It was hard to leave the lovely little lodge with great views but Namche Bazaar beckoned! The long anticipated laundry and hot shower was the motivation for today as we took a different path back up and over the "hill", visiting Khumjung: its landmarks included a 400 year old monastery and Sir Hillary's first charity school - made in 1960 by materials imported from New Zealand!
The monastery was nice and devoid of all tourists though we had to pay a small donation to see the "yeti skull". It looks odd and scientists cant figure it out. I remember dad saying that he once picked it up and wore it for a photo and thats why there is two cabinets protecting it!
The school was ok but there were dozens of tourists taking pictures of everything. I couldnt help but wonder what Sir Hillary would have though of the 10 Americans taking pictures of his statue! He always regretted being so influential in making the Lukla airport and the resultant easy access for tourists such as myself. I cant blame him. He is something of a legend around here and every sherpa has met him at least once; they were all pretty devasted when he died.
I am setting a good standard for Aussie fashion - boardshorts with thermal leggings underneath and footie socks! Had run out of clothes that hadn't been worn for less than 2 days. Crazily enough our lodge was booked out and the new one had a washing machine and dryer! They had been carried up by porters and the pictures on the wall proved it. Nuts! It wasn't that cheap and you weren't allowed to wash your own clothes so I had to carefully select the next few days' worth.
As the clothes were being washed we had a celebratory cake and hot chocolate at a bakery. Listened in to a 30yr old Canadian guy talking to friends and locals - he was climbing Everest and had just run the 2 day walk from Lukla to Namche in 3 hours! He didn't look puffed despite having carried an 80L bag but his porter was absoultely gone! He'd had to helicopter back down from base camp to get a climb permit - he called it his 70,000 dollar piece of paper. We helped ourselves to another bit of cake as we realised we would never be that fit!
Back at the lodge my clothes weren't ready yet and I had to remain smelly for 2 hours more than the promised time - I couldn't have a shower without clean clothes to change into. We kept sane playing cards in the dining room - huge and nice with electric heaters! Beautiful. However a huge group, about 20 American trekkers arrived and promptly sat down for dinner. They were camping beyond Namche Bazaar but for now they were in this cosy lodge ruining our peace and quite! I am quite prejudistic when I say American travellers are loud and somewhat rude but these guys were no exception! They complained about the lodge, despite it being the best lodge I had seen the whole time! No room for yoga, poor toilets as you had to put the toilet paper in the bin and not the bowl. I just labelled them as wankers.
Finally I had a very appreciated shower, feeling clean for the first time in a week. But I didn't have any shampoo and my hair still remained matted as I met the others for dinner. I didn't care how sick I was or was going to get when I ordered a Yak steak and celebrated with a can of beer. Karma surprised us all with a chocolate cake though my stomach was a bit queasy after the two at the bakery! The steak tasted like hamburger meat but was a blessing after a week of relatively basic foods in the upper mountains. Afterwards i felt a bit sick in the gut and ran upstair to the loo. Thankfully i didn't spew from either end but felt so rotten i collapsed in bed and was moments later visited by a worried Karma who thought I might have died!
