FIVE years ago Gill and David Koch were waiting for their son Gareth to return home from his Himalayan holiday.

And today they still wait, with a last desperate hope Gareth — who they call their “invisible son” — may just come walking through their door.

The missing backpacker from Hamfield in Wantage, who would have been 30 next month, was due back from a month-long trip to Nepal on March 20, 2004. But he vanished without trace and none of his belongings have ever been found.

His parents and brother Adam, 27, said they would never give up searching for him although they accept there is a good chance he is dead.

Mrs Koch, 51, said: “We’ve sent cards out to everyone we can think of to remind them about him. We call him our invisible son.

“We can’t see him, but we know he’s here. We talk about him an awful lot, but with joy and pride. We had such fun with him.

“Anniversaries, birthdays and this time of year are always hard because he should be here with us.

“But we have had to get on with life and invest our time in Adam and in other things.

“We won’t give up. We don’t know what’s happened to him, there’s a good chance he is dead, but no one can prove that and so we can’t give up.

“If he walked in the door one day and said ‘why did you give up Mum,’ I would never forgive myself.

“There’s always hope he might come home.”

Gareth, a retail shop manager and Scout leader, left England for Nepal on February 20, 2004, with work colleague Ian Napier.

But the pair parted company following a disagreement and Mr Napier returned home early.

The last known sighting of Gareth was on March 8, 2004, when he was seen with two German travellers.

He was due to return to Chhukung — which the Koch’s have now renamed their home after — before returning to Oxfordshire.

Mr Koch, 52, said: “He was looking forward to the trip. He planned extremely well for it. It was so different to anything that he had known in the past and there was the lure of Everest. We’ve heard nothing at all.

“His belongings, passport and bag have never been found. It’s almost like he has been plucked off the face of the earth. There’s no trace whatsoever.”

Over the past five years, the Kochs have met politicians and Government ministers to help find their son and improve procedures for finding missing people.

The annual Scouting event, the Gareth Koch Endeavour Shield day, takes place on April 25 at the Youlbury Scout Campsite, Boars Hill, Oxford, in his memory.

A Foreign and Commonwealth Office spokesman said: “Gareth Koch is still being treated as a missing person by the Nepalese authorities.

“His case remains open but there is no longer an active investigation.”

Mr Koch urged anyone going to Nepal to look at garethkochlostinnepal.co.uk He said: “If anyone has any information about him, please let us know.”

wantage@oxfordmail.co.uk