C.S.I. Reference Articles

The Prostate Cancer Climb

Once, when I was little, I saw a “Ripley's Believe it or Not Special” about a guy who ate an entire airplane. Really. He ate everything, including the engine, the wheels and the propeller. Climbing a very high mountain like Aconcagua in Argentina is something like that. Mainly because many consider it a foolish and ultimately pointless thing to do but also in the sense that you have to do it bit by bit. Luckily, the reason I attempted Aconcagua isn't as pointless as eating an airplane. I was part of a group of 15 men who made up the Hap Weyman Memorial Prostate Cancer Climb team; our leader was Dr. Terry Weyman whose dad Hap died of prostate cancer.

At 22,843 feet, Aconcagua is the highest mountain in the Western hemisphere and is higher than any peak outside of central Asia. It is located in western Argentina, near the Chilean border. It dominates the sky west of Santiago, Chile's capital city, and is visible from the Pacific coast, 100 miles away.

The official Aconcagua website cautions, "Some climbing routes are relatively straightforward hikes to the top, but this is the very reason that Aconcagua has one of the highest mountain death tolls in the world: ...many of its climbers tend to move too swiftly, with little respect for the elevation or the weather, which on Aconcagua can quickly become severe."

Indeed. On the second day I'm in the country I decide to spend the day with our film crew as they gather background footage. Bad idea. Their first stop is the climbers' cemetery. The earliest is from 1902. Juan Fiorini rests forever on top of a small rocky hill marked only by a small cross. Hauntingly, a pair of boots lie by his grave. The most recent graves are from this year, but last year was particularly bad. Nine climbers died then including an Italian, a Frenchman, a Mexican and a Japanese. Reasons ranged from pulmonary edema to falls to ‘cause of death unknown’.

Aconcagua is not as dangerous as K2, where I am told as many as 1 out of 4 who make the summit don't make it down alive. However, Aconcagua is tough enough. Less than 40% of those that try actually summit. But no mountain is only a summit, and to me the Prostate Climb's story is more about the battles three men faced inside themselves than it is about how far they made it.

Part 1 - Bob Each

The hero of the first week of climbing was Bob Each. He is a 57 year-old retired IBM executive. In the movie he would be played by John Malkovich. Five years ago he had cancer tumors the size of golf balls and doctors gave him three years to live. They took some of the tumors out and shrunk the rest with chemotherapy. He now takes a handful of pills three times a day that completely supress his body's production of testosterone, which the cancer feeds on.

His wife Joan, and children Laura and Jill are at home waiting for him. He thinks his kids don't realize the danger of this climb and, though he thinks his wife is beginning to, “she has started letting me do what I want since I was diagnosed with cancer.” He is not worried. "This team is so strong and there will be six guys watching me at all times". Of course, Bob once road an ostrich so he is a bit of an adventurer. I’m not quite as keen.

In fact, Day 1 gives me the feeling that I got in 10th grade before I asked the homecoming queen for a date. OK, in truth, I had trouble just asking her to borrow her science notes, so you can imagine how terrified I am. Conversations at dinner range from cool rock climbing spots in Nevada to airplane crashes to how climbing movies like “Vertical limit” are inaccurate. You can feel the testostorone in the all-male group as we discuss how one climber (Dr. Tom Hyde, played by George Carlin) used to have to tread water for an hour in full gear as part of marine training. This contrasts sharply with Bob’s body.

The climb will be much tougher for him. When you remove testosterone like his treatment does, it leaves him no way to flush lactic acid from his body. He also is anemic since he can’t carry some of his medicines that need refrigeration. Being anemic means his body won't acclimitize at all like ours, which is to say it won't produce more red blood cells. He will be operating with even less oxygen than the rest of us. To give you an idea of how battered his body is before we even start, a major beer company was going to sponsor the climb for over $500,000 if Dr. Terry would postpone it for a year. Bob convinced him to do it this year since, “I might not be here in a year.”

Day 2

We load the duffle bags for the mules and I have only 35 lbs. It is less than anyone else and this makes me wonder what crucial piece of gear I have forgotten. Bob's is equally worried by his first view of the mountain. "Where in the heck can they put trails up there? You look at this thing from 9000 feet and you realize you still have almost 14,000 feet to go!" The highest mountain in the continental US is 14,400 feet. Bob's highest climb is Mt White at 14,200 feet. He went with guys fitter than himself but the competitive part of him made him push and beat them to the top even though he was dehydrated and weak.

Day 3-5

Day 3 through 5 can be summed up like this: Wake up, walk, go to sleep. As our guide Mark Tucker says, “Lunch starts after breakfast and ends at dinner”. Of course, this is my normal regimen so I’m ahead of the game. Basically we are snacking on anything we can all day and I’m topping it off with Skyline Chili for dinner. No one is putting on any weight though, in fact one team member lost almost 20 lbs during the trip. Everyone is instead in perfect shape. The rest of the teams’ legs (not mine) look as if God took a perfectly normal leg and then stretched the skin and dropped a hotdog down the side of their calf.

Our guide Tucker ‘Tuck’, is so strong he carries grown men with their packs across creeks so we don’t have to change out of our hiking boots. He is the prototypical alpha male, outspoken, barrel-chested, with thighs as thick as a woman's waist. In the movie he would be played by a young Ed Harris. He talks though, in a slow sing-song voice like Bill Lombaugh in “Office Space” and his patter is filled with memorable rhymes to get you moving. "Nose over your toes", “Don't let your attitude determine your altitude." "Wakey wakey no more shakey" "Grab those socks, drop those ....." you get the idea. When Day 5 features a huge rockfall just across the valley from camp, Tuck comments, "looks like we are going to change our route today." Rocks the size of cars bounce down the mountainside.

Day 6

How hard was day 6? I once ran (I called it running anyway) a marathon. When I was done my legs hurt so much the next day - like someone had beat them with a broomstick - that I couldn't climb the stairs to work and literally had to crawl up to my office. This pain was worse. When we arrive in Base Camp we begin to realize just how much effect the altitude can have, and how hard Bob has been pushing himself when he breaks down in a tent while discussing the climb. He gets off the GlobalStar satellite phone with a friend back in LA and he is incensed. Apparently a reporter has questioned the integrity of the climb, claiming it is a farce. “ Only one prostate cancer patient and a bunch of guys trying to get a free climb.”

Another team member Ted retorted, "I hate heights, I hate cold, I hate dirt and I get sick at altitude. I´m here for the cause. If it was just a vacation, for the money I've put into this thing I'd spend it on a month in Europe or watching a Caribbean sunset through a Heinken."

I personally have spent thousands of my own money on gear, permits, and flights. I even sold my car to pay for my personal costs. On the way down here I flew into Lima, Peru and took a 63 hour bus ride to Argentina to save money.

My tentmate Erin agrees, "Just goes to show the world has no idea about prostate cancer."

The fact is Dr. Terry tried to find another men currently fighting prostate cancer to climb but he couldn't. Bob says, "I'm sure there are men (prostate cancer patients) out there stronger than me, we just couldn't find them for this thing." Other patients, even former climbers told Dr. Terry it was impossible and someone would be crazy to try. "I couldn't do that mountain now without testosterone”, one said. Because of that, with the amazing exception of Bob, the summit team is people climbing for their grandfathers or dads or brothers and the trekking team that is meeting us at Base Camp (at 14,000 feet a damn tough climb itself) is full of current patients.

This all just goes to show how tough Bob Each is. But the insinuations of the lady and the exhaustion of the day still had everyone worked up. Bob broke down as he began to explain to us what it is like to have prostate cancer. “You look at your wife, no desire. Love, but no desire, only the memory of desire. Imagine what that is like." He continues, "It’s hard to describe the edge we prostate cancer patients live on. It is not manly."

"Some days even my wife and children don't understand. I apologize. Even I can't believe me now." He's leaned over in his tent crying openly. Mike, our cameraman, is still filming. Tucker is watching, unsure of what to do. "A part of me is totally missing. It’s gone. I am so embarrassed right now. Never broke down like this, not even in front of my wife after I was diagnosed."

He explains that without testosterone he doesn´t have control of his emotions like he used to. Before he got the disease he was an engineer and loved picking horror movies apart. "Now I cower in my seat like a little child. Intellectually I understand, but emotionally I have no control."

Personally I have nightmares at this altitude about forgetting my contacts and wandering blindly off a cliff like Mr. Magoo. Worse I sometimes wake up gasping for air dreaming that I am drowning. I can only imagine what the nights are like for Bob.

Soon he has everyone crying. Even the macho guides, one of whom has to leave the tent twice he is crying so hard. Bob continues, "I never, never want any other man to have to go through what I´m going through. This is just what I didn't want to happen. Here I am among these manly men..."

Justin comforts him, "Bob you are here, that makes you the manly man."

Bob turns to Dr. Terry, "I hope you father weathered it better than I did, Terry."

Dr. Terry, "He didn´t.” Terry tells me later, “I never saw my dad like that until he got this disease. When his bones were breaking, I remember him crying that he just wanted to die.”

Bob continues, "What the hell am I doing here? Part of me that says I have to be here to show the guys I counsel that they can fight. The ones who can't even get out of bed. But I have no strength.”

Terry "But you give them hope."

Tucker, a bit unsure of how to deal with all this emotion, suggests that we should head to the dinner tent. Bob looks at him, points and begins to reply "You, you...." Tucker is not used to not being in control, let alone being admonished by a 57 year old client. Everyone, including Tucker, thinks that he is about to be told that "you just don't understand."

Instead Bob says, "You...you... You are a hero. You are my hero. You´ve been to Everest. You, sir, are the last person I want to see get this thing. You promise me right now that you will get tested when we get off this mountain. You won't like it. You won't feel like a manly man, but this is worse. You have no idea what it makes you feel like."

Mark promises and before we head to dinner Bob reminded us again that "Men don't cry."

Despite that, twenty-two year old team member Justin was still crying later that night in the tent when he told Dr. Terry, "You have to go to the top, you have issues with your dad, but if turning around with Bob is what it takes to make people see that we are here to fight Prostate Cancer, then I'll go down if he has to."

Day 7-8

The next day, Day 7, was a rest day and Day 8 that followed was the toughest day to that point. We did 3000 vertical feet carrying 50-70 pound packs of gear up to 16,400 feet, Camp 1. All of it up scree, which is loose rock and sand. Every step was like a Paula Abdul song, two steps forward and one step back. A guide from another group, 26 years old, was airlifted out with pulmonary edema. His lungs were producing fluid and he was literally drowning himself. Mountaineers are by nature tough so they don't advertise how dangerous this sport is. I'm began to realize. Bob however, had a great day and beat me into camp by 20 minutes.

Day 9

Day 9, was the first day where things were completely foreign. Instead of climbing the scree up to Camp 1 we walked through a penitentes field since a trail had been carved by another morning group. Made of years of packed snow, penitentes look like stalagmites make of ice coming up out of the ground. Some are taller than people so you can get lost in them if you aren’t careful.

That reaching in Camp 1, at 16,400 Bob recorded the highest climb any prostate cancer patient has ever made, as far as the Prostate Cancer Research Institute could determine. I asked him how he was doing and he told me "Last night I had a problem with shortness of breathe as I was going to sleep. I thought I was losing it." "I started to nod off but then I was gasping for air." Overall though he tells me he is doing well, "My PSA is low, but some tumors are outside the prostate. In my case we seem to have really decreased the cancer. We seem to be at a standstill now. I’m a bit of a miracle, I keep hanging on."

Ten minutes after this conversation Bob couldn't form words or sentences. He was shaking. He seemed to be trying to say "I have to go on. I´m the only prostate cancer patient." But he had already made it higher than any prostate cancer patient before him. Before he went, even though he still couldn't talk he had the presence of mind to hand Tuck a ribbon for the summit. On it wasn't anything for him. It was a ribbon for Terry's dad.

Five minutes after that he was heading down the mountain accompanied by Ben and Phil our two assistant guides. Tuck says, "Now that is some scary stuff."

Glenn sat on the precipice crying and watched Bob head down. "I´m going to stay until he is out of sight." Dr. Terry added, "He worked hard for a year. Now you see why he didn't want to postpone the climb."

Tuck, who has summitted this mountain seven times, summed it up "A hero, a great performance."

Later Bob told me, "I wanted to stay. I had worked too hard. I wasn't going out on a helicopter. That was giving in. I would have crawled down to the road." Bob walked the whole way out and though he didn’t make it to the summit, his climb was a success by every other standard.

The story could end here but it doesn't. Thinking of how hard Bob had worked and for Terry's dad Hap we pushed on.

Next week: We move to Camp II and prepare for our summit bid.

Tip of the week: You can still support the Hap Weyman climb. Send checks to Hap Weyman Memorial Climb, 1031 Dellwood Drive, Troy, Ohio 45373 or donate online at www.prostatecancerclimb.com

Part 2 – Bob Butler

Day 10

The second segment of the climb began at 16,400 feet with a rest day. As our guide Tuck told us, "Today is change your boxers day. Bob you change with Ted, Ted you change with Sean..." That’s funny. Actually most things are funny at 16,400 since your brain cells are dying by the thousands from lack of oxygen. While it is a bit like being drunk, it is actually more like an ether high where your brain feels alright but you can’t quite make your body do what you want. Tying your shoes takes about 10 minutes and that is also funny. What isn’t funny is how tough the climbing is. Your breathing is labored even when resting and it sounds far away like when you are scuba diving. In fact, everything has a detached quality as if seen through goggles.

Tuck’s rhyming hints have tapered off and are replaced by more ominious ones that don't rhyme like, "cotton kills", meaning he doesn’t want us wearing cotton anymore because it doesn’t draw moisture away from the body. Then you lose body heat more rapidly and can get into serious problems. Instead we wear donated Marmot underwear and North Face jackets. My favorite Tuckerism from this period is "Pain is just weakness leaving your body."

I try and concentrate on that saying but the mental aspect of climbing is something for which I'm not prepared. You would think breathing and walking are the two most natural things you’ve done since you were a baby but you have to relearn them both if you want to survive in this brave new world. The odd sound of pressure breathing is heard throughout camp. It echoes like the mating call of some obscure bird. Basically what you do is exhale as hard as you can with each breathe in order to give your lungs room to fill up their deepest air sacs with oxygen.

Likewise every step is both a chance and a choice. A chance to fall and end your climb. To avoid this you must be mentally sharp every single minute. Each step is also a choice where you can make a good step and have it hold or make a bad step and slip back a couple feet. Failing to use your rest step technique correctly (locking your lower leg to keep your weight on your bones instead of muscles) will result in you expending twice as much effort as necessary. You might be able to climb 22,000 feet, but if you make that into 44,000 you'll never make it.

Things aren’t all dreary though. Throughout the climb my tentmate Erin has been getting notes from his fiancee in his gear that she helped pack. They started out with innocuous messages like "three weeks until I see you again." and have gotten racier. Today he gets one and just smiles without reading it to me.

In camp, when the stove isn't going the silence is absolute. There are virtually no animals this high and in the mid-morning the wind almost stops. Minor rockfalls continue to occur every hour or so but they cease to cause anyone to leave their tents, where most of us are reading. I am reading “Endurance”, the story of Shackleton's 2 years trapped in the ice of Antartica and it makes our difficulties look minor. At least we aren't eating the dogs yet.

The afternoon is more exciting, women’s voices in camp cause the everyone’s heads to swivel and we spend the afternoon learning how to use our crampons and ice axes. Learning how to do a self-arrest with an ice-axe (to keep yourself from sliding off the mountain) does nothing to reassure me I am prepared for tomorrow’s load carry to 19,000 feet. At the back of the group the guides and I practice our Spanish off a training sheet they have. Learning the words for rockfall, snowstorm and avalanche doesn’t soothe my nerves either.

Day 11

The morning doesn’t start out well. Only Glenn has no complaints, everyone else is suffering from headaches or some other ailment. Justin hasn’t slept at all in two nights so he decides to head back down to base camp. I have a mild headache that is like a bad sinus cold or the feeling you get when you swim to the bottom of a pool without equalizing your ears. We each drink about a gallon of water a day and this helps ease the headaches. Though it is harmless and apparently from eating canned oysters the night before, I have a completely black tongue that makes me look like I’m Ozzy Osborne’s sidekick. An ominous sign I think. Another bad sign is that it is now getting cold enough at night that my pen is frozen in the morning and doesn’t work.

As we set off everyone has yellow OR sun hats and double OR waterbottles slung on their hips like wild-west six-shooters. This makes us look like a post-modern outlaw gang. Noticing this a guy asked me earlier what group we are with. I told him we were the “Prostate Cancer Team” but because of the wind he thought I said we were the "Tri-state dancer team". Don’t I wish a tri-state dance team was around, I need some motivation. Actually with all the heavy breathing it sounds more like an emphysema climb.

I try to avoid the heavy breathing by not moving at all. As Tucker says, "People who are lazy sometimes do better on the high mountain. They don't waste energy." ‘Well’, I think, ‘then I'm set!’ Tucker has climbed Everest once and is heading back this May so he must know what he is talking about.

In the morning if you are the first guy ready you end up helping take down the other gear. So I sleep in and then hang toward the back and practice being lazy. That way you don't have to backtrack as far if the route becomes impassable. Also everyone else stomps down the snow.

Despite my lazy techniques, Dr. Tom Hyde and I have to turn back at 18,500 feet. For me it comes suddenly. We are coming into our final rest stop and Camp II is only about 20 minutes away. But I can’t take another step. Erin reaches over to squeeze my arm and ask if I’m OK and tingling shoots down the right side of my body. I can’t get my breathe even though we aren’t moving and I can’t even form a complete sentence to tell Tuck that I am hurting. Instead I just shout, “I’m out” like Kramer in a certain Seinfeld eposide.

Tom and I are sent down to base camp so we will be with other guides. The climb down is too much for us and our guide Ben has to take some of our load. By the end he is carrying Tom's whole bag and we still can't keep up with him.

However, I’m proud I made it to 18,500. That is higher than the FAA guideline for oxygen dropping for airplanes that lose pressure so it should give you some idea of how hard it was. Actually, no, it doesn’t. Imagine an environment so cold, so windy and with so little oxygen that you have to take 3 breathes just to pick your foot up and set it down. Imagine spending over $3,000 of your own money, taking a 63 hour bus ride to get to the site and months training toward the goal of the summit and yet getting to a point where you simply can't force yourself to move a single inch more. Not one inch more.

How about this: strap a 50 lb pack to your back, breathe in a plastic bag for 10 minutes until you have 20% of the normal oxygen and then try to climb a local hill in 0 degree weather with winds that literally knock you down. Then ask yourself why you ever thought this would be fun.

Though my dream of eating Skyline chili on the summit (my only local sponsor) is dashed, the plus side is that Base Camp has beer to wash it down!

Day 12

We heard that the trekkers are coming in today and one of them made me wonder if I really did give it all I had when I hear how hard he worked just to get here. Bob Butler is a 75 year old prostate cancer patient. Imagine Walter Mathau with a deep Texas drawl and a baseball cap that says, “Get your PSA tested.”

This six day trip is the longest Bob has been away from his wife Frances in the 50 years they’ve been married. She was a bit apprehensive when he first started training in the hills of west Texas and when he slipped on an ice field on Sandia peak in New Mexico and broke his foot, things weren’t looking any better. But Bob is tough. He was running a 7 mile race last year when he fell and cut his knee and face. A young woman helped him up and began to lead him to the aid station. He pulled away and finished the race and heard her comment as he left, "I guess they do make them tougher in Texas." He has to take 20 pills a day to fight his cancer but his motto is, "every day is a good day." Now he is fighting his way up to base camp with a stress fracture in his foot.

How hard it is just to get to base camp? A Polish guy arrives in camp at 5:30 pm looking for his friend. No one has seen him. At 10:30 at night our cameraman Blue (who is wearing a Hawaiian shirt in honor of summit day) is out checking things when he hears walking sticks. At that time at night you know that means trouble. It is the other climber. He had fallen in a river and taken 3 hours to get out. He was frozen and wandering aimlessly and might have missed base camp if Blue hadn't seen him. So don't underestimate the difficulty of getting to base camp.

Even guys years younger than Bob have had serious problems. Only a day or two before a climber from a different team Tim Schowalter, 56 of Golden Colorado came down off the mountain. "I was just weak as a kitten. I sat down and felt like I was going to faint." He made it 5 more minutes then did faint. He was revived and "descended quickly. I was afraid for my life." He threw up at the medical center and then they put an IV in him. The next morning he was flown off the mountain in the rescue helicopter.

The day Bob made it triumphantly into base camp under his own power another trekker went out on the helicopter with pulmonary edema and Dan, our other cameraman, came down from 19,000 feet with torn knee ligaments. Bob said, "I was ready to give up after 2 days but I pushed on.” He had a button on his hat from a nurse that said, ‘I can’. When he got to base camp he added a piece of cloth next to it that says ‘I did’.

He confided to me, "My doctor told me that a 75 year old body doesn't belong at this altitude. But I made him sign the papers." He’s right. Dr. Terry’s local inquiries turn up that Bob is the oldest person to ever make it to this base camp. As Dr. Terry said of Bob, “he showed us his love for his fellow man and put one foot in front of the other. When he arrived in Argentina with a foot injury, he was ordered a horse to carry him to basecamp. In true Texas style he showed up to the trail head, refused the horse, took off his walking cast and put one foot in front of the other and walked the three days, 4 thousand vertical feet, 25+ miles unassisted. He never complained and always had a smile on his face.”

One of the guides remarked that he has seen hundreds of remarkable athletes in his life but Bob is on the top of the list as the most inspirational and remarkable. Bob says, "We just want to make a difference, we want to get the word out that people should get checked."

Judging from the fanaticism of some of the climbers on the mountain, like anything that kills brain cells (alcohol, Jerry Springer) mountaineering can become an addiction. Luckily I don’t think I’m at risk, I’m happy here at base camp talking to the summit team on the radio. But the story doesn’t end here, because there are still five prostate cancer climbers on the mountain.

Next week: Five climbers remain at 19,000 feet, Ted, Erin, Terry, John and Glenn. Will anyone make the summit?

Tip of the week: We have winter hats from www.wapitiwoolies.com the premier maker of hats for Everest. Buy their prostate hat online and profits go to the Hap Weyman memorial fund.

Part 3 - Terry Weyman

Day 13

On a treadmill in the middle of Alaska a guy in alaska on treadmill matches us foot for foot as the summit team climbs the mountain.

Here in Base Camp I come across a quote from American writer/climber James Ramsey Ullman. He said of Mt. Aconcagua, Argentina, "Its altitude is so great, its cold so bitter, its storms so frequent and savage, that the ascent ranks among the most grueling ordeals known to climbers."

Up at Camp II, 19,000 feet Dr. Terry (imagine a pumped up Kevin Bacon) describes the wind as "a semi rolling through a valley. It bent the tents, moved the anchor rocks of the tents, and blew away the wands that Tuck had set to mark the summit route."

At various heights from 16,000 to 21,000 feet all the rest of the summit team turned back. This left Dr. Terry alone with guide Ben Marshall. To give you some idea of how dedicated he had to be to make it even that far, the men that have turned back include one guy who pushed himself until he puked, an ex-marine, a seven time marathoner, a 22 year old mountain guide, and a guy who had climbed Mt.McKinley in Alaska (only 2000 feet less). It also included an overweight, psuedo-journalist who thought growing a beard would help him get to the top (hey, all climbers seem to have beards) but the point remains that only Dr. Terry’s supreme committment to the cause of fighting prostate cancer has brought him this far.

As he said, "Companies wanted to give us $750,000 but postpone the climb for a year. Bob Each reminded me who this was for. It is more about the awareness of getting tested for prostate cancer than the money. It’s for my dad. Bob and Harry came and begged me to do it this year. Bob said it was the only thing getting him out of bed in the morning." Terry actually was the one who diagnosed his dad with cancer but only after it had already spread to the rest of his body.

Neither Terry’s dad nor his doctor was aware that the PSA test could have caught the cancer early enough to save Hap Weyman’s life. Terry remember’s the last weeks of his dad’s life when Hap’s bones would crack just from rolling over and he would beg God to let him die. That is what is pulling Terry to the top and the knowledge that spreading the word could save people like his son is pushing him from the other side. Terry relates, “John said, ‘go on, get up there. Your dad is waiting for you.’ I just thought of my son pushing me and my dad pulling me.”

Since I was at Base Camp luxuriating in solar showers and cold beer I have to let other summit members describe what Terry went through. Comments included, “At high altitude everyones faces look the same: I’m gasping for breath, its damn cold and I'm tired.” In fact, water, or drool, as the case may be, freezes instantly on your face.

Others add, "Terry's an animal. He doesn't let the mental stuff get to him. He's climbing this for a huge reason."

"Wind didn't stop the whole time we were with him. There were penitentes (ice fields) that people get lost in with headlamps at 3 in the morning. Anything can happen up there.”

"I´ve been on Mt. Hood in 60-70 mph winds. They don't knock me over. These were stronger."

Terry continues, "I asked Ben if we were almost there. He said we were only halfway. Guys were laying on the ground puking. I wanted to quit three times, but Ben pumped me up." That makes sense, Ben is the one who helped take Bob Each down from Camp I and Tom and me (while he carried our gear) down from Camp II. He also once went 47 days in the Himalayas without a shower. Clearly a man of persistence.

Even 1000 feet from the summit it isn’t certain one will make it. Erin had a friend who turned around 500 feet from the summit when he stumbled on a dead body. Other groups on the mountain this week have had people turn back in sheer exhaustion as close as 200 feet away, literally in sight of the cross that marks the summit.

Terry says last few feet he could feel his Dad carrying him. "I walked up and kissed the cross and prayed for my dad." "My dispatch was only 5 words "I'm on the summit", I was bawling and exhausted. “I called Michele. Left blue ribbon up there. Took a picture with banner and told Ben, ‘I gotta get down.’ ”

Later he could explain more fully “When I reached the top, I knelt by the cross and said a prayer to my Father, kissed the cross and blessed God for allowing me to be there. Took pictures flying the PC banner, Memorial flags for My Dad, Laura Evans, a flag to honor Bob Each and Harry Pinchot who inspired me to the top, a picture of my son and family. I then took out a blue ribbon that Bob Each had carried in honor of my Dad and laid it at the base of the cross and placed a rock on the top and left it on the top of the Americas. This was definitely a highlight in my climbing career.”

Later at our celebration dinner Terry told me, "You know what blows me away more than making the summit. Seeing that all these people up here supporting a vision I had over a year ago. The trekkers coming around the corner to meet us on the way down, not the summit, was the biggest highlight of my climb. And you can quote me on that."

As I sit next to Dr. Terry’s mom, Bobbi, she tells me how her husband Hap made corkboards out of wine corks and christmas trees out of pillboxes while he was in the hospital dying. When Terry leans over to tell me, "This is the highlight of my entire life. Watching this thing unfold in memory of my father." I start thinking about what Bobbi has said and realize ‘unfold’ is the wrong word, Dr. Terry has created it from start to finish.

The piano player is playing requests and Bobbi asks for one. "You´ll never go hopeless no matter how far. To reach an unreachable star." floats through the air. As dinner continues around her Bobbi sings quietly to herself in memory of her husband Hap. "Thank you Charlie”, I hear her say to the piano man. No, I think. Thanks to Hap and Bobbi. Through Terry you’ve helped so many people.

Conclusion

My grandfather, 'Gramps', had prostate cancer when he died a few years ago of other causes. He would sometimes tell me that in his next life he wanted to be a cowboy on the Pampas of Argentina. I have no idea why. I’m just glad he lived long enough that I got to know him in this life and hear such stories from him. Hopefully being part of this climb will give that chance to others.

story of guy not talking to dad, or all the people who have heard gotten tested and saved. treatable and beatable. emphasize that getting tested can me you are completely cured, not getting tested can let the cancer spread outside the prostate and mean you will end up having to have chemo perhaps.

Prostate cancer is treatable, and even beatable, but the secreat is catching it early. As Bob Each says, with these treatments "It may still change your life, but it won't take it." Unfortunately as he also says, "Men say 'I'd just as soon die as see a doctor.’” That is exactly what they end up doing.

The good news is that the number of prostate deaths per year is down.from 40,000 to 32,000 over the last few years and some doctors attribute this not only to better treatment options but also to awareness of the PSA test and catching more cancers earlier.

The story could end here but it doesn't. It ends with you making a choice to get tested or not. Or to put this article under your dad's breakfast cereal or in your husband's briefcase. The success or failure of this trip won't be measured in feet climbed or dollars raised but in the lives saved. Its not a hard thing to do, especially not when compared to eating an airplane.

Next week: I leave Argentina and head to Chile, where it hopefully isn’t as chilly.

Tip of the week:
Go get your PSA level tested, or if you aren’t a male over 40 give this article to someone who is. Your brother, your dad, or your mailman. It doesn’t matter who, you’ll be doing them a favor and maybe saving their life.