London, England. 5 June 1986
My first day in London after a flight from Moscow. Head spinning from taking in all the familiar sites. In Trafalgar Square I managed to take this shot of two African men walking past South Africa House – site of the City of London Anti-apartheid Group’s non-stop picket of the embassy. (It went from 1986 to 1990).
Left Lobuche at 6.40am after a large breakfast. Fairly level walking but heavy breathing anyway. Heartbeat really pounding, could hear it in the back of my head. Going up a steep rise had to be taken at a snail’s pace. Then over a rocky moraine. Fine views of mountains all around – great weather.
Passed Gorak shep (a single teahouse) after 2 hours. Ascending Kala Pattar (black rock) – actually the end ridge of Pumori – I had to rest often. Saw Rick on a lower level of the ridge, followed others to the summit, only just making it, 5,540m, or 18,500ft.
Actually its now recorded at 5,643m. A local dog followed me to the top – you can see it in the picture at the lower left. I now have a (14 year old) Border Collie that I’ve named Tenzing.
Extremely windy and cold. However, a great view of Everest, a gigantic black rock, virtually no snow. The huge jagged Khumbu icefall reached down to bace camp where a joint Japanese/Korean expedition is in progress.
Taj Mahal, Agra, India. 30 May 1986
I like the way the mother is framed in this shot – over-seeing her kids for the formal Taj photo. But concentrating on the fore-ground, oblivious – seemingly – to the object in the background.
Walked to the Alice springs rodeo near Heavitree Gap arriving at 3pm. Caught up with other backpackers I’d seen at Coober Pedy or Yulara. This portrait is of Cecilia Thornberg from Sweden. She gave me her address and I was going to either send her this photo or catch up once I arrived in Sweden. Neither happened – so I’m posting this on-line 32 years late…
North of Chiang Mai, Thailand. 11 March 1986
On our hill-tribe trek we met a “witch doctor” with matted hair metres long. Our guide said he had the Guinness world record for the longest hair.
I checked Google and found some references to him – Hoo Sateow – and his brother Yee. Apparently he did have the record and there is an interesting video of him from around 1997: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGHADMTWfyE
It looks like the same home and village we visited. A news report stated that Hoo died a year before his brother in 2001 aged 91.