Badge of honor
Aditi Vaidya (25) and Anuja Vaidya (21) planned to climb the top of the world not because the world could see them but because they could see the world. They became the First Gujarati Sisters to scale Mt. Everest and Second Sisters in the whole world to do the same.
The journey towards Everest started on 3rd April. It was a 12 day walk to base camp. A peak called Lobouche (6119 mts) was climbed before we reached Everest base camp as a pre-Everest peak. We reached the base camp on 15th April. After that, started our journey of rotations, which means walking high and sleeping low. We started for the summit push on 17th May. We spent one night on camp 1, second on camp 2, third on camp 3, fourth on camp 4 and then the fifth day (21st May) in the evening at 5:30 pm we left for summit. We were standing on the summit at 5:30 am. Then began the return journey. We reached back on the camp 4 at 5 pm in the evening. It was a 24 hours day for us. The temperature was almost -(minus)50 degree Celsius. We had both bad and good weather days. The bad weather days had winds up to 100-170 km/hr. But we came back safely and without injuries. We returned back to base camp on the 24th and then were in Kathmandu on 25th.
Before going to Everest, we did Aconcagua (6962 mts) in Argentina. That is the highest peak of South America. We did that in February 2019. 16th February 2019 was the day of summit for that and we became First Gujarati Sisters to be on the top.
Anuja Vaidya has also done Manirang (6593 mts) in Himachal. She did that in August 2019. She scaled the highest peak of Europe called Elbrus which is in Russia. She was on the top on 7th July. Then she did Carstensz Pyramid (4884 mts) in Indonesia on 15th August 2019 at 9:30 am.
Both the sisters then went on to climb Kilimanjaro (5895 mts) in Africa on 14th Sept at 7:30 am.
Anuja then summit Mt. Vinson Massif (4862 mts) in Antarctica on 15th January 2020 at 5:30 pm and became the First Gujarati Women to stand on the top of Antarctic continent.
Aditi has done 3 summits and Anuja has done 6 of the 7 summits by now, Anuja will be going for the last one that is Mount Denali in Alaska this June. Both have also undertaken professional mountaineering courses like Basic Course, Advance Course and Method of Instruction Course from Nehru Institute of Mountaineering, Uttarkashi.
Aditi has done B.B.A. from B.R.C.M. College of Business Administration and then she did her M.Sc. in International Business from Queen Mary University, London. She also did specialized courses in Human Resource and Corporate Business Strategy from London School of Economics.
Anuja completed her graduation in B.B.A. from B.R.C.M. College of Business Administration.
Both the sisters completed their schooling from Lourdes Convent High School, Surat.