To kick off the 18th annual Ogden Climbing Festival, Weber State University’s Outdoor Program is announcing a new travel opportunity for service-minded students that will take them to the mountainous region of Khumbu in Nepal, a region that may be better known as the Everest Region.
The announcement of the new travel opportunity will follow a keynote event on the evening of April 11, where WSU students and faculty will reflect on their experience traveling to Nepal with the Outdoor Program in Spring 2024.
“It became a place that’s special to me,” said Hayley Prine, WSU Campus Recreation’s Outdoor Program Coordinator, who had gone on the trip to Nepal in 2024 alongside eight students and several faculty members. “It’s a really magical place and it felt really special to be able to experience that feeling together.”
WSU’s Outdoor Program partnered with the Apa Sherpa Foundation, a nonprofit organization that leads service-oriented treks through the Khumbu region, for its trip to Nepal in 2024. Prine said the group completed a number of service projects for the locals while completing the 100-mile trek to Everest Base Camp.
Through fundraising, the group was also able to donate a number of solar lanterns to the locals along the trip. The lamps are a well-appreciated commodity by the locals because electricity isn’t always reliable in the Khumbu region.
In another instance, the group helped a local school move some heavy stones and paint a mural. Cage Vigil, a WSU alum who attended the 2024 Nepal trip, said his experience reaching Everest Base Camp paled in comparison to the moments he shared with the locals along the way.
“The landscape was beautiful, the food was pretty good, but it was the people of Khumbu and Nepal that really made the trip worthwhile,” Vigil said. “The mountains are really cool, but if you go, you should really try and experience the people and their culture.”
While the landscape the group trekked through in the Khumbu region certainly captivated them, those who went on the 2024 trip described their experiences in getting to know the local culture and connecting with the locals as being the most personally impactful part of the trip.
“Spending time with people who are so willing to give their time and resources really meant a lot to me,” Prine said. “I hope that I brought some of that kindness home with me — maybe now I’m more willing to stop my feet and give people time and resources when they need it.”
Eddie Hill, an associate professor in the Outdoor and Community Recreation Education program at WSU, was also able to take part in the 2024 trip to Nepal. While on the trip, Hill conducted a qualitative study of the lived experiences of those who went on the trip.
Hill said he and his two undergraduate student research assistants were able to find three common themes among the experiences of those who went on the trip.
These themes included a collective sentiment that the trip was extremely physically, mentally and emotionally demanding, a desire to have been able to do more for the locals and a feeling that the Nepal trip was the most impactful trip that the participants had ever been on.
“I’ve never been to Nepal or a developing country like that. I realized how much in need they really are and yet, they’re so humble that they’d give you anything,” Hill said. “It was transformative for me and the others because it really made us think of how much we have and how appreciative we should be.”
Hill will be presenting the findings of his study in further depth during the Ogden Climbing Festival’s keynote event on April 11. Another trip to Nepal in partnership with Apa Sherpa Foundation is expected to be announced at the same event alongside registration details and expected costs. According to Prine, the Outdoor Program is hoping to hold the trip in Spring 2026.
“When people ask me how the trip went, I say that they don’t make words for it,” Vigil said, reflecting on the impact that Nepal trip had on his life. “It was paradigm-shifting and it changed my view of the world.”
