What the Wind Carries: How This Film Almost Didn’t Happen

I had a poster of Mount Everest on my wall as a kid. I don’t remember exactly when it went up, but I remember looking at it for years, wondering what it would feel like to stand anywhere near a mountain like that.

It took me a long time, and a lot of work, to find out.

The Work Before the Mountain

After my time in the service, healing wasn’t something that happened on its own. I had to build it, piece by piece.

I dug into neuroscience and counseling, trying to understand what had happened in my own mind and how to work with it instead of against it. I became a yoga instructor. I started meditating, journaling, and shaping my whole life around health and well-being instead of just surviving the day.

It was slow. It was not glamorous. But it was mine, and I stuck with it.

When I finally booked my first trek to Everest Base Camp, it wasn’t the beginning of my healing—it was the reward for it.

The Mountain That Changed Everything

Nothing prepared me for actually being there. The sheer scale of the Himalaya. The kindness of the people. And more than anything, the simplicity of waking up, putting one foot in front of the other, and walking all day toward something enormous.

Some days I didn’t speak to anyone. I didn’t need to. The walking itself was the meditation.

And then I saw Everest. The actual mountain, not a poster on a bedroom wall.

I can’t fully explain what that moment did to me, except to say I knew immediately I wasn’t done with this place. This wasn’t a bucket list item to check off and leave behind. This was something I needed to give to other people—especially the ones who had given so much of themselves in service and were still trying to figure out how to find their way back to themselves.

That was the exact moment Blue Side Adventures was born.

An Idea That Kept Finding Me

I built Blue Side Adventures to bring other veterans into these mountains—to give them their own version of what I had found. The Everest Base Camp trek was already on our calendar, one journey among several we run.

For years, people kept telling me I needed to document the journey. "Write a book," most of them said.

I brushed it off more times than I can count. I wasn’t trying to be the center of a story; I was just trying to build something that mattered. And practically speaking, a book was never going to happen while running a business, managing logistics, and leading expeditions in the field. If this story was going to be shared, it had to happen a different way.

Then something completely unplanned happened: for this particular EBC trek, only women signed up.

It wasn’t designed that way; it just unfolded. But the moment I looked at that final roster, I knew. This was the trek. This was the story I’d been told for years to tell—except it was never about me. It was about them.

Finding the Right Partner

A film made infinitely more sense than a book. Film moves the way the trail moves: the mountain passes, the prayer wheels, the rhythm of boots on rock, all captured without having to freeze the experience into static words on a page.

I knew two things immediately:

1. This had to be a real film, not a home video.

2. I had no idea how to make one.

That’s where Margaret came in. Wild Idea Media has spent years telling stories about wild places transforming human beings—which is exactly what I lived, and exactly what I wanted to capture.

From our very first conversation, it felt less like hiring a production crew and more like collaborating with someone who already understood the soul of the assignment. We talked about why this trek, why these women, and why now, long before we ever discussed camera rigs or shot lists.

Fourteen Women, One Wild Yes

The roster filled with fourteen women.

Some are still in active service. Some are veterans who hung up the uniform years ago. A few are supporters—women who haven’t worn the uniform themselves, but carry the weight of service through a spouse, a sibling, or a parent they love.

Every single one of them said yes to something immense: Everest Base Camp, the grueling training schedule it demands, weeks away from family and work, and a camera crew documenting every raw step.

Watching that roster fill has been one of the most humbling parts of this journey. Fourteen women, preparing to trust me, trust Margaret, and trust each other on the other side of the world.

What the Wind Carries

In the Himalaya, prayer flags line the high trails—strung between suspension bridges, chortens, and stone tea houses, fluttering continuously in the wind. Buddhist tradition teaches that the wind carries the prayers and blessings printed on those flags outward into the world, touching everyone and everything in their path.

That is where the title of this film was born.

What the Wind Carries is about the good these women have already put into the world through their service—and the good still waiting to find its way back to them.

It is about what happens when people who have spent their lives pouring out for others finally get the stillness, space, and altitude to receive something for themselves.

Preparing on Every Front

The past few months have felt like running three expeditions simultaneously:

• The Physical Training: Logging miles under heavy packs, hill repeats, and preparing bodies for an altitude that does not care how tough you used to be if you haven’t put in the work today.

• The Film Production: Navigating international filming permits, specialized high-altitude battery and camera logistics, insurance, and working with partners who stepped up with everything from satellite rescue coverage to coffee beans.

• The Logistics: Visas, gear lists checked three times, medical kits, and flights halfway around the globe.

Why We’re Sharing This Now

We aren't waiting until the credits roll to bring you into this story. The lead-up matters. The 5:00 AM training rucks, the group texts, the gear explosions across living room floors, and the goodbyes at the gate—all of that is part of what the wind carries, too.

Fourteen of us boarded flights bound for Kathmandu. We stepped onto the trail toward Everest Base Camp together, with Margaret capturing the journey as it unfolded.

What comes back won't just be footage. It will be living proof of what I learned standing in front of that mountain years ago:

Wild places don’t just test people. They return them to themselves.

I don’t know what this trek is going to look like on the other side. None of us do. These types of adventures take months to process. But I know why we went, and I know who is walked beside me.

— Sarah