You know that sense of achievement when you finally reach the top of a big hill or numerous flights of stairs? It’s a special strain on the legs, and most of us can feel it after only an hour of climbing – or even less.

Now, imagine that your climb lasts for a week and a half, and at high altitude. Then imagine doing it when you’re 80.   

This isn’t something Carolyn Robinson has to imagine: she did it only a few months ago when she spent 11 days trekking to Base Camp on Mount Everest.

“I never doubted that I could do it, although at times I wondered why I was doing it!” the Berry parishioner says with a laugh. 

“My granddaughter thought I was amazing... she told the kids at school, ‘My grandmother is over 80 and she’s done this!’ My grandsons were very proud of me, and my Bible study group and my church friends all prayed for me, so I always knew God was with me. 

“A friend in my Bible study gave me a card with a verse from Psalm 40 on it: ‘God rested my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along’ [ESV]. And every time I struggled, I put my hand in my pocket and remembered that psalm, and it was absolutely wonderful. It got me through.”

Incredibly, Mrs Robinson didn’t have any climbing experience when she heard about the trek at a Rotary meeting last year. A fellow member spoke about organising the trip, wanting to raise funds for the global eradication of polio, and her interest was piqued. 

She watched videos of climbers trekking to Base Camp and felt confident she could do it, so she signed up and was surprised to discover that, if she completed the climb, she would become the oldest woman in the world to do so.

“Because I’m over 80 that was actually in my favour,” she says. “Whilst I’m very fit for my age, it was all uphill and I went slowly, so I was able to acclimatise as I went because of my slowness. That meant I didn’t have to stay in one place for two days to acclimatise.

“The fitter you are the faster you tend to go, and then you get altitude sickness,” she adds. “If you get altitude sickness the guides will tell you to go straight back down, because it means there’s bleeding on the brain and bleeding in the lungs. You can’t breathe or function and they won't let you go any further up.

“I didn’t have to take [medicine] or ride a horse or a donkey to get up there. I did it all under my own steam, one foot in front of the other.”

“It was a wonderful experience”

The group of seven men and six women began their 11-day trek on April 23 in the Nepalese mountain town of Lukla after flying in from Kathmandu. Mrs Robinson describes their path as uphill and rocky all the way, and admits that from time to time she would look ahead and say, “Do I really have to climb that?” Her Sherpa guide’s wise advice to “look back and see how far you’ve already come”. (photo above)

Happily, the weather for the group’s climb was excellent – blue skies and sunny all the way, although nights and mornings were still very cold. 

“You wore layers, and as you walked you gradually discarded the layers in your daypack,” Mrs Robinson explains. “But you did have to be careful not to sweat, because in the afternoon cold winds would come straight up the gully and any sweat would turn to ice!”

The group walked about 10 kilometres a day, but as Base Camp sits at 5364 metres above sea level, they also had to climb 2½ kilometres over the course of their trek. Nine of them made it, including Mrs Robinson, whose efforts have now been registered with the Guinness Book of Records – although she shrugs that off.

“I’m just an ordinary person,” she says. But I’m pretty determined. Giving up is easy; it’s the going on that’s hard. As [the trek organiser] said, ‘If it was easy, it wouldn’t be great’ and it certainly wasn’t easy! But it was a wonderful experience.”

Mrs Robinson says she “absolutely” felt God’s presence with her throughout the journey: as she climbed, as she stopped to take a breather, whenever she asked him for help, and every time she looked out upon the majesty of the Himalayas.

“It was almost overwhelming,” she recalls. “You look at that range of mountains and you think, ‘Gee, God made all this’ and it’s just amazing. Stunning.

“With God’s help I just kept putting one foot after the other. And I got there.”