I’m currently waiting for a tube at Hammersmith. I’m feeling quite nervous about the trip, but I’m not really sure why. It’s not because I think I can’t do it – I’m pretty confident that if the knees survive then I should be OK.
I think the nerves are more to do with the fact that in under an hour I should have met the nine other climbers that I’m going to spend the next four weeks with. There’s going to be precious little contact with anyone outside them and the supporting cast of guides, porters, cooks etc, so hopefully we’ll all get on…
Arriving in Kathmandu I was very grateful that I was part of a group. Andy, the leader, told us that we shouldn’t tip anyone, which has already proved useful advice – as we pushed our trolleys towards the bus we were approached by “porters” who asked “Are you part of the Jagged Globe group?” then whisked our trolleys away, only to demand payment a hundred metres later at the bus.
There were others begging, but using a tactic I hadn’t seen before: rather than just asking for money they offered £4.50 (in sterling) and asked for a £5 note.
Kathmandu is a pretty crazy place at the best of times. Once you’ve escaped the airport you’re thrown into the most noisy and disorganised traffic system on the planet. Then while you’re crawling along in the inevitable traffic jam, feeling the initial irritation caused by the clouds of smog you’re inhaling, you watch the half-built buildings clad in precariously bendy bamboo-scaffolding, the modern glass office blocks and the slums in between them going by.
The Summit Hotel is slightly south of the main chaos, in Patan, and in total contrast to the rest of Kathmandu, is calm, quiet and peaceful – even the air seems cleaner. We were supposed to leave here in the early hours of this morning to fly to Lukla, but it’s currently raining there and the airport is closed, so the group is relaxing in the garden of the hotel, discussing snow leopards and gradually getting to know each other.
Tenzing-Hillary Airport in Lukla is rated as the most dangerous in the world. Its runway is 460m long and has a gradient of 12%. At the bottom of the runway the hillside drops hundreds of metres down into the Dudh Kosi valley, while at the top there’s a big stone wall holding up the hillside. Unfortunately the weather at the moment is not conducive to safe arrivals, as Lukla doesn’t have any landing aids – if you can’t see the runway, you can’t land. We’ve been getting hourly updates all morning, but apparently the rain is still falling and there haven’t been any flights, so we’re staying here for the moment and ordering lunch.
Andy doesn’t seem too worried about losing a day. Our schedule has a couple of bad weather days built into it, so if the weather is OK after this then we may still be able to fit the whole itinerary in. We’re supposed to walk for a few hours this afternoon but it’s already too late for that, so it doesn’t make much difference now whether we fly later today or tomorrow morning.
The group seems pretty friendly. They’re an interesting mix, but mainly blokes in their 30s and 40s. So far the group has been quite quiet, but it’s early days so we’ll see how things develop. There are some pretty experienced climbers in the team: Andy has lead 28 trips for Jagged Globe, been in the mountain rescue in the UK and spent 2½ years with the BAS in the Antarctic, a Scottish guy called Mark has climbed in the Alps, the Andes and all over Africa, and there’s a young couple from Fulham who seem quite experienced too. There’s a guy called Dave who’s been out here several times before and seems to know the area well – he and Mark are pouring over a map trying to work out where we’re heading.
…and the wait goes on. We gave up in the middle of yesterday afternoon and Rich (my room-mate) and I walked to Patan Durbar Square, one of the seven Monument Zones that make up the Kathmandu Valley World Heritage Site. The square is full of temples but seemed pretty similar to Kathmandu Durbar Square, so Rich and I adjourned to a bar overlooking the square and sampled some Nepal Ice beer.
A small group of us went out for some food in the evening, and Andy told us a few stories from previous trips he’s been on. I came away thinking that I don’t want to be one of his future horror-stories, so had better put in a good effort when we start climbing!
I think Andy is beginning to feel quite bad about the situation we’re in. He bought us all a beer last night, and keeps apologising for the fact that we haven’t flown yet. He’s pointed out several times that this is what adventure travel is like, but seems very aware that people may be getting annoyed. So far though, everyone is in good spirits and I haven’t heard any complaints.
One option Andy mentioned is to forget the flights and walk in. This would take 7 days (1 day in a bus then 6 walking), and would mean we’d definitely lose at least 1 of our 3 summits. He seems keen to switch to this option tomorrow if we haven’t flown by the end of today, but I’m not sure that makes much sense – I’d prefer to hang around here another day or two as a flight on Wednesday or Thursday would give us a lot more time than walking in.
We were stood down at about 3pm yesterday afternoon, when it became clear we weren’t going to fly. Lukla was open yesterday, but there’s now such a backlog that it may take days to catch up,
and since our flights were on the third day of delays, we’re at the back of the queue: they fly each day’s scheduled flights first, and then start on the oldest part of the backlog.
With every update from the airport, Andy apologised and thanked us for being so understanding. I think he must have expected more trouble!
Now the airport is open, Andy seems a lot more positive about flying. Walking in is still an option, but there’s no talk of setting off today and I think he’s prepared to wait until tomorrow if we’re unlucky today. It’s a bit of a gamble as we don’t know for certain when we’ll be able to fly, but if we walk then we lose one of the three summits straight away. If we fly today or tomorrow then we can still fit all three summits in if the weather isn’t too bad, though we’re probably going to chop off the last few days of the original plan (a minor climb to get a good view of Everest).
After we’d been stood down yesterday, Rich, Mark, Vanessa and I caught a cab into Kathmandu to visit the temples at Pashupatinath (Hindu) and Boudhanath (Buddist). Pashupatinath doesn’t allow non-Hindus in, but it’s worth a visit to see the monuments surrounding the main temple, and the funeral sites along the banks of the Bagmati River. Boudhanath is one of the biggest stupa in the world, and was looking pretty impressive in the evening sun.
Back at the hotel I finished my book, and we ate what will hopefully be our last evening meal before we fly. We also planned a yoga class for this morning – Dave is (at least semi-) qualified, so has just lead a class in the hotel garden! We ended up doing it on slightly damp grass and it got pretty hot as the sun rose over the trees, but it feels good to have stretched a bit.
There’s no news on our flights yet, but the other Jagged Globe groups have gone, so hopefully we can get out of here today.
Well the other Jagged Globe groups may have left he hotel yesterday, but they came back later, and they weren’t happy. They’d spent the day at Kathmandu airport being promised flights that never materialised, and they were blaming Jagged Globe’s agents in Kathmandu.
When it became obvious that we weren’t going to fly, we tried to arrange yet another night in the hotel, but discovered we couldn’t all fit. We were only booked for Sunday night originally so six of us had to move down the road to the Greenwich Village hotel, which wasn’t quite as nice as the Summit but had the bonus of free wifi.
Rich, Dave, Martin and I spent the afternoon exploring Thamel, the tourist area of Kathmandu. In amongst the hundreds of counterfeit gear shops there are three or four real ones so we began by scouring the Mountain Hardwear and North Face shops for any last minute purchases we might need for the expedition. Unfortunately I’d bought so much kit before I left that I couldn’t see anything I could justify buying. Dave knew Thamel pretty well, so guided us to a shop selling Kukri, then on to a bookshop where I found a map of the Khumbu, covering most of our route.
Back at the Summit, we met up with the rest of the team, who weren’t in great spirits – the news from the Island Peak/Everest Base Camp team had been pretty depressing. A short while later though, Andy arrived and announced we’d got a helicopter lined up! It’s not entirely clear how this came about or was funded, but it seems likely that Jagged Globe sorted it out, presumably to avoid having both groups missing significant proportions of their trips.
This morning, for the fourth day in a row, we packed our kit up. Unlike the previous three, we actually left the hotel this time. The first few stages at the airport went pretty smoothly, but once we were through to the departure lounge it descended into chaos again. No-one seemed to know what was going on, and we spent ages sitting around while a horrific female voice barked incomprehensible noises from the tannoy.
Finally, after several hours of waiting, there was action, and we were driven off across the airfield in a tiny jeep. The route left the domestic terminal and seemed to take in most of the perimeter road – after 5-10 minutes we were dropped off in what seemed to be an aeroplane graveyard, surrounded by shells of ancient planes with no engines and helicopters without rotors.
Unfortunately that was as good as it got for the next few hours, so we sheltered from the rain under the wing of an old Fokker and waited. There was excitement every time we heard a helicopter, but they all seemed to be little four-seaters, then finally a massive Soviet Mil Mi-8 AMT troop carrier thundered into view, and we were in business.
It seemed to take ages to unload, pack all our bags in and refuel, but eventually it was ready and we took off for Lukla. The flight took around 45 minutes and was pretty straightforward, with endless views of the terracing around the hillside villages, but nothing hugely spectacular. Lukla on the other hand was amazing.
Shortly after we landed, as we were beginning to unload the bags, a small plane shot up the steep runway next to the helipad and managed to come to a halt before reaching the stone wall at the end. As we were leaving, another plane taxied to the top of the runway, opened its engines up to full power with the brakes on, then rocketed off down the hill and up into the sky. The runway is tiny – it’s hard to believe it’s long enough, but it seems to work…
We climbed up round the top of the runway and on up to our first lodge, where were given tea, introduced to the Sherpas and assigned rooms. The rooms are pretty basic (bare plywood floor, walls and ceiling, and a bit of foam for a mattress on a simple wooden bed frame) but are a lot better than I’m expecting when we get further up the valley! At first glance the toilets look normal, but they have no water supply, so are flushed using a jug of water from a big barrel.
Lukla itself seems to be mainly lodges, clustered around the airfield. There are various shops and a few bars, and even a fake Starbucks with free wifi!
Today began pretty slowly as everyone got to grips with our new lodge-based lifestyle, after the luxury of the Summit Hotel. Washing this morning was limited to a bucket of warm water on the wall outside the lodge, or the cold tap inside the building.
We had breakfast about 07:30 and after a certain amount of faffing we left at about 08:30. Having spent weeks walking with Klaas learning to improve my time-keeping to meet Dutch Army standards, I’m now sharing with Rich, who’s another ex-soldier. He’s ridiculously tidy and efficient, so we were both ready to go at 08:00 – tomorrow I may be a bit more relaxed!
We walked slowly through Lukla, pausing to take some photos of the planes dropping off the end of the crazy runway, then I sent my brother a birthday text message for tomorrow and we congregated at the police station while one of the sherpas filled in the required paperwork. Beyond the police station were our first prayer wheels, which we duly spun, then we passed through the arch that marked the edge of Lukla and set off up the trail.
The route actually went downhill for most of the morning, dropping from Lukla down to the Dudh Kosi river. The valley is very steep-sided, so not much was visible beyond. Occasionally we were able to see a snow-capped summit, but there’s generally been a layer of cloud hovering along the ridge on either side of the valley, limiting the views. By contrast, the centre of the valley was clear, and we had sun throughout the morning.
Having left Lukla at 2,800m, we had dropped down to 2,560m by the time we reached Phakding three hours later for lunch in the sun, then we spent the afternoon climbing slowly back up to 2,800m. The yaks carrying our bags passed us during lunch, and for some reason we never overtook them again, so our progress was limited to the speed of a heavily laden yak. Although it was probably a good idea to start the acclimatisation slowly, the leisurely pace got a bit frustrating at times, as the effects of altitude are almost imperceptible so far.
We’re now settled into our home for the night in Monjo. It’s pretty basic but has light, indoor (albeit squatting) toilets and running water, so will do the job.
The most popular Nepalese beer with our group so far is called Everest. There’s a special edition out at the moment with a picture of a Sherpa called Nima Gombu on the label, celebrating the fact that he’s climbed Everest twelve times. His brother, Nima Temba, is our sirdar (chief Sherpa) and he’s also been up Everest. In all, their family of seven brothers has summitted Everest forty-seven times.
I’ve been wondering what Nima Temba makes of our little trip – it must seem a bit dull after going up Everest. I guess it’s probably similar for Andy though – trips like this are the bread and butter, with treats like the 8,000’ers being much less common.
Today we climbed up the valley from Monjo, past the confluence with the river and up to Namche Bazaar. The trail was very busy for the first hour or two this morning, but after our second break it seemed better, and we were able to go at our own pace. Before that we seemed to be stuck behind either a slow group or more yaks.
There are a lot more yaks on this trail than I remember from the Annapurna Circuit. There, we met the odd mule or donkey, but I don’t remember that many yaks. Here, our bags are being carried by yaks, at least for the moment – I think higher up the yaks may get a break and we’ll have to carry our own kit up to the high camps.
The trail yesterday and this morning were a bit too busy to enjoy, though the last hour climbing up into Namche was a little better. I’d never thought about the fact that we would be on the Everest Base Camp trail so much, or that it would be this busy. Apparently it’s worse than usual at the moment because of so many groups being stacked up in Kathmandu while the weather in Lukla improved. I guess I was spoiled with the solitude of the Pyrenees too.
The weather here hasn’t been great so far, but it’s a lot better than I had during the first week in the Pyrenees. It’s been raining by the time we’ve reached our lodges the last two days, though not heavily enough to need waterproofs. Nima Temba reckons it will be better after another day or two, which would be a relief, as we’re on a pretty tight schedule after the five days we lost in Kathmandu and can’t afford any bad weather days. It would be nice to see Everest at some point too!
Acclimatisation seems to be OK so far, though I guess it’s early days as we’re only at 3,400m. I’ve had a very slight headache but otherwise I’m feeling fine, and the climb up to Namche didn’t feel too hard at all.
I was talking to Andy last night and he said that when he was on the summit of Cho Oyu last year, he was probably the highest person in the world! It’s the sixth highest summit (at 8,201 m), and records show that there was no-one climbing the other five on the day he summitted, so there could have been no-one higher. That’s a pretty cool claim…
I spent yesterday afternoon relaxing in the lodge while some of the group visited the shops down in the village. I had a lovely shower, then played some cards and had a frustrating game of Scrabble. We had a very good buffet dinner in the evening then carried on playing cards, though I seem to be useless.
Having passed and then been passed by one of the other Jagged Globe teams, we ended up in the same lodge as them last night in Namche. There was a healthy rivalry and some competitive banter out on the trail, and now we’re fighting to get to the buffet before them, but they’ve been hogging the tables closest to the kitchen, so only Mark has been successful so far!
Today we’re acclimatising with a small climb then staying in the same lodge again. We were up pretty early for breakfast and then climbed about 350m up to a hotel called Everest View. The climb was good, but unfortunately there was no view: the clouds broke briefly and we saw Lhotse’s south face, but most of the time we just stared at the cloud. It was a promising trip though, as everyone seemed to cope well with the altitude.
The lodge is pretty busy but the trails are more of a worry. During one of the breaks in the clouds Mark and I were looking down on tomorrow’s trail, full of yaks, porters and tourists. I’m desperately hoping it will be a bit emptier when we start climbing.
It’s a bit strange doing this trip so soon after the HRP, as everything is a comparison. The trails here are much busier and life is generally more luxurious – it’s quite strange having such a light pack and very different staying in lodges. Rather than washing in streams I’ve got a bowl of warm water.
The walking so far is pretty easy compared to the Pyrenees, partly due to the light pack and partly because we aren’t (so far) walking a great distance or time. This will be very different on the summit days I think – there the days will be colder, longer and much more technical than anything I did on the HRP.
Another strange thing about being on the Everest Base Camp trail is meeting so many trekkers. Mark introduced me to a new phrase today: Acute Mountain Snobbery. I’ve definitely been suffering from this, looking down on the trekkers, but I imagine there are more serious climbers who’ve looked down on our little group. It’s hard to imagine the likes of Chris Bonnington coming up these trails, mingling with the trekkers…
Yesterday afternoon we wandered into Namche city centre to have a look round the shops. Most of it was the usual Nepali tourist stuff – yak-wool socks, singing bowls, etc – but there were a couple of decent gear shops so I bought a hat and another hand-warmer for summit days.
We wiled away the evening with more cards then went to bed early – we’re gradually getting used to early nights and early mornings, in preparation for the ridiculously early starts we’re going to have to handle on summit days. Unfortunately I hadn’t drunk enough last night so woke up a few times with a headache, but that’s gone during the day.
We set off this morning at about 07:45, up the busy trail we’d seen yesterday from the acclimatisation walk. The team seems to be way faster than Andy expected – we’re easily beating his estimates, and ended up having lunch at 11:00, we’d gone so fast today!
The morning walk was a spectacular path, high up along the side of a steep gorge. Unfortunately the cloud meant there were no views of Ama Dablam (apparently just across the valley) or any of the more distant peaks, but the views down the Dudh Kosi valley were very dramatic.
Just before lunch we dropped right down into the valley and crossed over a bridge. I had my first dal bhat for a few days, then we climbed up to Tengboche, again caning Andy’s estimates. We had a look round the famous monastery there, then on the way out we came across some very un-synchronised monks doing a crazy dance with nothing more than a single cymbal providing the music.
When we finally tore ourselves away from the monks, we had tea and cakes in a nearby shop to recover, then dropped down through a forest to Deboche, where we’re currently roasting in the lodge thanks to a very powerful wood-stove in the middle of the room. We’re sharing the lodge with the B-Team again, and are looking forward to dinner as lunch seems a long time ago.
I’m still finding it a little bit strange how much time we’re not walking. All the sitting around feels a bit lazy – it’s quite relaxing compared to 8-hour days carrying 25kg up 1,000m a day!
The sky finally cleared last night, and even under the light of the moon, the views were amazing. For the first time, we saw the iconic shape of Ama Dablam, and I spent ages trying (not entirely successfully) to get a decent long-exposure night-time photo.
This morning it was still clear, the beautiful blue sky raised everyone’s spirits. We set off with fantastic views of Ama Dablam then, during the morning, the cloud further up the valley cleared, and we finally saw the highest point on earth.
We had a long relaxed lunch today, then Andy lead us for the two-hour climb up to Dingboche, as he was keen to avoid anyone racing ahead. He told us that today is key in our acclimatisation: we’re just over 4,400m here, which is where he reckons most people encounter their first problems if they’re going to have any. As a result, he’s re-organised the rooms so that no-one is on their own - one of his biggest worries is people having strange breathing patterns during the night, so we all have someone to keep an eye on us.
Along the way we passed a field where the farmers were drying out yak dung. This is the main source of fuel up here, used on fires to cook food, heat homes, etc. Some of the lodges we’ve stayed in have burnt dried yak dung in their stoves, and it doesn’t smell as bad as you’d expect! It’s actually barely noticeable.
Tonight’s lodge is a bit more basic than some of the earlier ones, though the room is OK. Battery charging is still available at this altitude, but it’s getting pretty expensive: 100Rs for a complete charge in Namche, 150Rs for an hour in Deboche, and 300Rs for an hour here. Unfortunately we don’t have much choice, as when we leave here on Thursday we’re going to be camping for the next six nights so there won’t be any opportunity to charge for while.
The weather has deteriorated during the afternoon (which is apparently standard practice) and the mountains gradually disappeared. The sun is still shining through every now and again, but there are no views anymore.
