TREK TO EVEREST BASE CAMP
Reader Thomas Jamieson shares the journal of his hike to Everest Base Camp,
In October this year, I journeyed to Southeast Asia and on to Nepal to hike to Everest Base Camp with my friends, Stu Coulson and Jeremy Renke. This is my diary of the trek.
OCTOBER 8
Flew from Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia and arrived in Kathmandu mid-afternoon. Our first order of business was to book our trek to Everest Base Camp as we had been told it was far easier (and much cheaper) to do this once in Kathmandu, rather than organize it ahead of time from Vancouver. When searching for a taxi in Kathmandu airport, we found a driver who spoke English. He recommended booking with Himalaya Hub while also driving us to that location.
They provided us with trekking permits, a guide who spoke English, room reservations at each tea house, an itinerary for the trek, and planned for three meals a day at various tea houses.
We then started to explore Kathmandu, which is much larger than we thought, with a population over 1 million. We walked around a district in Kathmandu known as Thamel, which features many narrow alleys crowded with shops, restaurants and vendors selling trekking equipment.
OCTOBER 9
Visited a monkey sanctuary where many wild monkeys roamed near the streets. They mainly stayed near the bottom of the sanctuary as there was easy access to food there, along with many trees for them to adventure through.
A very long staircase led to the top. The view was stunning; I could easily see all of Thamel.
Thamel had a vast diversity of food. Each hotel has its own breakfast/dinner service with mainly local foods available, but there were also restaurants that specialized in food from many other locations around the world: French restaurants/ Mexican restaurants/ Irish pubs.
We grabbed delicious food at a high-end hotel before heading to the travel agency to finalize our trekking details and get our paperwork.
OCTOBER 10
Flew from Kathmandu to Lukla, where the trek begins. Lukla sits at an elevation of 2,840 metres and its airport has been called the most dangerous airport in the world! The airstrip is right in the side of a mountain and is barely long enough for airplanes to slow down when arriving, or pick up enough speed to take off when departing. Most flights are delayed due to weather as they will only send flights on the clearest of days, but we were really fortunate throughout our entire trekking trip to have glorious sunny weather.
Met our first guide, named Lakpa Sherpa, and we immediately began the first leg of our hike to Phakding, where we settled for our first night (2,610m).
This first day was a relatively short and simple day of hiking to begin our journey.
OCTOBER 11
Early start (the norm, we would find out!). Hiked to Monjo, where we met our new guide, Pema Sherpa. Pema would be our guide for the rest of the hike. Most hiking days we would leave around 7 a.m. and arrive at our location just after noon. Longer days involved us leaving at 7 a.m. to arrive around 3-4 p.m.
Stopped in Monjo for lunch and then continued the hike all the way to Namche Bazaar (3,441m). This day was very long and tough as much of it was spent hiking uphill. Our 20-kilogram backpacks felt like they weighed much more!
We stopped at regular intervals whenever we needed a break, which helped.
There are quite a number of trekkers making the trip, some in much larger groups, and we’re happy we’re in our own little group of three. We seem to be one of the younger groups making the trek.
Learned Nepalese phrases like “jam jam” (meaning “go go”) and “bistali bistali” (meaning “slow slow”) which are used a lot.
Namche is the largest town we will visit and we’ll be spending a couple of nights here as part of the acclimatization process.
OCTOBER 12
This was an acclimatization day in Namche for getting used to the high altitude. This is a very important feature of the trek to Base Camp, as we’ll be climbing to 5,500 metres and the body needs to adjust to the high elevation and reduced oxygen levels.
Did a short half-hour hike to a viewpoint where we could see Everest for the first time.
The peak of Everest was as high as the clouds. The viewpoint was amazing, as we were very high up and had a clear view of all the major mountains visible during the hike. The weather was perfect, no clouds at all.
Surprisingly, Everest wasn’t visible that often during the hike, as there are many other large mountain ranges that block the view. Everest, along with the mountains around it, is nearly completely covered with snow.
OCTOBER 13
Our plan today was to hike from Namche to Tengbouche (3,860m). This hike involved a lot of uphills, but we’re getting used to this and it wasn’t too bad.
However, when we arrived in Tengbouche, there were no rooms available in any of the guest houses. So we continued hiking to Pangbouche as it was only an hour or two and mainly downhill or flat land.
Spent the night in Pangbouche (3,985m).
OCTOBER 14
Today we trekked to Dingboche (4,400m), making for a slightly tougher day than yesterday, as it was a lot of uphill going.
Dingboche is a popular stopping place for trekkers and it has an Internet café! The Imja River flows by the village and the area around the village has many stone walls.
Used the extra time in Dingboche to do half of the hike we would be doing tomorrow and got some more amazing pictures along the way.
OCTOBER 15
This was our acclimatization day in Dingboche.
The trek to Base Camp is reasonably simple, very minor uphills. The itinerary is set out in a way that lots of rest is included, which is nice.
The main issue we had while hiking was the altitude. There’s a noticeable change in oxygen available when you’re that high. That tired us quickly while doing even the smallest bit of uphill climbing. (Even something as simple as going up a couple flights of stairs at a tea house would leave us out of breath.)
We met many travellers from all over the world, a lot of people from Europe (mainly Ireland and England) along with some from other places in Asia. but not many from North America and none from Canada). It was nice to talk to people on their way down as we were heading up and ask how they fared with the trek.
OCTOBER 16
Today we trekked to Lobuche (4,900m), through the village of Dugla. There was more beautiful scenery along the way and we’re getting to some good elevation now. En route we passed by a couple of memorials to Rob Hall and Scott Fisher (famous mountaineers who lost their lives on Everest).
The weather is still perfect, not too cold at all. Most days we would wear a long-sleeve layer or two along with hiking pants and boots. Since we were constantly sweating during the hike, we often would take off a layer if necessary to stay cool.
Spent the night in Lobuche. The plan is to make it to Everest Base Camp tomorrow, Very exciting.
OCTOBER 17
This is the day we’ve been waiting for and working toward — the final leg!!
We started our day by trekking to Gorakshep (5,164m). Gorakshep is a very small village with only a couple of guest houses.
We dropped off our heavy bags, got some food and carried on to Base Camp. Arrived in Base Camp after a short, but difficult, final hike (5,363m). So exciting and unbelievable to be there.
Everest Base Camp is a reasonably small and flat location. It’s used as a rest stop/meeting location for people hiking to the peak of Everest. There were many prayer flags (flags of various colours) along with a sign that says “Everest Base Camp 2016” on it. And as we were enjoying our success, we were joined by many other people we met along the way who were doing the same hike as us (nobody was continuing to the summit.)
Spent 30-45 minutes at Base Camp celebrating by taking many pictures.
As we’d been told ahead of time, Everest isn’t actually visible from Base Camp as Lhotse (the fourth highest mountain in the world) blocks its view.
Saw the Khumbu Ice Falls, which are amazing but are considered one of the most dangerous stages of the climb up Everest.
Hiked back down to Gorakshep, where we spent the night. An amazing day.
OCTOBER 18
Started the hike to Kalapatthar in the dark at 4 a.m. with headlamps and flashlights. This was easily the coldest part of the trek. It was a short hike but very difficult as this was the highest point we’d reach during the whole trip (5,550m), but well worth the effort as this would be as close as we would get to Everest.
About an hour into the hike, the sun started to rise over the mountains. What a thrill it was to be that close to the highest mountain in the world! We spent plenty of time at the top, where we took pictures of Everest as the sun was rising.
Later that day, we began our descent.