Everest2: Sevenoaks School - Kent, United Kingdom

Sevenoaks School, UK

“To London Bridge please…” I requested as I threw my 120 litre kit-bag into the back of the black taxi. The cab driver looked at me inquisitively and asked whether I had the “chopped up remains of my ex-boyfriend in the bag and was going to throw them off the bridge”. I suppose that it was rather odd to see a rather flustered Burberry-clad, high-heeled, thirty-something-year old carrying around a small, trendy Paul Smith laptop bag and an absolutely gargantuan monstrous red kit-bag at 7:30 in the morning…  I decided it was likely not the best strategy to let my cabbie think he was ‘aiding and abetting’ an escaping criminal so I shared with him the contents of the bag --- 1 down suit, 1 jumar, 1 abseil device, 1 harness, 1 pair big boots, 1 pair inner boots, 1 pair big mitts, 1 buff, 2 carabineers, and an RGS coffee table book about the history of Everest… all in, about 20 kilos of kit in preparation of my presentation for Sevenoaks School.

Everest2: Ridgetown District High School, Canada

One of the reasons why I love Canada is the weather. Spending my ‘formative years’ knee deep in snow during the winter and knee deep in lake water during summer are two of the key highlights of growing up in South Western Ontario. The weather is generally quite predictable and, being a farmers daughter, has always played a dominant role in dinner table conversations particularly during planting and harvest season. Given that my father has since retired and weather now only seems to determine what clothing I’ll pack for my regular visits back to Canada, it was a slight surprise that ‘weather’ dominated the dinner table conversation on Thursday evening and ultimately impacted the Canadian-portion of the Everest2 programme.