So we left Kathmandu on October 5th to fly to Lukla and begin our trek to Everest base camp. Flying into Lukla was like being in a James Bond movie. It felt like our little propellor plane was dodging its way through the mountains before landing on the shortest little landing strip I have ever seen. Needless to say, we survived.
[Note: I will do my best to save you the smelly details of our 14 days of trekking, while providing you with key highlights. Keep in mind, throughout all of this, Andrew lasted 14 days with one pair of socks and no shower. Yes, I repeat..no shower. (I allowed myself two showers..and one pair of socks.)]
Day one, from Lukla to Phakding, was by far the easiest day. It was only a couple hour hike and we found accomodation that we shared with only two fellow trekkers- our British friend Matt and another Brit who calls himself Wolf. After settling in, we busted out our brand new ponchos and did a little exploring (because with Andrew, it is impossible to ever sit still). It was thanks to this little exploration that I familiarized myself with the many uses of a leaf and little corners hidden away in the bushes..little did I know how comfortable I would become with this setting in the next two weeks of my life. Later that day, we settled in for an evening of cards and chatting with Wolfman and Matt. We set out early the next morning as a group, but Wolf was the first to fall behind the pack..no pun intended.
We were all planning to stay at the same hotel in the next village (Namche Bazar) anyway, so we decided to just all go at our own pace and meet up at the end of the day. We eventually lost Matt too.
I can't even explain to you how many times, along the way to Namche, that I wanted to quit and turn around. It was all uphill and the steps were ridiculously huge. But, we eventually made our way up..only to realize we actually didn't know the name of the hotel where we were supposed to meet Matt and Wolf. We found a different place and settle in for two nights to allow ourselves some acclimatization time.
The next few days are sort of a blur of waking up, putting on damp sweaty socks, trekking, eating, sleeping and repeating said process over and over and over. The first four days of the trek were cloudy and rainy. Each time we reached a new village, the rain would begin as soon as we set foot inside. I was beginning to think we would not even get to see Everest. We were surrounded by nothing but grey clouds. On day four, we reached Tangboche. The last two hours of the hike there were completely uphill. It was pouring rain. We were soaked, cold, sweaty, and tired. We found a place to stay and got out of our wet gear as fast as possible. That's when I realized that Mona had sadly been lost somewhere along the rain. I began tearing everything apart looking for her, hoping that she got put somewhere else in our bag somehow. But she was nowhere to be found. She, along with our towel, is living somewhere happily in the Himalayan Mountain Range. Her disappearance is still a bit of a sensitive subject and some have been more affected than others by it...but I'm sure Andrew will get over this loss soon.
Anyway, that night in Tengboche, it finally stopped raining and for a brief half hour there was a break in the clouds and we got a sneek peak of Everest! It was honestly as tho a small window had been opened in the clouds and all that could be seen through it was Mount Everest. One star could also be seen in the sky, so we went to bed hopeful that the rain and clouds were gone for good. We woke up the next morning and were surrounded by a brand new world. There were ridiculous views all around us...all sorts of mountains that the clouds had been hiding from us all along. The good weather stayed with us for the rest of the trek and not a single cloud covered Mount Everest from our view.
We made our way up slowly, some days only hiking for a couple of hours. After the clouds and rain lifted, the trails started getting busier and busier as the back-logged flights were making their way into Lukla. In Lobuche (second last stop before Everest base camp), we were lucky to get the second last room in the village. The dining rooms of all four lodges were full that night, with people sleeping wherever they could set their mummy bag down. That night for dinner, we each ordered a pepper steak, inhaled it and raved about how good it tasted. Little did we know what those pepper steaks had in store for us the next day...
We set out at 6am for a big day. The plan was to make it to Gorak Shep early in order to get a room, eat breakfast, and head to base camp. Twenty minutes in, my pepper steak (...or was it steak?) was not agreeing with me. I was feeling pretty terrible the whole way, but we made it to Gorak Shep and even got a room. By that point, Andrew was feeling ill too. We somehow got some food in us and decided to still make our way to base camp. (We later learned that we each agreed to it only because we thought the other wanted to. Really, we should've been asleep in bed or letting the pepper steak do its thing.) Three hours later, we found Everest base camp and were so happy to have arrived. We started taking pictures and relaxing, only to find out that the actual base camp was still two kms away...this one was just a touristy thing. So, we hiked two more kms and were finally at the actual base camp. By that point, I felt incredibly horrible. The view was amazing though and we were the only two there..away from all the other tourists, which was nice for once. We made our way back to Gorak Shep, and the pepper steak and the altitude had the best of me. The next morning Andrew got up to hike up to Kala Patar, but I stayed back for fear of feeling the same way as the day before.
In total, we took nine days to get to base camp. The way back down was much quicker and a heck of a lot easier too. It felt like we pretty much ran down the mountain. We ended up randomly running into Matt again and plenty of others that we saw repeatedly throughout the 14 days.
And what did we learn in these 14 days to Everest base camp and back?
#1- altitude gives Andrew uncontrollable gas at all times of the day/night
#2- altitude does something to Andrew's concept of hygiene and his need to keep clean
#3- one pair of socks is not enough to last Andrew 14 days
#4- our 17 kg bag does not compare to the ridiculous loads that the porters carry up the mountain
#5- to become one with yak poo...it means you are on the most practical path and no matter how hard you try not to, you will step/slide through a pile at one point or another
#6- squatters are not as scary as I thought they were but..
#7- the bush or a rock are always a better option
#8- do not eat the pepper steak
#9- every second of it was worth it and we'd do it all over again!
|  | 
|
