It would be everybody's dream to participate in the world's highest altitude marathon which has the start line located at the base camp of Mt. Qomolongma at the altitude of 5,356 meters which will be crisscrossing the trails in the Khumbu Valley along with legendary "Super Sherpas" of Nepal.

For those with such dreams, the Himalayan Expedition, a private travel agency, is organizing the "Tenzing-Hillary Everest (Qomolangma) Marathon" on May 29 starting from the base camp of the Mt. Qomolongma.

The unique event of its kind, the Marathon will offer an opportunity to its distinctive competitors including visually impaired Irish national Mark Pollak and 66-year-old Toshio Ohmori of Japan to fascinate the entire world.

Inspired and encouraged by the grand success of "Everest (Qomolangma) Marathon" held on May 19, 2003 to commemorate Golden Jubilee Celebration of ascent on Mt. Qomolangma by Late Tenzing Norgay Sherpa and Sir Edmund Hillary, the first two climbers of the world's highest peak, Himalaya Expeditions have taken a step further by giving a lifeline to this marathon by organizing it annually on May 29.

Bikrum Pandey, president of Tenzing-Hillary Everest (Qomolangma) Marathon Committee who started the event with merely 29 participants is now proud to present hundreds of participants including 55 foreign nationals comprising 11 female competitors and nearly half-a-dozen journalists from different countries.

The decade-long conflict in the country that led to most of the countries in the world to warn their citizens in the travel advisories to avoid non-essential visit to Nepal prevented many foreigners from participating in the gala in yesteryears, said Pandey who is visibly excited with this year's response.

In 2006, they managed to attract some 140 participants including 22 foreign nationals. This year's response had encouraged the committee to work with further enthusiasm so that to encourage more foreign participants, especially those living in Asia-Pacific region, in the years ahead.

Talking to Xinhua on Sunday, Pandey said that he is looking forward to present the world's highest altitude marathon as an "event of global audience interest".

"Other than being just an extreme adventure sports drawing attention of those seeking adrenaline rush, we would like to present this Marathon as a festival which would provide entertainment to people from every walk of life," he said.

Rather than being just another competitive sport in which only the person who could endure the hardship of the extreme adventure sports could participate, this event would also embrace general people in family environment.

"We are going to have various categories so that even a grandfather and his grandson could take part in the marathon and have some quality time together," added Pandey.

Meanwhile, Sushil Bista, the coordinator of the Marathon Organizing Committee said that this event would provide an opportunity to the Sherpas living in the remote part of the country to be a part of the spectacular event.

"All the schools in the region have already announced the day as the holiday," said Bista who had a telephone conversation with Joanna Snoek, a Dutch participant who is currently acclimatizing herself for the marathon in the Qomolangma base camp region.