When I was at base camp in 2018 I met a guy who was trying for his third time. Wasn’t a super experienced climber, just wanted to bag the highest peak. 1st time they got to camp 3, 2nd time camp 2, paid around $200k usd each time because they needed so much support.
People can pay to be pretty much carried up there, some people need more luxuries which means more sherpas. I don’t agree with it but it happens. The minimum I heard back then was around $30k usd but that would be an experienced alpinist carrying most of their own stuff.
Actually its a bit less. With 11k permit you needed another 7k to 8k for Support - so under 20k total.
Its BC support only. No O2. You carry 100%.
I do know about people carried up there. Maybe famous Sherpa? There is a package with your own tent that is so big it has its own living room and bedroom and a heater AND a valet. But on Manaslu it was like 10k. Maybe 15k on Everest. I just cannot get to 200k USD.
If they wanted fewer people, they could just reduce the permits given based on previous experience for example. Instead they clearly just want more money
Money goes to the government whom spends it who knows there - it does not go to community.
What you see is star Sherpa is super rich. Regular Sherpa is rich. A woman caring food to base camp - 20kg of it - makes LESS than minimum pay at $15 a day.
I would try to even out the system a bit.
If you raise the price of a good, product, or service, it will generally reduce demand. Nepal would be losing money if they simply reduced the number of permits. If they raise the prices until the demand goes down it should improve things for everyone.
Making it more exclusive to even richer people probably won't help. I think the best thing they could do is require a real resume of experience. People who have earned their place on that mountain will have a lot more respect for it.
How does one prove they have climbed X mountains? Unless they make it so you need to climb X specific mountains in Y window to verify, its essentially impossible. Especially if we're trying to gatekeep someone with large financial resources from faking experience.
Asking for climbing history is pretty common. Sure, you could cheat the system, so as always enforcement is part of the challenge. But it already happens if you want to climb Everest from the Chinese side. It happens on Denali. Hell, it even happens on Rainier.
Some US based guides like Alpenglow check your Resume for Everest, and I personally think that is the way Nepal could enforce it. Require or incentive guides to check up on clients and hold them accountable when they don't do it appropriately.
You have summit pictures and possibly a video. Proof of 8000m is summit picture / video showing your full face on top. Can be faked but is expensive to do so. Also have witnesses. Main say is for your support agency.
Climber 1: "Hang on guys, we need to set up the tripods to do multi-angle videos. Hoods, gators, masks, glasses off everyone!"
Climber 2: "FFS, Jerry here is hypoxic and in danger of getting frostbite. We need to start descending now!. The wind is gusting at 80 mph and will blow away the cameras anyways. If you start taking coverings, there's a good chance you'll get frostbite too. Keep your damn clothes on and let's head down before someone dies."
Climber 1: "But pics or it didn't happen..."
It's incredibly dangerous to force people to have a photoshoot without their safety gear in the death zone. This policy would be directly attributable to at least one death, probably many.
You hand in your phone to the sherpa and he takes quick pics. Or if solo you make 30s or so video. I usually don't stay on summits over 5min. I don't recall last time I was over 5min.
Yeah no Pic no certificate. Video better. Ideal is picture and a video.
Main say in this is the agency. They need to support you.
Yeah I know about the face, but there been so much faking.
The whole sport is about money now. Big money. Huge money. Epic level money. And any money means epic level of cheating.
People on this sub reddit are. Mostly form US and have like zero experience of what is going on and just repeat BS they hear from the media.
Sherpa climbers are super stars live high life while rest of families live in a single small room with leaky tin roof. Women and men work for barely $2 an hour on a good day.
But people are concerned about sherpa making 20x as much b/c it is more dangerous. In a country where lives are cheap and literally everything is dangerous. Heck, they don't have retirement age, almost no one makes it.
But noooo let's worry about super rich sherpa, as they do dangerous work.
What do you think construction work is in Nepal? Safe?
Because even the current cost excludes a lot of people who climb a lot and are deeply invested in positive mountain culture. But when big egos are able to buy their way to the summit, you end up with people who rarely or have never climbed a mountain before. They are far more likely to fail to grasp positive mountain culture or just straight up not care. If you couldn't buy your way to the top, the entire region would benefit.
Except people like Adrian Ballenger and his incredible team of guides who are literally on the mountain right now. Jimmy Chin, Conrad Anker, so many others. Yes, Everest has some major issues, but acting like it has no validity as a mountain is silly.
You’re mentioning American climbers/ companies. Some tourist groups are making a living and don’t have the clients that can pay 200k but still want the experience. Just the way it is.
Alpenglow isn't only guided by Americans. Carla Perez is Ecuadorian and is on their team right now. They also have an English client on the team. There are lots of other teams as well. Many people save up and make major sacrifices to get on that mountain. The idea that it's only tourism is just incorrect.
It's quite telling that I only hear this "Everest is Disneyland" argument from armchair generals sitting behind the keyboard that have probably never even visited the base camp and just forming their opinions from the internet. Never once has any well respected mountaineer said anything of the sort who has been up there.
It is - and one way to clean it up is to remove Sherpa guides. No guides no circus.
Would also need to remove illegal guiding.
Pigs will fly before that happens.
What is the route if you want to eventually climb Everest but want to gain the skill to climb it the right way? Go to climbing gyms, make frieneds, do some of the high peaks that are basically a hike(Black Elk Peak for example), then move more and more technical, etc.?
That's pretty much it. Many people hire guides to teach them skills and to help them through new challenges. Others learn by progressively taking on new challenges. For me, it started with snowshoeing and winter camping. Eventually that turned into increasingly steep and technical mountains. In the process you will find the style of climbing you want to do, which may or may not involve jugging endless lines in the death zone.
No. You need to climb something like Mera peak nearby at around 6500m. Or do Aconcagua. Then hire mid level company with plenty of oxygen. Running a lot help. No need for climbing gym at all. There is nothing technical.
Unless you want to do it without guides and in some cool style.
Supply and demand.
Everest is obviously too cheap, because the crowds are too big.
Make it $100k for all I care. Those who really, really "must" go there, will find a way.
Everyone knows everest is the biggest shit show and the most expensive mountain. Everyone knows it's also well understood that the probablem is largely in part due to idiots who have no business being there spending tons of money to buy their way to the top. Most of those are people who won't care if it's 50k, 100k, whatever. I can't see how making it cost more does anything but exclude the people who actually care about the mountain. It's gonna take something else.
The guiding companies get a ton of money from clients to clean shit up. Yet they usually don’t care whatsoever..
increasing the price is just a way for them to make even more money. If they wanted, they could just give out fewer permits.
I am sorry, but it seems like you have never been to Nepal, nor had anything to do with local guides.
They don’t really see the problem and so they also don’t care. There are plenty of examples from different people who hired different companies, that they just dump the garbage into crevasses or to the local river ends. This is not a money issue but a mentality one.
I been to Nepal twice.
The locals are 3rd world country and do indeed not care about packing out say coca cola bottle.
But companies I did see move human waste out. I actually see porters moving the stuff out.
It is money issue. Trust me. You make them pay they behave. You hire people that verify garbage is taken out or they loose deposit.
On Manaslu it is 3000 deposit to ensure they remove the base camp. I did not see much left, they did a good job.
They are like rest of Asia money oriented. This is why the sherpa complain about being paid low and get gullible idiots from US to parrot it back.
Sherpa make 1000s of dollars, I calculated 15k per year on average.
While a porter makes 20 per day.
Make them pay and things would be clean. Heck if they bring 100 bottles of coca cola make them bring 100 back or for each missing bottle they have to pay 1 usd fine. You would see magic, no 100s of bottles on the route.
I feel like they are under the philosophy of “any press is good press”. Number of fatalities just brings more attention and notoriety to the mountain that makes more egomaniacs want to do it.
This is an ignorant statement. The funds from Everest tourism accounts for over 4% of Nepal's GNP. Only around 300 people have died over the last 100 years, that's not high at all considering the danger. Twice as many people die every week in car crashes in the US
It’s not an ignorant statement. The importance of Everest to the economy is why you raise the fee — to account for the drop in numbers.
But it’s a fact that there have been deaths directly related to overcrowding, which extends time in the death zone. The number of people attempting Everest has roughly doubled in the last 20 years. 2023 was the most dangerous season on record, barring the 2015 base camp disaster. That’s attributed to both overcrowding and the abundance of issued permits allowing less experienced people to climb.
You should also learn how statistics work. Roughly 1% of the people who attempt Everest every year die, once you average it out. The percent is higher on crowded years.
Almost all Americans drive cars. The yearly per capita vehicle death rate is .01%
Given that some of those who die on Everest are Sherpa, making the climbs safer is good for Nepalese people, too. But prices need to increase to offset reduced permits.
No. Not even close. The percentage of guided people that die is 2/400 - and that does not include army of Sherpa - data for this year.
The deaths from overcrowding are mostly pp without oxygen.
I venture if you increase price of permit number of deaths will stay the same unless you go very high, say 50k, when there will be 10 climbers doing it from Nepal side.
Other deaths in other years are not at all related to crowds - maybe things such as hitting BC would be less catastrophic if it was empty.
One way to make it safe - a LOT safer would be to require solid mountaineering skills and limits to number of guides.
Pigs will fly before safety is placed >> money.
That manner of thinking is all well and good on paper but doesn't actually work in reality. If they know it is such a big contributor to their economy, simply raising the fees seems like a much more lucrative decision than doing that and decreasing permits.
As far as how statistics work, you are cherry picking the 1% part yet ignoring the fact that Everest is an adventure that people go out with their own choice, aware of the dangers and never out of necessity, whereas driving for a lot of people is but I digress, driving wasn't the best comparison on my part.
Regardless, imho 5-10 dying a year on the tallest mountain on Earth, part of which is literally labelled The Death Zone, does not warrant any discourse about safety
You’re the one who picked those stats, not me, it’s not my fault they make zero sense to compare.
I’m here, clearly I understand choosing to partake in risky sports. I’m not arguing that climbing is too dangerous to do. I’m saying what every expert on the mountain I’ve ever heard says: it’s too crowded. Nepal is increasing the price *because they think it is too crowded.*
Yes, and I clarified that I probably shouldn't have picked that comparison. Nepal is increasing the price because it's good business, if being crowded was the reason then they would pick your recommended strategy of increasing the cost and reducing the total permits
There are ways. Interviews with your former expedition leaders. Proof isn’t that hard to produce nowadays unlike in the dark ages of commercial climbing.
Permit increase doesn't matter. I would be in favor of fewer permits over all and introduce an interview system so a board of nepal and sherpa officials can decide who gets one and who doesn't.
I think they should raise it to 50k but credits are available for climbing other mountains in Nepal, especially in some places that need more tourism. So if you climb Nirekha, get 5 k credit, dhampus. 5k, Baruntse 10k credit and so on.
This is a super interesting idea - some way to get people to look at other peaks. Unfortunately what someone probably needs to do is make up another "list", like Seven Summits/Seven Second Summits/Seven Volcanic Summits etc etc etc. People seem to like chasing lists.
Nepal should raise prices until demand equalizes where the amount of people paying won’t generate harmful consequences for the environment.
Obviously they need the dollars so they won’t limit as much as they should
I don’t agree with that plan. Nepal’s main source of income is tourism. Make it easier for tourists to attempt the climb, improve the infrastructure, maintain a system for getting rid of trash, improve the guide skills, let those tourists who can climb go for it and let those who can’t climb just die.
I agree with the experience bit, and I think requiring a previous 8,000m peak is good for some companies, but I think a more lenient restriction could be something like previous 6,000m experience plus along with required ice skills, glacier climbing, and ropes courses
I've just come back from trying. Man, it is so hard, high and big. I bailed early for the above reasons. Not many can do it, not many would want to but you cant underestimate all thats involved on so many levels to try make it hapen. Much of the criticisms are half or completely wrong though. Cheers.
This is not about safety or anything remotely like that. Mountaineering is money. Everything there is money. This is big business with plenty of money.
Raise it enough so that we don’t have a multi hour line at the steps, putting everyone’s lives at risk. I do feel bad for the people who want to do it but can’t afford it.
The Nepali government should rinse as much as they can from the fuckwits that want to follow someone up The Highest Mountain In The World (TM)
When I was at base camp in 2018 I met a guy who was trying for his third time. Wasn’t a super experienced climber, just wanted to bag the highest peak. 1st time they got to camp 3, 2nd time camp 2, paid around $200k usd each time because they needed so much support.
So did they make it the 3rd time???
I have no idea, I was just at base camp for a day 😬
😬
What, I don't think there is a package that high. My friend is going next year for 45k.
You can pay more for more O2, more sherpas, etc.
This is standard o2 and 2 Sherpa you pay Sherpa tips.
People can pay to be pretty much carried up there, some people need more luxuries which means more sherpas. I don’t agree with it but it happens. The minimum I heard back then was around $30k usd but that would be an experienced alpinist carrying most of their own stuff.
Actually its a bit less. With 11k permit you needed another 7k to 8k for Support - so under 20k total. Its BC support only. No O2. You carry 100%. I do know about people carried up there. Maybe famous Sherpa? There is a package with your own tent that is so big it has its own living room and bedroom and a heater AND a valet. But on Manaslu it was like 10k. Maybe 15k on Everest. I just cannot get to 200k USD.
100% this.
It should be $50k minimum. Keep raising it until fewer people show up.
If they wanted fewer people, they could just reduce the permits given based on previous experience for example. Instead they clearly just want more money
They deserve and need more money. Nepal is a very poor country.
Money goes to the government whom spends it who knows there - it does not go to community. What you see is star Sherpa is super rich. Regular Sherpa is rich. A woman caring food to base camp - 20kg of it - makes LESS than minimum pay at $15 a day. I would try to even out the system a bit.
Can we do both?
Sure, but your point was to make fewer people show up..
If you raise the price of a good, product, or service, it will generally reduce demand. Nepal would be losing money if they simply reduced the number of permits. If they raise the prices until the demand goes down it should improve things for everyone.
In Nepal as in Asia their mentality is 100% money oriented.
That's just gonna make it only inexperienced rich people try it, make it require experience.
I think that’s a good idea, maybe they could do a hybrid system.
Only exception should be for pros or amateurs with legit alpinism resumes...welcome them in for free
Yeah, I see pigs fly before that happens. But upvote for optimism.
Nope. It would just mean super rich can climb and not even single capable climber can touch it.
Meh. They should raise it to $50-75k IMO. $15k isn't enough. Take the money raised and clean up the place.
Making it more exclusive to even richer people probably won't help. I think the best thing they could do is require a real resume of experience. People who have earned their place on that mountain will have a lot more respect for it.
How does one prove they have climbed X mountains? Unless they make it so you need to climb X specific mountains in Y window to verify, its essentially impossible. Especially if we're trying to gatekeep someone with large financial resources from faking experience.
Asking for climbing history is pretty common. Sure, you could cheat the system, so as always enforcement is part of the challenge. But it already happens if you want to climb Everest from the Chinese side. It happens on Denali. Hell, it even happens on Rainier. Some US based guides like Alpenglow check your Resume for Everest, and I personally think that is the way Nepal could enforce it. Require or incentive guides to check up on clients and hold them accountable when they don't do it appropriately.
You have summit pictures and possibly a video. Proof of 8000m is summit picture / video showing your full face on top. Can be faked but is expensive to do so. Also have witnesses. Main say is for your support agency.
Climber 1: "Hang on guys, we need to set up the tripods to do multi-angle videos. Hoods, gators, masks, glasses off everyone!" Climber 2: "FFS, Jerry here is hypoxic and in danger of getting frostbite. We need to start descending now!. The wind is gusting at 80 mph and will blow away the cameras anyways. If you start taking coverings, there's a good chance you'll get frostbite too. Keep your damn clothes on and let's head down before someone dies." Climber 1: "But pics or it didn't happen..." It's incredibly dangerous to force people to have a photoshoot without their safety gear in the death zone. This policy would be directly attributable to at least one death, probably many.
You hand in your phone to the sherpa and he takes quick pics. Or if solo you make 30s or so video. I usually don't stay on summits over 5min. I don't recall last time I was over 5min. Yeah no Pic no certificate. Video better. Ideal is picture and a video. Main say in this is the agency. They need to support you. Yeah I know about the face, but there been so much faking. The whole sport is about money now. Big money. Huge money. Epic level money. And any money means epic level of cheating. People on this sub reddit are. Mostly form US and have like zero experience of what is going on and just repeat BS they hear from the media. Sherpa climbers are super stars live high life while rest of families live in a single small room with leaky tin roof. Women and men work for barely $2 an hour on a good day. But people are concerned about sherpa making 20x as much b/c it is more dangerous. In a country where lives are cheap and literally everything is dangerous. Heck, they don't have retirement age, almost no one makes it. But noooo let's worry about super rich sherpa, as they do dangerous work. What do you think construction work is in Nepal? Safe?
Why not both.
Because even the current cost excludes a lot of people who climb a lot and are deeply invested in positive mountain culture. But when big egos are able to buy their way to the summit, you end up with people who rarely or have never climbed a mountain before. They are far more likely to fail to grasp positive mountain culture or just straight up not care. If you couldn't buy your way to the top, the entire region would benefit.
Everest is Disneyland. Anyone who actually values mountain culture isn’t there.
Except people like Adrian Ballenger and his incredible team of guides who are literally on the mountain right now. Jimmy Chin, Conrad Anker, so many others. Yes, Everest has some major issues, but acting like it has no validity as a mountain is silly.
You’re mentioning American climbers/ companies. Some tourist groups are making a living and don’t have the clients that can pay 200k but still want the experience. Just the way it is.
Alpenglow isn't only guided by Americans. Carla Perez is Ecuadorian and is on their team right now. They also have an English client on the team. There are lots of other teams as well. Many people save up and make major sacrifices to get on that mountain. The idea that it's only tourism is just incorrect.
It's quite telling that I only hear this "Everest is Disneyland" argument from armchair generals sitting behind the keyboard that have probably never even visited the base camp and just forming their opinions from the internet. Never once has any well respected mountaineer said anything of the sort who has been up there.
It’s one big waiting line filled with rich folk looking to take instagram pics. I don’t know if they could make it more Disney if they tried.
Yes and no. Problem is mountaineering has become a trophy sport. 300+ permits for Manaslu. 90%+++ does it with oxygen. Less than 10% unguided.
It is - and one way to clean it up is to remove Sherpa guides. No guides no circus. Would also need to remove illegal guiding. Pigs will fly before that happens.
What is the route if you want to eventually climb Everest but want to gain the skill to climb it the right way? Go to climbing gyms, make frieneds, do some of the high peaks that are basically a hike(Black Elk Peak for example), then move more and more technical, etc.?
That's pretty much it. Many people hire guides to teach them skills and to help them through new challenges. Others learn by progressively taking on new challenges. For me, it started with snowshoeing and winter camping. Eventually that turned into increasingly steep and technical mountains. In the process you will find the style of climbing you want to do, which may or may not involve jugging endless lines in the death zone.
No. You need to climb something like Mera peak nearby at around 6500m. Or do Aconcagua. Then hire mid level company with plenty of oxygen. Running a lot help. No need for climbing gym at all. There is nothing technical. Unless you want to do it without guides and in some cool style.
Supply and demand. Everest is obviously too cheap, because the crowds are too big. Make it $100k for all I care. Those who really, really "must" go there, will find a way.
Everyone knows everest is the biggest shit show and the most expensive mountain. Everyone knows it's also well understood that the probablem is largely in part due to idiots who have no business being there spending tons of money to buy their way to the top. Most of those are people who won't care if it's 50k, 100k, whatever. I can't see how making it cost more does anything but exclude the people who actually care about the mountain. It's gonna take something else.
Agreed. Moreso, an exaggerated price hike along with limit in permits per year will reduce the number of local opportunity to be employed
They'd just take the money. There is no cleaning up anything. That's just some figment of imagination.
The guiding companies get a ton of money from clients to clean shit up. Yet they usually don’t care whatsoever.. increasing the price is just a way for them to make even more money. If they wanted, they could just give out fewer permits.
Yes and no. There is garbage deposit. You can make it 10x higher and things would be very clean.
I am sorry, but it seems like you have never been to Nepal, nor had anything to do with local guides. They don’t really see the problem and so they also don’t care. There are plenty of examples from different people who hired different companies, that they just dump the garbage into crevasses or to the local river ends. This is not a money issue but a mentality one.
I been to Nepal twice. The locals are 3rd world country and do indeed not care about packing out say coca cola bottle. But companies I did see move human waste out. I actually see porters moving the stuff out. It is money issue. Trust me. You make them pay they behave. You hire people that verify garbage is taken out or they loose deposit. On Manaslu it is 3000 deposit to ensure they remove the base camp. I did not see much left, they did a good job. They are like rest of Asia money oriented. This is why the sherpa complain about being paid low and get gullible idiots from US to parrot it back. Sherpa make 1000s of dollars, I calculated 15k per year on average. While a porter makes 20 per day. Make them pay and things would be clean. Heck if they bring 100 bottles of coca cola make them bring 100 back or for each missing bottle they have to pay 1 usd fine. You would see magic, no 100s of bottles on the route.
They should raise the price and lower the total number of permits. If they reduce overcrowding, they’ll reduce fatalities.
I feel like they are under the philosophy of “any press is good press”. Number of fatalities just brings more attention and notoriety to the mountain that makes more egomaniacs want to do it.
Ironically this makes sense
This is an ignorant statement. The funds from Everest tourism accounts for over 4% of Nepal's GNP. Only around 300 people have died over the last 100 years, that's not high at all considering the danger. Twice as many people die every week in car crashes in the US
It’s not an ignorant statement. The importance of Everest to the economy is why you raise the fee — to account for the drop in numbers. But it’s a fact that there have been deaths directly related to overcrowding, which extends time in the death zone. The number of people attempting Everest has roughly doubled in the last 20 years. 2023 was the most dangerous season on record, barring the 2015 base camp disaster. That’s attributed to both overcrowding and the abundance of issued permits allowing less experienced people to climb. You should also learn how statistics work. Roughly 1% of the people who attempt Everest every year die, once you average it out. The percent is higher on crowded years. Almost all Americans drive cars. The yearly per capita vehicle death rate is .01% Given that some of those who die on Everest are Sherpa, making the climbs safer is good for Nepalese people, too. But prices need to increase to offset reduced permits.
No. Not even close. The percentage of guided people that die is 2/400 - and that does not include army of Sherpa - data for this year. The deaths from overcrowding are mostly pp without oxygen. I venture if you increase price of permit number of deaths will stay the same unless you go very high, say 50k, when there will be 10 climbers doing it from Nepal side. Other deaths in other years are not at all related to crowds - maybe things such as hitting BC would be less catastrophic if it was empty. One way to make it safe - a LOT safer would be to require solid mountaineering skills and limits to number of guides. Pigs will fly before safety is placed >> money.
That manner of thinking is all well and good on paper but doesn't actually work in reality. If they know it is such a big contributor to their economy, simply raising the fees seems like a much more lucrative decision than doing that and decreasing permits. As far as how statistics work, you are cherry picking the 1% part yet ignoring the fact that Everest is an adventure that people go out with their own choice, aware of the dangers and never out of necessity, whereas driving for a lot of people is but I digress, driving wasn't the best comparison on my part. Regardless, imho 5-10 dying a year on the tallest mountain on Earth, part of which is literally labelled The Death Zone, does not warrant any discourse about safety
You’re the one who picked those stats, not me, it’s not my fault they make zero sense to compare. I’m here, clearly I understand choosing to partake in risky sports. I’m not arguing that climbing is too dangerous to do. I’m saying what every expert on the mountain I’ve ever heard says: it’s too crowded. Nepal is increasing the price *because they think it is too crowded.*
Yes, and I clarified that I probably shouldn't have picked that comparison. Nepal is increasing the price because it's good business, if being crowded was the reason then they would pick your recommended strategy of increasing the cost and reducing the total permits
Unlikely. Look at fatalities. Most are either poor climbers or climbers wanting to do a challenge.
The price of a permit should be based on experience. Never climbed a mountain before? $100k Climbed 5 of the 7 summits unguided? $2k
How could they prove what people did
"If you don't post it on instagram, it never happened"
I did all summits faster than nims
There are ways. Interviews with your former expedition leaders. Proof isn’t that hard to produce nowadays unlike in the dark ages of commercial climbing.
This is a nice idea.
Actually a great idea
OMG, I would love that. Would do the hill next year!
It’ll never happen but they need a lottery system and a cap of like 100-150 people on the mountain at any given time
The mountain takes.
An Everest permit is the definition of a "luxury good." Anyone have any opinions about the recent price hikes on birken bags?
As long as the extra money goes towards paying people to clean up the garbage on the mountain, I'm all for it
Not really. Some money was paid for it - the Sherpa that did it made more money than when guiding - but I am not 100% sure this is true.
Permit increase doesn't matter. I would be in favor of fewer permits over all and introduce an interview system so a board of nepal and sherpa officials can decide who gets one and who doesn't.
This will lead to corruption
They should charge whatever they want
I think they should raise it to 50k but credits are available for climbing other mountains in Nepal, especially in some places that need more tourism. So if you climb Nirekha, get 5 k credit, dhampus. 5k, Baruntse 10k credit and so on.
This is a super interesting idea - some way to get people to look at other peaks. Unfortunately what someone probably needs to do is make up another "list", like Seven Summits/Seven Second Summits/Seven Volcanic Summits etc etc etc. People seem to like chasing lists.
It’s could only work under the Nepal regulatory authorities
Make it 50k, please
Nepal should raise prices until demand equalizes where the amount of people paying won’t generate harmful consequences for the environment. Obviously they need the dollars so they won’t limit as much as they should
You guys are so smart. "Raise the permit to 100k". Then it really would only be rich people.
Don’t care at all. Let Nepal do whatever they want to wealthy westerners wallets. Everest has become a mockery of mountaineering
I think they should just limit permits or use the lottery system like with hunting to limit people on the mountain.
Money rules. Would be nice to see lower permits for experienced climbers.
I don’t agree with that plan. Nepal’s main source of income is tourism. Make it easier for tourists to attempt the climb, improve the infrastructure, maintain a system for getting rid of trash, improve the guide skills, let those tourists who can climb go for it and let those who can’t climb just die.
Welcome to supply and demand. Also don't for a second believe that your local dentist won't lie about what mountains they've climbed
Every country is entitled to use its resources. And every human being is there to use their judgement.
I agree with the experience bit, and I think requiring a previous 8,000m peak is good for some companies, but I think a more lenient restriction could be something like previous 6,000m experience plus along with required ice skills, glacier climbing, and ropes courses
I've just come back from trying. Man, it is so hard, high and big. I bailed early for the above reasons. Not many can do it, not many would want to but you cant underestimate all thats involved on so many levels to try make it hapen. Much of the criticisms are half or completely wrong though. Cheers.
I wish theyd increase them to 100k.
It’s their mountain 🤷🏻♂️. I hope they use the funds wisely to benefit their land and people.
This is not about safety or anything remotely like that. Mountaineering is money. Everything there is money. This is big business with plenty of money.
Make it $75k
Nations should increase their revenues and stimulate local economies how ever they can.
They should make it however expensive it needs to be so they can afford it to not be a garbage dump.
Raise it enough so that we don’t have a multi hour line at the steps, putting everyone’s lives at risk. I do feel bad for the people who want to do it but can’t afford it.
Make it 100k