That is a queue of climbers, 320 of them in fact, standing on a mountain ridge just a few days ago: Wednesday, May 22, waiting to make the final climb to the summit.

The ridge is at 8000m altitude and the summit is, of course, that of Mt Everest.

Seven people have died on the mountain in the last week alone. Two on that Wednesday, and one of them almost certainly because she was trapped by this traffic jam in “the death zone” for too long. Both of them were in their mid-50’s and reasonably experienced climbers.

I get the idea that people want to achieve things, including getting to the tops of mountains if they’re climbers. But the Mt Everest summit achievement is starting to get stupid. What sort of boast is it any longer when it’s literally a queue to get to the top? Why not tackle slightly lesser peaks like K2, peaks which are no less challenging, sometimes more so from a technical point of view, and in some respects more dangerous than Everest.

Okay. One can say that I don’t get it because I’ve never been into mountain climbing, but by contrast I’m incredibly impressed by the feat of Alex Honnold, who in 2017 free-climbed the 3000 foot high granite wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park.

Free-climbing means no ropes or any other safety gear. He used only his feet, hands, body and a degree of mental discipline that is almost literally beyond belief. Moreover he did this after years of practice free-climbing on increasingly long climbs, plus climbing the wall with ropes so as to build up the incredibly detailed plan of the route he would take and how each single step would be done.

He did it in 3 hours 56 minutes.

I doubt they’ll ever be a queue for this effort, nor guide companies to help you along the way.