Ama Dablam. We climbed the 1961 first-ascent route. Our members were John Michaud, John Tuckey, Scott Johnson, Ken Morr, Ben Greene, Karen Simmonds, Joe Burleson, Ron Crotzer and I as leader. We arrived at Base Camp on September 16. We then fixed a mixture of old water-ski tow ropes and ropes left by the Spanish as far as Camp II. Beyond the Yellow Tower we fixed our four climbing ropes to the start of the Mushroom Ridge, saving only one for climbing. Michaud, Tuckey and Johnson took a tent to the site of Camp III to spend the night and reached the summit on October 5. After another night at Camp III, they left the tent there and descended to Base Camp. On October 7 Greene and I descended from Camp II with altitude problems. On October 9 all of us except for Simmonds, Greene and me left Tang- boche, while the three of us went back to Base Camp. At that point an old knee injury nearly prevented Simmonds from walking at all. On the 10th I climbed to Camp II. October 11 was a long day getting to Camp III. When the first summit three came down the Mushroom Ridge, they could not pull down the rappel rope and cut off what they had been able to pull down. That was all the climbing rope I had. On October 12 I reached the summit on a very windy day and was back in Camp III just after noon. I decided to wait till the next morning for better snow on the Mushroom Ridge and sat there for 18 hours watching the tent disintegrate in the high winds. On the 13th I discarded the remains of the tent and descended to Base Camp. Ben Greene and I cleaned everything but anchors from Camp II down on October 14. On the 15th we all left Base Camp.

Gary Neptune