It’s incredible how the mood changes with the weather. When the sun is
shining I’m happy and when it’s snowing I’m sad. During the last week my
mood has been bouncing up and down like a ball. With ten days of good
weather and good acclimating climbs everything looked great and my
confidence was on top. Then it started snowing and the days went by
without any change. More and more snow was piling up outside my tent.
After six days of continuously snowfall and with my tent disappearing
behind the snow walls most of my thoughts were negative. I started
thinking about how to get out the valley to go home instead of thinking of
how to get up the mountain.
Sunday morning I woke up to a blue sky and sunshine over the northeast
ridge of Dhaulagiri. In an instant my mood changed and I was forming plans
for the summit push. It’s interesting what a bit of sunshine can do.

Tomorrow Tuesday I will leave base camp together with Austrians Andreas
and Lawrence and Edvin and Tomas from Holland to try to make it up to Camp
1. We will leave early in the morning to be able to walk on top of the
frozen snow and hopefully we will reach C1 before it’s too hot. According
to the Korean climber Kim, who came down from C1 yesterday, all the tents
are covered by snow. So I guess there will be a bit of digging to find my
tent that I left up there on my last visit.
If conditions and weather are good I will continue up towards C2 and C3
the following days. Very early Friday morning I will put the skis on my
backpack, leave my tent in C3 and start climbing towards the summit of
Dhaulagiri.

For more info about Fredrik and the Dhaulagiri Expedition check out his
website www.fredrikericsson.com

Fredrik’s partners: Dynastar, Osprey, Adidas Eyewear.
Supporters: Grivel, Giro, Ortovox, Dynafit, Therm-Ic, Himaya, Duracell,
Loben Expeditions and Jämtport.