Wind on Everest Photo by Wally Berg

This dispatch from Base Camp on October 23rd will be a brief one.

I think the most important thing I have to say for today's dispatch is that we have been without Internet. The Thuraya satellite phone data capabilities that we've been relying on for the entire trip have been down for a few of days. That means no photographs have been uploaded. But I think most importantly, for expedition team members' family members and friends who may be sending emails, please don't worry, we're not getting them. We can't respond to them, we can't send any emails back. But we're fine. We can still talk on the phone and we'll continue to give you the developments.

The developments today are that the entire climbing Sherpa team, with the exception of Nwang Pasang who is up at Camp II with Shom the Camp II cook, is here at Base Camp, along with all the climbing members.

The wind is still blowing like crazy up on the mountain. Ang Temba and I just got off the radio with Shom and he reported no wind at Camp II but light snow and the roar still present above. So this mountain is still very windy. And the new development today is we do have some light precipitation.

I think it's going to remain light but we'll be back on the radio early tomorrow morning with Shom to confirm that and make sure they don't have any problems with a lot of snow accumulation on top of the wind.

Today's big activity was watching a movie in the communications tent. We have a DVD in the laptop computer and we got a pretty nice speaker system. And tonight's movie was "Forest Gump", enjoyed by most of the climbing team members. The real movie hit of this season has been "Himalaya or Caravan", a movie about Tibet and Sherpa people taking yaks in the Dolpo and it's something that the Sherpas sit and watch fascinated and they also laugh a lot during this "Himalaya or Caravan" movie. They weren't too interested in "Forest Gump" but the climbing members were. It was good entertainment tonight.

It's dinnertime, no snow at Base Camp, no wind. But we have cloudy skies and we're watching to see what develops so we know when to make our move back up the mountain.

— Wally Berg, Expedition Leader