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Don’t have time for pesky weeks of acclimatization when you want to climb Mt Everest? How about doing the whole thing in under a week. All through the wonders of Xenon gas.

A small group of Furtenbach Adventures clients plan to fly to Kathmandu this spring and try out a new climbing method. After arriving, they will receive xenon therapy in a clinic before flying to Everest Base Camp for an immediate summit push. The plan is to climb Everest in three days, with full oxygen and sherpa support.

How? Xenon, an inert gas occasionally used as an anesthetic, has been observed to have the side effect of radically increasing the body’s production of EPO (erythropoietin, a hormone that regulates a healthy level of red blood cells). Xenon helps red blood cells multiply without acclimatizing or injecting a synthetic version of the hormone. Furtenbach became a believer in xenon therapy after it was suggested by Michael Fries, a German anesthesiologist. It was tried by Furtenbach to great success on a climb of Aconcagua in 2000. Medical studies show it doesn’t have any of the harmful side effects of other similar medications.

The hope is to reduce HACE and HAPE deaths, reduce the dangerous up and down traversals through the Khumbu ice sheet, as well as reduce the life-threatening effects of frostbite and high altitude degradation. It is causing a stir in the climbing community that believes this just reinforces the idea of a more tourist-like behavior of bagging a summit for Instagram over demonstrating real climbing skills or embracing the hard-fought values of the climbing community.

The method may be fast, but it won’t be cheap. Furtenbach will charge his xenon climbers $154,000. Xenon gas treatment is extremely pricey: A 30-minute session costs $5,000 per person.

Articles:

• https://explorersweb.com/you-can-now-climb-everest-in-a-week-using-xenon-doping-the-implications/
• Furtenbach Adventures explained the new approach to Simon Usborne published on the Financial Times.

Gear Patrol reported on a new four-season capsule tent that assembles in under five minutes, can sleep four, and fits into a backpack. It’s called the Air Station Pod-01 and it’s made by Exod – a company that also makes the Monolith inflating tent.

The shelter supposedly takes just five minutes to assemble with the included hand pump, and once set up, it offers a self-standing design with 4.2m² of floor space. The exterior of the capsule has two tunnel doors, a pair of windows and multiple ventilation points. All four walls can also be easily lifted up to create an open-air shelter. It weighs 18.7 lbs and can be disassembled by one person in five minutes, including the time it takes to stuff it into the included 25 x 35 x 64cm carrying backpack.

It’s claimed to be rigid enough to stand up in four seasons – but I’m curious how it would do with 3″ of snow on it (4.2m² = 6430in² * 3″ of snow = 19,440in³ or 11.25 cubic feet. Snow weighs about 12 pounds per cubic foot, so 3″ snow would weigh roughly 135lbs); or if its tie-down system could stand up to 20-35mph winds on a ridge.

At $2,679 (now $1930 at their website) it’s not cheap, but it certain is cool looking and would likely be right at home at a Burning Man style festival where wind/snow might not be a problem.

Links:

• https://www.gearpatrol.com/outdoors/exod-air-station-pod-01/
• https://www.gearpatrol.com/briefings/today-in-gear/g38686751/today-in-gear-1-13-2022/
• https://en.exod.store/pod-01

Luno makes a lot of cool car camping gear. Pillows, window covers, camp fans, organizers and other upscale tidbits for your #vanlife. Now they’re offering their AIR+FOAM custom fitted car camping mattresses. They claim to be better than a standard air mattress because they use air and perforated open-cell foam sandwiched between protective layers.

Each set is custom fitted for your specific vehicle. You put in your make/model/year and it’ll find the set that perfectly fits your vehicle (if available). It looks like they charge a flat $499 for most vehicles.

For the more budget minded, they have cheaper pre-owned/upcycled/returned products.

Car camping is fun, but something you should always keep in mind is that these pretty much take up all your cargo space (unless you use only one – which is a nice feature). So, if you’re bringing any other gear/food it better all fit in the front seat or it’ll sit outside all night (in the rain/snow/elements and with critters or bears around to nibble on anything edible). Some other tips for car camping here – like always sleeping with your head pointed uphill (since it’s been shown being inverted for long periods has even led healthy people to death).

The Ulakhan-Sis Mountain Range is in the Sakha Republic, Far Eastern Federal District, Russia. This range is one area of Yakutia – which is one of the most isolated and distant portions of northern Russia. This area is largely unexplored and uninhabited – only being first mapped in 1870. It’s nearest inhabited neighbor to the south is the infamous Kolyma area of Russia that served as Stalin’s brutal gulags.

They’ve been getting a little more exposure lately with climbers and visitors making the treacherous thousand mile trip to the range. What makes it interesting is that the area is marked by fascinating baydzharakhs rock formations. Kigilyakh rock formations are also found on this range, some of them quite impressive.

Baydzherakhs are formed by a cryo-lithic process in which polygonal ice-wedges thaw within the permafrost and reach heights of 15-30 feet. They form a landscape of unearthly spires. Not that different than the Penitentes in the Atacama desert.

I ran across this interesting article on The Trek.co about what footwear people wore while hiking the 2190 mile Appalachian trail. Taking many weeks to complete, the trail is a grueling test of equipment. Most trail hikers ended up wearing out 4-5 sets of shoes – matching the recommendation to retire shoes after 500 miles of hiking.

The most interesting point to me was that hiking boots were not high on the list of footwear hikers have been wearing. While still recommended for snowy sections, the vast majority of the hikers used trail runners. When I started hiking decades ago, I actually preferred hiking easier trails in more rugged tennis shoes too. I somewhat feel vindicated. 🙂 The data they collected for the last 2 years shows boots were only worn by around 10% of hikers. There was also the trend that people that started with hiking boots were more likely to end up switching to trail runners during their journey.

Shoe satisfaction showed 91 percent of respondents who began their hike in trail runners said they were happy with their choice. On the other hand, only 64 percent of hikers starting in hiking boots were satisfied.

For all shoe types, fit was one of the most important factors in switching footwear; which just reinforces the age-old wisdom to get plenty of long miles in your boots/shoes before major trips to make sure they don’t have any hot spots, issues with swelling feet, or other similar problems. I personally find the adage of ‘breaking in’ boots/shoes to be complete bunk. In my experience, if the shoes don’t fit and aren’t comfortable right off, they never become so later.

You can read the rest of the excellent article since it also has recommendations and breakdown of hiking shoes, socks, and other equipment they most used. The summary was this:

1. The trend of most hikers wearing trail runners over heavier, sturdier boots continued this year; the numbers were about the same as last year with a slight (3%) dip in popularity for trail runners.
2. While boots may still be preferable during the snowy sections, we recommend that hikers planning thrus or long sections consider lightweight, more flexible shoes for the majority of their hikes.
3. In general, thru-hikers should plan to go through four to five pairs of trail runners or two to three pairs of boots.
4. Altra remains the top brand for trail runners, and the most popular model was the Lone Peak.
5. Topo Athletic made the list for the first time, ranking in the top 4 brands and boasting the third most popular model overall with the Ultraventure.
6. Darn Tough, Injinji, and Smartwool socks were all well-represented on the AT, but Darn Tough was by far the most popular with 75 percent of respondents using them.
7. Injinji is the leader in sock liners, used by almost a third of respondents.