Comments on: Gigapixel Everest

Gigapixel Everest

jontyjago — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 07:55:35 -0800

Gigapixel image of the Khumbu Glacier and Mount Everest Taken by filmmaker David Breashears this is a gigapixel image of Everest (the mainly rock peak to the left of centre) and surrounding area taken in Spring 2012. To get an idea of the scale Everest basecamp can be seen in the bottom-centre area of the image. Best viewed fullscreen.

By: curious nu

curious nu — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:06:47 -0800

It's a pretty big mountain.

By: COD

COD — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:09:03 -0800

If you zoom in on the glacier (just above the V formed by the two mountains in the center of the image) you can also see a long line of climbers.

By: daveje

daveje — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:18:38 -0800

Love this. Been reading a lot of Everest disaster porn lately, and this helps me understand the route and the problems a lot better.

By: Capt. Renault

Capt. Renault — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:31:17 -0800

I guess it's *kinda* big...

By: dhartung

dhartung — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:35:53 -0800

There's a route map here, small but descriptive and from nearly the same orientation.

By: Jehan

Jehan — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:37:22 -0800

That's a right neat picture.

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:53:34 -0800

Stunning. Basecamp is like a small city. There's a line of tents at what I guess is camp IV halfway up the Lhotse face, and people scattered about the whole icefall. The look to have kept to the left-hand side of the glacier this particular season. The whole endeavor is madness, if you ask me, though I'd love to just look at it some day.

By: genug

genug — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:54:29 -0800

Base camp looks like it has enough tents for well over a thousand people. I had assumed it was more like a hundred or maybe a few hundred. Looks like there's more than a hundred people just on the glacier where COD pointed. I had no idea it was such a vast enterprise.

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 08:59:25 -0800

Looking at that route map, that's actually camp III. Camps 1 & 2 are kinda hidden in this view & camp IV is up at the South Col. I had no idea it was such a vast enterprise. It's kinda out of hand at this point. I'd like to see the Nepalese more strictly regulate the number of people allowed on the mountain at any given time. Overcrowding is a serious issue.

By: Capt. Renault

Capt. Renault — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:27:59 -0800

The whole endeavor is madness, if you ask me, though I'd love to just look at it some day. My neighbour traveled to just the base camp. He said that was enough to get the awe. Didn't think any more than that was necessary for anyone.

By: Thorzdad

Thorzdad — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:44:12 -0800

If you zoom in on the glacier (just above the V formed by the two mountains in the center of the image) you can also see a long line of climbers. That's a pretty amazing thing to see. The sense of scale is pretty damned humbling.

By: samworm

samworm — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:44:25 -0800

That's a great picture, does anyone know if the full image can be downloaded? The flash viewer is pretty hopeless really....

By: OHenryPacey

OHenryPacey — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:52:24 -0800

This is a place i've never been, but i've read so many expedition journals, books about the climb and websites following the season that I felt quite comfortable navigating my way up the rout from base camp to the summit, fully zoomed in, noting climbers just where I would expect to see them. This is a terrific image. Also, i wonder why more folks don't try to ski the Lhotse face?

By: dances_with_sneetches

dances_with_sneetches — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 09:53:27 -0800

Where does Mt. Everest begin, separate from the other mountains? At what altitude? Because I've always fantasized climbing Mt. Everest to the bottom. (although in my bragging I'd probably just say climbed Mt. Everest.)

By: yeti

yeti — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:01:16 -0800

This is so amazing. Especially zooming in all the way and tracking the climbers on the Khumbu Icefall itself, and then the line of people at the base of the Lhotse face and then the tiny tents up at Camp III. Then, staying zoomed, scroll up and up and up. Keep scrolling. You may get tired but eventually you'll find the top of the mountain. Congratulations! You made it!

By: Mister_A

Mister_A — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:05:13 -0800

Yeti! What are you doing here?

By: rtha

rtha — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:16:03 -0800

He's also doing very cool work comparing historical photos with contemporary ones of various glaciers.

By: Devils Rancher

Devils Rancher — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:16:50 -0800

My neighbour traveled to just the base camp. I would actually love to do that. There's an Everest trekking co. here in Austin, and if I were young and carefree, I'd ship out with them as a camp hand, & work a season at basecamp.

By: zombieflanders

zombieflanders — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:32:27 -0800

Best viewed fullscreen. We're gonna need a bigger monitor.

By: jfuller

jfuller — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:57:00 -0800

> That's a great picture, does anyone know if the full image can be downloaded? The flash viewer is pretty hopeless really.... The only media file the firefox page information tool reports there is EBC_Pumori_050112_8bit_FLAT.swf. You can get that and it will open in a Flash player but it's not the mountain. This makes me sad; with that file local, my need for models of icy craggy terrain would be taken care of for.ever. Die, Flash, die.

By: Wordshore

Wordshore — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:58:41 -0800

I'd like to go to base camp (but no higher), but it looks kind of like ... well, a camp. Or the Glastonbury Festival site, but with less mud, more snow, and not the fear that the headline act will be replaced by Justin Bieber at short notice. Am kind of too old, and needing home comforts, to do the tent thing anyway. Out of curiosity (I have scanned the picture), at or near to base camp, is there: - Wifi (essential) - a hotel or motel (nothing posh, but a good shower is always nice) (HBO also good) - a decent coffee place (not expecting a Starbucks of course, but somewhere serving a decent cappuccino always good) - a nice bookstore or two for when the weather is gloomy / the mountain view gets a bit "meh" - somewhere to buy gloves or mittens

By: Wordshore

Wordshore — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 11:14:22 -0800

Discovered a wikipedia page on Everest Base Camp which indicates there is at least tea there.

By: DelusionsofGrandeur

DelusionsofGrandeur — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 13:41:18 -0800

Those of you who'd like to go to basecamp (EBC), it's totally doable. I did it in March this year, I'm 43, at least 10kg overweight, have a bad left knee and right foot, and "gave up" smoking about 4 months before the trip. A friend and I walked from Lukla to EBC in 11 days, no guide, no porters and no tent. It took us 3 days to walk back down. I have photos here. And that gigapixel photo is 10 different kinds of fucking awesome!

By: pjm

pjm — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 14:01:21 -0800

Everest Base Camp is just a concatenation of what all the expeditions provide (for their own clients) each year, and is just what it looks like in the picture: tent city. Nice to say "been there", but that's about it. Nearby, however... jaw droppingly beautiful, almost every time you lift your head. Wifi? Depends what you're after. There's cell phone reception at base camp (even on the summit, though it's a bit wonky), but the highest internet café is at Dingboche. Hotel/motel? There are a few tea houses at Gorek Shep. Definitely *not* decent, and the showers, if available, are a bucket of hot water. This was the original "base camp". Not a place I'd choose to spend more time than I had to. My tummy starts rumbling at just the thought of the woeful food we ate there. It's terrible coffee all the way from Tengboche to Base Camp. The former town has a great little coffee shop and bakery -- I think our Nepalese guides found it outrageously/comically expensive, but a decent cup of coffee on the way back (after Base Camp/Kala Partha, and climbing Island Peak) was worth pretty much any rupees I had left. The bookstore is whatever's in your backpack or on your kindle. You can charge most gadgets along the way (for increasingly more money per hour). Best place to buy everything is definitely Namche Bazaar (one to two days walk from Lukla, which is where you land, and three or four days from base camp, from memory). You can certainly buy bits and pieces of everything at other towns along the way (particularly Dingboche), but the range and quality of the items in Namche Bazaar is quite astonishing.

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 14:07:29 -0800

Denali is more visually impressive, rising as it does some 18,000 feet from its surroundings. I love big mountains.

By: Ghidorah

Ghidorah — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 15:27:00 -0800

I've read a ton of books about it, and see some photos of the face, but I don't think I've ever really seen pictures of the ice fall. I had a lot of images in my head, and I think it's a tribute to the writer's I've read that it isn't all that far off from what I imagined. I'd love to get to base camp, too, just to see the mountain up close. I'd never try the climb in a million years, and I'll most likely never get to basecamp. This photo, though, makes up for a lot of that. Thanks for posting it.

By: hubs

hubs — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 15:37:42 -0800

Trying to find the hikers? Here's where to look.

By: aacheson

aacheson — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 15:48:04 -0800

There are a bunch more hikers. They are almost to Camp3. In fact, there are probably dozens scattered throughout the route. Its fun to try to find them. I didn't find any about camp 3. However, now, after reading Into Thin Air, I can see how that guy just walked off the face behind the camp. Its tiny and nothing is there but a couple of tents! Thats a crazy picture.

By: various

various — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 17:17:46 -0800

Yeti! What are you doing here? There is no Yeti.

By: desjardins

desjardins — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 18:43:30 -0800

I don't know what you guys are talking about, looks like some ants on a giant pile of frosting.

By: desjardins

desjardins — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 18:44:05 -0800

Also, no Waldo jokes?

By: kliuless

kliuless — Thu, 20 Dec 2012 08:34:39 -0800

He's also doing very cool work comparing historical photos with contemporary ones of various glaciers. Glacial melt may hit the Oscars with the stunning, somber Chasing Ice, fwiw...