Mumbai: 10-year-old girl climbs Everest base camp

A 10-year-old Indian girl has climbed Everest Base Camp without any training. Rhythm Mamania, a Mumbai native, has become one of the youngest Indian mountaineers to climb Everest Base Camp. Rhythm completed the trek in eleven days. Along with Rhythm, her parents Herschel and Urmi took part in the trek. Rhythm and her team arrived at Everest Base Camp on May 6 at 1 p.m. This little girl did base camp trekking without any mountaineering trainers or training.

Rhythm is a fifth class student of MET Rishikul Vidyalaya, Bandra and is also a skater. "It's our determination to get ahead of us in the skating rink or on top of a peak. “Along with skating, trekking has always been my passion, but this trek taught me how important it is to be a responsible trekker and also solve the mountain waste management problem,” she explained.

The base camp, located at an elevation of 5364 m above sea level, is low on oxygen, but this does not dampen Rhythm's spirit. During the Everest Base Camp trek, Rhythm walked 8-9 hours each day on steep terrain. She arrived at the base camp after overcoming a number of obstacles, including hail and snow. The temperature in the area where the trekking took place was often as low as minus 10 degrees Celsius. Rishi Bandari of Satori Adventures along with a group of trekkers based in Nepal organized the trip of Rhythm and her parents to the base camp.

From the age of five, Rhythm loved the heights of the mountains and her first long trek was the 21 km long Doodhsagar. Rhythm has climbed various peaks in the Sahyadri range such as Mahuli, Sondai, Karnala and Lohagarh. After arriving at the base camp, the other members of the group decided to take a helicopter on the way back. But Rhythm insisted that she would walk down. And hence her family decided to descend.