The Everest Base Camp Trek is a 12-16 day hike, covering approximately 120km through the Himalayas in Nepal. The trail is well worn and travelled, and we hiked it solo, meaning no guide and no porter. There are many little villages along the way that have guesthouses and restaurants to stay at. A room, which consists of 2x4’s and plywood costs about 200 rupees ($2.40) and a meal is about 400 rupees ($5.00). Each day we hiked about 5 hours, paying close attention to how much altitude we were gaining to avoid altitude sickness. We had 2 showers over the trek, and by the top, my hair was straight due to my toque!
It was an amazing, challenging journey that required both strong muscles and a strong mind. The views were incredible, the local Sherpa people so friendly and God showed his majesty through it all. It was an amazing trip!
Day -4 to 0: Kathmandu, waiting for a flight
Due to poor weather in Lukla, the starting point of our trek, we were grounded in Kathmandu for 4 days. We went to the airport everyday for 6am for the off chance that we could get seats on an airplane that may or may not take off. It was so disappointing every morning we decided to head back to the hotel at 11am and try again the next day! The manager of the airline got to recognizing us every morning and within seconds of seeing us he would give us a remorseful smile... and we’d know then we’d have another morning in the airport. Hooray.
Day 1 (Oct. 5): Kathmandu - Lukla - Bengkar (2630m)
We got to the airport and found out that flights were flying! But due to high air traffic, everything was delayed by about 4hrs. And then... they closed the Lukla airport again. They then decided to send a flight to a small village 2 days away from Lukla, and we got in line for that asap! Dozens of people were desperate to leave that day and were waving their tickets and passports in the air. I waited patiently, making eye contact with our friendly manager and lo and behold, he picked me out of the crowd and got us on that flight! It meant an extra 2 days of trekking but we were desperate to go! About halfway through our flight, they announced “We’re landing in Lukla!” YAY! Such a gift!
The Lukla airport is one runway, that is chiseled out of the side of a mountain, and runs uphill - it’s so short, the plane requires the angle to slow down during landing, and to speed up during takeoff. That landing was an adventure in itself! We then grabbed our bags, grabbed some somosas and started hiking! We were on our way!
We hiked 4.5hrs and were whipped. It was awesome to start seeing the trail life - dozens of porters carrying everything from beer to lumber to rice to chairs and eggs. Everything has to get carried in! The porters often sing and giggle when the trail isn’t too strenuous and we learned to watch out for children grabbing your trekking poles. We also got used to sharing the trail with yaks/cows/horses who were hauling loads up the mountain. We learned to stay on the upper part of the trail so they didn’t accidently bump us off the side! The trail winds along the valley, over the river and back (all hanging bridges) and is very green and lush. A good first day!
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| Fingers crossed that we will actually take off! |
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| The Lukla airstrip |
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| Happy to be on the trail! |
Day 2 (Oct. 6): Bengkar - Namche Bazaar (3440m)
We knew this was one of the toughest days on the whole trek - an 800m climb. Almost a vertical kilometer! The trail continued along the bottom of the valley, alongside a rushing river. Then it started up. You could see the trail from the bottom, and little people slowly trudging up. Trekking poles became our best friends, because you could plant them infront of you, and then slowly use the leverage to haul yourself 4 slow steps forward. Three hours later, after our first Everest viewing, we crawled in Namche. We have never been so exhausted.
Miraculously, within 5 minutes of being in town we met up with our original trekking buddy, my cousin Jacob. He had gotten a flight in a few days before us and we were thrilled to meet up again and do some trekking together! We found a little 4 room lodge to stay in with our hostess, Nina - our Sherpa grandmother who hardly spoke enough english to understand her own menu, but was the sweetest thing.
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| Every village has Buddist symbols at its entrance |
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| Waiting for a meal inside a Sherpa Lodge |
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| A typical village on the first half of the trek |
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| A bridge built by Sir Edmond Hillary himself! |
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| 240 cans of beer... |
Day 3 (Oct. 7) - Rest Day in Namche
Our sea level bodies needed a day to acclimatize to the high altitudes. We spent this day eating, getting more money out, stocking up on Snickers bars and bandaids, and enjoying the beautiful village. We even found an American owned bar that got beef shipped in for hamburgers! That night we found a place that showed the Everest Imax movie, which was filmed the year of the 1996 disaster. It was incredible to be seeing that story fold out while in the Himalayas. We also showered today ($2.50). It was lovely... except my water ran out when I was covered in soap, so that was fun.
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| The view from our lodge! |
Day 4 (Oct. 8): Namche - Tengboche (3860m)
Ugh. Another day from hell. The trail started off lovely, meandering around the sides of green mountains, displaying fantastic views of snowcapped peaks. It then plummeted down to a river which we crossed and started the inevitable climb back up the other side (crossing a river always means a deadly climb on the other side). This was brutal - my worst day. Snot, sweat and tears... this day had it all. It took 3hrs to get back up the other side, then climb along the top of a ridge, continuing up hill into Tengboche. When we crawled into town, I found some rocks, and laid down. My head was crushing and all I wanted to do was cry. This was my altitude sickness.
We ate some food, Jacob decided to go onwards, and I could only move in the direction of BED! After a long nap, I came to, but felt like I was lying with my head downhill, and I couldn’t move. Dizzy. Disoriented. Terrible. Eventually my head cleared enough to walk around a bit and by dinner I was okay.
There is a famous Buddhist monastery in this village. It was pretty quiet when I walked in, but as I was reading the guidelines of respect, all of a sudden I hear “Baby, baby, baby, ooohhhhhh...” -- one of the monk’s cellphone had a Bieber ringtone and he answered it right there in the monastery! You can have a shaved head and wearing a robe, and still love the Beibs. So funny. Everyone has a cell phone up there.
That night we had dinner with a couple British guys and since they were sick of all their card games, we taught them Eukre! They caught on really quick and we had a good game!
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| Mt. Everest in the background! |
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| Everest is the med-tall peak on the left-middle! |
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| A typical 100rs ($1.20) room |
Day 5 (Oct. 9): Tengboche - Pheriche (4240m)
This was a great day! It was cloudy all day, but would clear from time to time to see snow peaks poking through the clouds! We crossed the tree line, and everything was just shrubby and grassy. We quickened our pace for the last 10mins of the day because clouds were billowing in behind us up the valley, and just as we landed in town, it started snowing. Snowing in the Himalayas! We were stoked.
The Himalayan Rescue Association is based in this village - they help thousands of people every year who have altitude sickness, and save many lives. We went to a free session on altitude sickness - thought it would be wise, since they said that no one has died who has attended that session. We learned about what happens in your body as you raise in altitude, and how to recognize and understand symptoms. We found Jacob again here in this village and hung out for the rest of the evening.
We got out oxygen levels tested - at sea level, you’ve got about 99% oxygen in your blood. Andrew was 97% and I was 92%. Danger zones are in the 70s.
We stayed at a fantastic little lodge with Pemba, a Sherpa man who was on the American Expedition on Everest in 1996. He carried supplies up the mountain for the climbers all the way up to 300m from the summit. Amazing.
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| Above the tree line |
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| snow! |
Day 6 (Oct. 10): Rest Day in Pheriche
We slept terribly, Andrew had a horrible headache all night from the altitude and his sleeping breathing was off. At high altitudes, you can’t get enough oxygen while sleeping, so your body won’t breathe for 10 seconds... then take in huge gulps of air, which sometimes wakes you up. Andrew’s sleeping breathing was like this from here on to the top.
Jacob decided to go on to the next village, and we decided another rest day would be wise. We also started taking altitude medication, just to help with some symptoms. We did a day hike this day, about 100m higher to the top of a ridge, relaxed, hung out with some awesome views, then came back down.
On our flight to Lukla, there were two German guys, Lucas and Alex. We crisscrossed them along the trail all the way to this village. We decided to actually connect and be friends here, haha, so we spent lots of time with them and coordinated our next few days schedules.
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| The morning after snow. Beauty. |
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| Our bedroom window in the morning - brr! |
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| Sherpa stew - my fave! |
Day 7 (Oct. 11): Pheriche - Labouche (4910m)
Another challenging day. All morning my fingers and mouth were numb and I had breathing difficulties. Weird. Kept going though, lol. Lots of climbing again... one MONSTER of a hill that took an hour and a half to get up, all lose rubble with a path chiseled out of it. Then we hiked along a desolate valley that at one point had a glacier in it, which left it bare and grey now.
Labouche is a miserable cold town with the highest prices on the trek. Rooms were going for 1000rs. We someone stumbled upon a little hole in the wall lodge that gave us a free room (she really wanted our business - all their profits are in food sales). We met up with our German buddies and eventually more guests, and all huddled around the yak dung stove to stay warm. Peoples’ water bottles froze that night and so did the water in the bathroom.
*A note on toilets! We had everything from a flushing western toilet, to a squattie pottie that you had to pour water from a bucket into the hole to ‘flush it’... to our favourite... a shed filled with hay, and you had to aim for a baseball sized hole in the floor, then throw hay down under it. The floor got pretty slippery. There was never toilet paper, so you always bought and brought your own. I think the most we paid for one roll was about $3.00.
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| Heading off in the morning! |
Day 8 (Oct. 12): Labouche - Gorak Shep (5140m)
BASE CAMP DAY.
The last village on the trek! What a rough trail though - we really started feeling like we were on a different planet this day. Everything was either mountain, glacier, or monsterous hills of piled rock that either used to be a glacier, or has been pushed around by a glacier. We spent the whole day scrambling around rocks to get to Gorak Shep.
Andrew was feeling really crummy by this point. I was having stomach problems. It was slow going.
We got to Gorak Shep, dropped our bags at the guesthouse, ate a quick lunch, and headed towards Base Camp, which was about 3hrs away. It was slow going - Andrew was hurting. More of the same, scrambling over and around rocks, up and down hills, all alongside a huge glacier. We descended onto the glacier, and over to base camp. We did it! 5364m! The tourist EBC is not the real EBC - they discourage tourists from going to the real thing for the health and mental prep of the climbers. So the tourist one overlooks real base camp, the Kumba Icefall, and you can see the tip of Everest poking up in between two other mountains. A very cool experience!!! It was freezing though, so we stayed about 20mins - long enough to take some photos, hang with our German buddies a bit, eat a Cliffbar and chat a bit with other tourists.
I think the most fascinating part for me was the Kumba Icefall. It’s hundreds of meters high. It is a frozen river that is 500m deep, and is all jagged, deformed pieces of ice, standing all on top and around each other, with crevices that are hundred of feet deep. Everest climbers have to go up and down this icefall four times, using ropes and ladders. And the whole thing moves a meter every day, so it’s a different climb every season. Every team that wants to ascend, has to pay I think $2000 to the first team that went up that season and installed the ropes and ladders. Not my cup of tea!
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| The trail to Gorak Shep - a different world! |
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| Kumba Ice Fall up the left! |
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| Made it!! |
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| Yak Attack! Supplies to Base Camp. |
Excerpt from my journal:
What I would give for:
- Kleenex w. lotion in it
- warm, free shower
- heated bedroom
- sea level air
- a solid poo
I’m thankful for:
- yak dung
- sunshine
- majestic mountains
- Andrew’s grace for me
- my down coat
- cough drops and altitude meds
Day 9 (Oct. 13): Kala Patthar (5550m), Gorek Shep - Pheriche
Today we were supposed to hike to the summit of Kala Patthar, for 360’ mountain views and a full on view of Everest. Andrew woke up feeling SO terrible this morning, that he hardly made it up 30mins of the hike, and had to listen to his body and head down. I continued solo for a HELLUVA climb. Ooooooh man. It was like climbing the Lions in North Vancouver, but with little oxygen. There were 3 tiers of the climb, and you could never see past the part that you were working on. I got passed by a couple that paid $300 for a horseback ride to the top - even the horses were struggling.
Finally, after 2 hours - I reached the top. 18 200 feet!
It was incredible. Literally, 360’ of snow capped peaks and I could see fully, the King, Mount Everest. I climbed almost up to the summit, then I realized that the rock ended, and I could plummet thousands of feet to my death. So I didn’t go the last 15ft, lol. I snapped some photos, took a video, then just sat down and soaked it all in. It was breathtakingly beautiful.
I think summits bring out 3 distinctive emotions:
- Desperation - the couple was desperate to get to the top, and even though their health didn’t allow it, their $300 and horse hire did.
- Adventure - as soon as this one guy got to the top, he stripped his clothes off and started shouting at Everest as his buddies too photos of his naked back profile!
- Love - a couple that I had been following up got engaged up there!
It was an eventful little summit experience!!
Finally I started down. I love going down, haha. What took me 2hrs to get up, only took me 35mins to get down. LOVED IT.
At the bottom though, I found a very sick husband who was delirious and desperate to descend. All he could say was “I gotta get down.” So we started down, and for 2hrs, I couldn’t keep up with him. I’d come around a ridge, and he would be one or two ridges up, wave his poles at me, then continue. We had a good scare after we saw one man breathing bottled oxygen and he eventually got airlifted down.
We descended over 5000 feet that day. It was exhausting; our knees were upset but our lungs and brains happy!
Day 10 (Oct. 14): Pheriche to Namche
Basically on the way down, we did what took us 2 days on the way up, in 1 day on the way down. So while they were easier because we were going down, they were flippin’ LONG! Today we hiked 8.5hrs, and pulled into Namche just as it got dark. It was the day that never ended!
I had THEE best shower of life - 20mins of hot water and heaven.
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| No shower for a week. Niiice. |
Day 11 (Oct. 15): Namche - Phakding (pronounced just the way you think it is...)
That killer climb that took us 3hrs last time, took us 1hr on the way down. Lovely.
Although, by today my knees were screaming and my feet were in brutal pain.
We were so excited to get to Kathmandu and eat food other than rice, noodles and veggies. Andrew was thrilled to find meat momos (dumplings) on the menu.
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| NOT hamburger patties. |
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| Always time to play! |
Day 12 (Oct. 16): Phakding - Yulning
BAD DAY BAD DAY!
Those meat momos from last night, ruined Andrew at about 3am. Food poisoning.
We hiked about 30mins today, and Andrew was sick twice and had to run for a toilet. He was soooo sick... we crawled into a guesthouse with an indoor western toilet and let the food poisoning run its’ course.
I didn’t know much about it, so I hiked the half hour back to Phakding to do some research on the internet, but the connection was so terrible I hardly learned anything. We didn’t have quite the proper medicines, he was really dehydrated, I was really worried. Then I ran into an Aussie couple on the trail who then stayed at our guesthouse and they had a ton of info on sicknesses, a wilderness first aid book, plenty of travel experience and extra medication. They were a godsend!!! Andrew spent the whole entire day in bed sipping water and apple juice and sleeping.
Day 13 (Oct. 17): Yulning - Lukla
Andrew was feeling a lot better and determined to get out today, so he filled up with Immodium and we trudged up to Lukla, walked straight to the airport and were on a flight back to Kathmandu 20mins later!
All in all, it was incredible. A LOT more challenging than we anticipated, as you can tell. But it strengthened our endurance and perseverance. It was a different world up there - I’ve never gone 13 days in my life without seeing any sort of car. You rely on the Sherpa people to house and feed you, yet you’re completely responsible for taking care of yourself and carrying yourself and your stuff up the mountain.
It was cold! At night it would be below zero degrees in our room. I don’t think I took my toque off for 5 days.
But the landscape was amazing. We were trekking through the Himalayas - unbelievable. The mountains were breathtaking - we would just stop and stare and the snow peaks for minutes at a time before carrying on the trail. They were mesmerizing.
We relied on each other for grace, and it was God’s grace that when one of us was weak, the other was strong.
Amazing memories, a once in a lifetime experience!
