A plate of pancakes with kaalo chi-aa (black tea - go my Nepali!) put us in good stead for a long trek to G-Town (forgotten the real name). We were rushing to reach this place before lunch so that we could go to Everest base camp in the afternoon. Woohoo we were finally going!!! It seemed unreal that we were nearly there.
As we reached the lodge a sherpa was trying to put a yak's lead under a heavy rock but the yak was going crazy. Karma said to stay well away as we could easily get gored! This time i felt pretty sure he wasn't lying.
The lodges kitchen is small but caters for a lot of trekkers, so we were told to order teh same meal to shorten the waiting time. Of course noone did so we were a little late when we finally left! It was good to reach the night's lodge by lunch as we could dump all the stuff we didn't need for the 6 hour return trip to the bottom of Everest! We even had to bring torches as we could be returning at night time!
We set off as a whole group but soon lost Rodger and Olivia as she was complaining about breathing problems. We later found out that they headed by themselves to Kalapathar as they didn't care about base camp! But without a guide and with the cloudy afternoon weather they only made it 3/4 of the way up. We were planning to climb it the next morning anyway but they just wanted to sleep in!
The group was divided further when Karma told Paul, Robyn and I to go ahead with a porter called Om. Dorothy and Marjorie were having difficulties scrambling over the rocks due to the altitude and long day of effort. To be fair we were struggling slightly as well on the hard trail - so many ups and downs in a landslide zone! But we were determined, especially being so close to the destination and the views of the biggest mountains in the world were spectacular with the ice glaciers and occasional avalanches making it even more exciting!
There was much celebration and rejoice when we finally reached the base camp - mars bars and cookies were the reward! Surprisingly there were several tents full of expedition hopefuls. We had all thought that at this time of year it is empty as noone climbs but these guys were here for a month to acclimatise! It was great to actually see and meet some true adventurers and for a moment we were inspired to join them in their feat but it quickly passed as we realised how much higher we would have to go!
I pulled out the Aussie flag for the photo opportunities but Everest was clouding up. Didn't really matter as it is not the most characterable mountain and the surroundings were good enough. I have yet to see all the photos but I am sure that we are all grinning broadly like idiots!
To our huge surprise Dorothy and Marjorie arrived, tired and not 100% but you could see the elation on their faces as we had a huge group photo with the welsh flag. Dorothy even pulled out her father-in-laws ashes to scatter them but was a bit too tired to make it overly sentimental!
They all grabbed a few rocks before we started to head back. Me being the hippie I am didn't bother, joking that the porters carry all the rocks here so the tourists can collect a memento! It was late in the afternoon so Paul, Om and I set off fast and left the torches for the others. Stupidly I had stinged on a pricey bottle of mineral water and now had nothing - the altitude sickness started to kick in as we set a cracking pace. It was snowing and a little dark by the time we finally got back to the lodge - warming ourselves with a pot of hot choc! We worried a little about the others as it got darker but with my combination of fever, cough, altitude sickness and general fatigue I can't say i would have jumped up to save them! Am a bit worried that my current state might affect the ascent of Kalapathar tommorrow morning, particularly with a 5am start!
The others did get back ok as they'd made it off the hills before dark. Could do nothing but crowd by the yakshit stove and smile in satisfaction!
