has lived twice the lives that I have (and has six of the OP's lifetimes.)

OP needs to grow and learn. OP needs to take up climbing as a hobby to see if OP's childhood fantasy is just that or something more. OP needs to learn the value of money.


tl;dr - OP is talking about Everest, but OP isn't asking what it takes to build/grow/develop an OP who can climb Everest successfully.

Mountain climbing for entertainment ("self-actualization"... yada yada), is a fundamentally selfish act.

You wouldn't be doing it to help others. You wouldn't be doing it to advance human knowledge (we've been there, done that). The only purpose then would be to satiate some desire you have.

You'd be risking all you are, everything you have, everything you'll ever be, and every positive impact you might have had on anyone in the future, for that desire. This fact differentiates climbing Everest from other things you do because you like them. You're risking immediate demise for possible gratification, and that is both selfish and foolish.

But what of the elevated notion of excellence, achievement... I do believe those things are noble when they push back the frontiers. They are sometimes necessary risk of sacrifice for the elevation or deliverance of others. As mere entertainment or amusement though? No.

My $0.02.

I want to know why the OP is going to be so rich.

Don't start with Everest if you don't have any climbing experience. Start with a tree in your backyard. Claiming and hanging off trees helped me build a lot of my initial endurance for taking on walls and then mountains.

Try an easy mountain first.. something in a temperate area without all the complications that snow, ice, and low temperature poses. Build your strength at a climbing gym. Your legs, your arms, your feet, and your hands are invaluable. They will shave hours off a climb and save your life.

I prefer to be a gearless climber but I have experience climbing with gear in the Himalayas and in Concordia. If you have any questions, feel free to shoot me an evemail.

Because, if he doesn't climb that mountain he will neverest ....