Week 105 - Dingboche, Lobuche, Gorak Shep, Periche, Monjo, Lukla (Nepal)

Our Everest Base Camp trek continued and the week started with our second acclimatisation day, this time in Dingboche. We’d realised the weather was at it’s best in the morning and set our alarm to get up while the skies were clear. Before breakfast me and Rhys had already climbed to a stupa for views into the next valley and over to Lhotse (8,516m), while the sun started to rise and light up the tips of the mountains surrounding Dingboche. As always, we’d managed to collect a couple of dogs who escorted us to the ridge where we extended our pack to six dogs. We came across a lot of friendly dogs during the hike, the majority black and with thick hair to fend against cold nights in the mountains- to name a few, we walked with Fruit Loop, Plaster Cast, Marmite and Onion.

Pre breakfast exploration in Dingboche as the sun was coming up.

Back at the teahouse we ate breakfast with the rest of the group before heading out in the cold for the walk to Chhunkung at 4,730m, the final stop before Island Peak, a one day hike further rising to 6,189m. It’s recommended that acclimatisation days are spent climbing to higher altitudes then descending to spend another night at the same level, Dingboche was at 4,440m. The trail took us up a steady gradient along the Imja Khola Valley, negotiating a path of loose boulders while we followed the river, crossing streams on stepping stones. The clouds had come in soon after we left Dingboche so again we missed out on the views, supposedly one of the most scenic side routes of the whole trek.

We ordered lunch in Chhunkung then the majority of the group opted to continue a further 100m climb to a ridge that despite having no views would hopefully make the following day easier by giving our bodies more exposure to higher altitude. Apparently, through the clouds stood the world’s 5th highest mountain, Makalu (8,462m), one of the world’s 14 mountains that stand over 8,000m tall, 8 of which in Nepal. Although we were above the tree line, making loo stops harder to find, the floor was carpeted with tiny, delicate, beautifully coloured flowers, from bright reds to cornflower blues, pinks and purples.

After lunch we were all feeling pretty sleepy and the thought of facing the cold winds on the walk back to Dingboche wasn’t very appealing but as it was cold and down hill we made less stops and made it back quickly, only to find another group had moved into the teahouse. After 5 nights of having places mostly to ourselves, having to share the log fire was a surprise, i’d hate to think how busy they get in peak season.

We stopped in the common room to warm up with a flask of hot lemon before retiring to our room for a bit of peace and quiet. The reduced oxygen in the air really made you feel sleepy and it was a task to stay awake until bedtime, something we’d been recommended to do to help with the altitude sickness. For dinner that night Rhys ordered tuna pizza and was disheartened when it came as a cabbage, carrot, cheese and tuna mix, the ingredients for all meals were the same and variety in diet was limited to noodles, potatoes, rice or bread.

The next day we headed to Lobuche, a climb to 4,930m. The first 2-3hrs took us to Duglha along a gradual incline where we stopped for tea by a river raging with ice cold glacier melt, where we filled our water bottles with such dirty water we couldn’t bring ourselves to drink out of them - even iodine doesn’t kill everything. 

Leaving Dingboche behind on route to Lobuche.

We then had a steep climb to the Memorial Park which left most of us out of breath. Lynn had been struggling with the altitude and managed to rent a horse to carry her up the worst of it. The park is incredibly peaceful and has a number of stone memorials wrapped in prayer flags and with poetic epitaphs to honour people who had attempted to climb Everest and died in the process. It brought it home a bit, although the trip to Base Camp is a tourist hike, climbing Everest itself is a hardcore challenge and although not the most technical mountain in the world, taking it lightly can be fatal. 

The walk from Dingboche to Lobuche.

From the Memorial Park we followed a river along a mostly flat section to Lobuche. At this point I started to feel lethargic and nauseous and despite it being the easiest section of the day I didn’t get a chance to enjoy it. Once in Lobuche where we stopped for lunch, a flask of hot lemon and lots of water seemed to quell the sickness and I joined the rest of the group who were continuing on a short outing to a ridge next to the teahouse. From the top of the ridge we got our first close up view of the glacier and the snowcapped peaks that until then had only been in the distance. Talking to the sherpas we realised just how much the glacier has shrunk in the last 20 years, pulling back almost to Base Camp from Lobuche.

Rhys and Bryce resting by the glacier, Lobuche.

View from the ridge in Lobuche towards Base Camp.

That night was a terrible nights sleep, I headed to bed early as I hadn’t slept well the whole trip, what with all the liquid you had to drink meaning you were up every hour in the night queuing for the loo. I was short of breath from the altitude and back to feeling nauseous.

The next morning I spoke to Gelu and decided to take Diomox (akin to taking sea sickness tablets while at sea) so I could enjoy the walk to Base Camp and up to Kala Pattar the following day. It was like a miracle drug, as soon as it hit my system I felt right as rain, by dilating your capillaries it enables your body to absorb more oxygen and so combats mild symptoms of altitude sickness. Most people in our group were already taking the drug from the start and by the end of it, only 4 people managed to make it all the way to Kala Pattar without taking it, Rhys, Ró, Ashleigh and Noemi. When you think about it, we climbed pretty high, baring in mind the highest mountain in the UK, Ben Nevis is only 1,344m and when we skydived in Australia, it was only from 4,270m.

A beautiful morning in Lobuche with view of our teahouse.

I was glad to be feeling better and we headed out with a spring in our step to our final teahouse during the ascent, at Gorak Shep. It only took 3 hours following a trickle of a stream and we didn’t gain much altitude until the last kilometre or so which involved lots of short climbs and descents over loose boulders. Lunch at Gorak Shep was a welcome rest.

Rhys, nearly at Gorak Shep.

Then, after lunch, we headed to Everest Base Camp and we couldn’t have planned a more special place to be spending our two year traveling anniversary (go us!) It was a long walk and with the return to Gorak Shep, made for a long day. Although we didn’t climb much, the path was rolling and we were constantly either climbing or descending. Suddenly there seemed to be a lot of people around and there were queues to get passed some of the narrower sections. The final part of the walk dropped down to the glacier bed where sections were slippery with black ice. 

Me, nearly at Base Camp.

Actual Base Camp itself was a little unimpressive, just a pile of boulders drapped with prayer flags with views of the Khumba Icefall, the hardest part of the Everest climb and the sight of the 2014 avalanche that claimed the lives of 16 Nepalese guides. From Base Camp you can’t even see Everest as it’s nestled behind other mountains on the Tibetan border, but you can see a couple of tents that mark the New Base Camp (the one for trekkers is the Old Camp, for the new one you have to pay thousands of dollars for a permit), it would be really interesting to see how busy the new camp is in spring when people are there preparing to climb.

After 2 years of traveling, we make it to Everest Base Camp.

As for a few facts, Everest was first scaled in 1953 by the Kiwi Sir Edmund Hillary and the Sherpa, Tenzing Norgay while on a British led expedition. Since then, more than 6,850 people have made it to the top (and there are thought to be hundreds of bodies still up there), some even solo and some without Oxygen (if you were flown directly to the top of Everest without acclimatisation, you’d only have a few minutes until you passed out from lack of Oxygen and died). Hundreds of people set out to climb the mountain each year and it costs an absolute fortune to do so (upwards of GBP£30,000 for the cheapest companies), the success rate to climb is only about 56% with a 10% death rate. 

We stayed at the camp for nearly an hour. Our porters had followed us up with hot chocolate and cookies and we wandered around taking hundreds of photos and high fiving everyone. Although being there was the aim of our entire trek, we knew we still had a big challenge the following day to reach Kala Pattar. Of the 18 of us who started together, 16 had made it.

The sun had dropped below the mountains on the way back to Gorak Shep and the wind picked up. It was a cold walk and we moved quickly without stopping to prevent us getting too cold. By the time we reached the teahouse we were shattered and after a celebratory Mars Bar and hot lemon we took a nap before dinner. Most people had lost their appetites and forced down some food before turning in for an early night.

The walk back from Base Camp to Gorak Shep.

The earliest start of the trek and we were up and ready to climb Kala Pattar, a small hill(?!) at 5,545m with the path starting directly opposite our teahouse. The diomox had led me to having the best nights sleep of the entire trek but Rhys had started feeling lethargic and nauseous and hadn’t slept much at all. He battled on through though. We were 15 minutes late leaving the teahouse as we had to wait around for everyone to get ready and were all wrapped up in our puffer jackets against the bitter cold.

The climb was the hardest part of the trek. There was a lot of loose gravel and rocks and ice in places where the sun wasn’t yet up to defrost it. It felt like we were climbing for ages and it was the longest up hill section of the walk. We took it slowly and made it to the top in 2 1/4 hours, just after the sun had risen over the peak of Everest. 11 out of the 18 we were hiking with made it and some of those who stayed at Gorak Shep decided to get an head start on the descent while we climbed. Again, we had hot chocolate and cookies at the top and were happy in the knowledge that from here on it was downhill all the way back to Lukla. 

Everest before sunrise (the peak in the middle peering over from behind the closer peaks).

As we were late getting up to the peak, we were also the last leaving and had the place to ourselves, the view was spectacular with the valley rolling out beneath us and Everest in front of us peering out over it’s neighbours. It’s easy to forget just how high you are when everything around you is over 5,000m, I can’t even imagine standing at sea level and having an 8,488m mountain tower over you.

Rhys at the top of Kala Pattar, 5,455m, champion.

Our TnT trekking group at the top of Kala Pattar, Rex, V, Stan, Ró, Me, Rhys, Noemi, Kathy, Karlie, Ashleigh and Kathryn.

The way down was warmer as the sun was out and before we knew it we were back at the hotel being served breakfast. Rhys took a quick nap and we packed our bags for the porters to collect for the descent. We still had a long day ahead of us.

Descending from Kala Pattar towards Gorak Shep.

The return trail took us down to Lobuche where we stopped for lunch before continuing to Periche where we ended the day walking through sleet, glad to make it to a dung warmed common room where we ate dinner and stayed up playing cards. The evenings highlight was seeing one of the dogs we’d met on the way up run full pelt at us to say hello.

Walking from Gorak Shep to Lobuche.

Our tenth day of walking took us down to Khumjung at 3,700m. We had a huge descent before lunch, taking us down hill over a kilometre before climbing 500m again to the teahouse. The start of the day had been cold, with no fire in the lodge and we’d had a late start while we waited for everyone to get their stuff together. We didn’t make it to the planned lunch spot and ended up eating in Tengboche, where we’d stayed and visited the monastery. We still had some down hill to go after lunch to reach the river bed but we were back in the tree line and the temperature had warmed up a bit. The final descent was steep as we wove between trees and yaks before we began our final climb of the day to Khumjung.

Our tired group heading down to Monjo.

Khumjung was a beautiful little village and our favourite of the trek with a sacred craggy mountain towering over terraced plots and rows of stone houses. We followed a track passed piles of mani and small shops to a stupa on the far side of the village, opposite which we were staying. The common area had huge windows with views over town, the toilets were clean and the beds were comfy and warm. It felt like we were returning to civilisation despite the village being a little off the main trail. TnT, our trekking company is one of the only ones who stay there on the the return and even though it was just above Namche, there was hardly anyone else around.

Khumjung village.

After a hot lemon me and Rhys wandered out to explore, swiveling at every step to try to see where all the yaks were from the sound of their bells. We didn’t get far before we were enticed into a shop selling beautiful yak wool blankets and scarfs and ended up making a few purchases. Although probably a little more expensive than in Kathmandu, at least you feel like your money is going straight to the source. We treated ourselves to salt and vinegar Pringles and watched men playing a local game flicking plastic counters across a chalked board into holes. Ró wandered out later and returned to show us her new Yak wool dress, a scarf that she planned to artfully wrap around herself to make an elegant evening dress for our final farewell meal, I was glad to be at a lower altitude else all the laughter may have caused a black out.

We only had a short walk ahead of us on day eleven but rather than walk directly down to Monjo, we took a scenic route. Our little group decided to do a bit of final yak wool blanket shopping after breakfast and were running a bit late to get back for the school tour so we had to fast walk through the gates to catch up. No kids were about so there wasn’t that much to see apart from a big Sir Edmund Hillary statue that made us realise just how much he’s done for the villages surrounding Everest, building hospitals and schools, helping create the national park, bringing in programs to replant after climbing groups cut down all the trees for firewood, not just sending money but really getting involved. 

Next, we wandered up to the monastery, that although only small, held a Yeti skull in a locked cabinet. It was interesting to see, a cone covered in thick ginger hair giving off a strong wet dog smell but i’m doubtful whether it was real, even though i’m open to their existence. We stopped at a small hospital in Kunde, the next village along before descending to Namche.

Once in Namche we headed to one of the German bakeries for an expensive lunch, grateful to have something that wasn’t rice, potatoes or noodles. We then had some free time to finish off any shopping, more yak wool, yak bells, maps and T-shirts showing the route we’d just trekked. 

By the time we left Namche we were all pretty tired and didn’t really fancy the 2 hour walk we had left to make it to Monjo. Nevertheless we persevered, crossing back over the high bridge and two lower bridges, zigzagging up the valley passed the hordes of people trekking now peak season had started, to our teahouse, passing the time planning a Utopian community where we’d move to Khumjung, wear nothing but yak wool and make moisturiser and protein milkshakes from berries and plants.

After a great nights sleep following a night time PJ party in Ró’s humongous room, we were up early for our last day of walking. We still had 5 hours of trail to cover until we reached Lukla and we’d forgotten how much uphill was involved. It felt like an extremely long day and the ridge behind which Lukla was tucked, never seemed to get any closer. Finally we rolled in to town, Rhys and Ró racing the last 200m to be the first back (Rhys won). We dropped off our bags, ordered dinner and headed out to an underground Irish Bar for celebratory drinks with Ró, Karlie, Ashleigh, Bryce, Noemi, Rex and Kathy. I think Ashleigh even found a new favourite tipple in the hot rum punch.

Back at the teahouse our guides had arranged a buffet Dal Baht dinner in a separate room along with our porters. Food was great and was washed down with a few more drinks. Lots of dancing followed as we thanked our porters and assistant sherpas in style and getting to bed, although not late was all a bit hazy.