Off the Fork: Southold native Miller scales Mt. Everest

The first in a summer series designed to answer the question “whatever happened to…? we bring you Off the Fork, profiles that showcase locals moving, shaking and living it up, you guessed it off the North Fork. Jim Willse tagged along — at least digitally — with Southold graduate Evan Miller, who attempted to scale both Mount Everest and Mount Lhotse and — as if there could be more — break a record in the process.

Evan Miller likes to climb things.

When he was a very little kid, it was the banister inside the house, from which he landed on top of a large clock, from which his dad had to talk him down. After graduating from household obstacles, he turned to the tall limbs of the trees surrounding his family’s home in Southold.

These days, it’s the highest mountain in the world and its nearby neighbor, the fourth highest, that he’s set his sights on — and climbed — within a few days last month.

The mountains are Everest, 29,032 feet high, and its lesser-known neighbor, Mount Lhotse, 27,940 feet. Both are on the border between Nepal and Tibet. Only a couple hundred people have ascended both, and Miller is now one of them.

A graduate of Southold High School, Mr. Miller was introduced to climbing as a sport 10 years ago. That’s when he and his father, Mark Miller, went to Ecuador and climbed an active volcano, Cotopaxi. But it wasn’t until he was out of college that he got serious about the sport. 

He first went to Bolivia, where he climbed three more mountains. He’s been doing it ever since.

“It’s become a huge passion, [a] part of my life,” he said. “I love pushing the body to its limit and really understanding what the human body can do.”

The Everest adventure began by applying for a permit through a Nepalese guide company. Fewer than 500 are issued for the spring climbing season, 140 of which went to the group Miller was in. The climbers were then broken into smaller contingents of 20 for the weeklong up-and-down from base camp, which itself is 17,383 feet high.

Mr. Miller was accompanied to base camp by his father, the former CEO of Miller Environmental Group in Calverton. 

“My part was the little one,” his father said. “It was like dropping your kid off at the school bus stop.”

From the base, climbers proceeded in daily segments of about 3,000 feet each, resting overnight to allow their bodies to acclimate to the elevations. They slept in tents at Camps 1, 2, 3 and 4, and then, when ready, they climbed the final 2,000 feet to the summit.

The overnight stops were not luxurious. There was food, like Spam and eggs for breakfast, and an occasional hot shower — a bucket of heated water poured over the hikers.

Only the spring and fall are climbing seasons, but the terrain still is pure ice. There are special hazards like the Khumbu ice fall, a slow-moving glacier, or the ever-present crevasses. 

For one especially tricky portion of the climb, Mr. Miller and his sherpa partner, Nyima Gyalu, navigated four wooden ladders tied together with rope.

“It makes for an interesting way to get higher,” he said. “OSHA definitely would not approve.”

The climbs are scheduled to coincide with favorable weather. Temperatures can range from 40 degrees to minus 5. But Mr. Miller said another obstacle is traffic.

“Everest is so commercialized,” he said. “It’s the most crowded mountain I’ve been on. I’ve been climbing for a while now and I’ve never seen anything like it.”

In all, about 300 climbers were headed for the summit at the same time, so they had to find a way to avoid the snarl. Mr. Miller and his sherpa partner did that by “short-roping,” which took them off the main route. He compared it to an HOV lane.

The last part of the climb took them about 10 hours, at night, when the ice is most stable. They made it to the summit just as daylight arrived.

“It’s one helluva sunrise,” he said. “We got to see how far Everest cast its shadow over the landscape of the world.”

He said he stayed up there for about 20 minutes, taking in the view and talking with some other climbers he’d gotten to know. He took plenty of photos, careful to take his gloves off for only a minute or so to avoid frostbite.

“Making the summit is only half the problem,” Mr. Miller said. “You still have to descend.”

Which he and Mr. Gyalu did. And seven days later, they repeated the challenge at Mount Lhotse.

What does Mr. Miller do for an encore? He’s recently acquired a skydiving license, and is planning to return to the Himalayas to try another mountain, Xixiabangma, this time without a portable oxygen tank.

“I want to give myself a more difficult challenge,” he said.

He’s moved to Florida, where he’s involved in a commercial real estate project, but he remains dedicated to the training regimen necessary to keep climbing. When he lived in Brooklyn, he would run up and down the stairs in Fort Greene Park.

It’s been a long time since Miller was an outstanding high school soccer player, but he credits that experience with his dedication to the sport of climbing. He particularly mentioned his high school coach, Andrew Sadowski, and his travel team coach, Tim Graham.

“Those two guys gave me a different kind of mentality, helping me understand the true power of just not giving up,” Mr. Miller said.