onward and upward

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Woken up at 7am and had to hurry to repack my bag, dress and throw water over my face before the tent was taken down while I was still inside it. Today was to be a hard day, I had been warned of that before I came. The trek up to Namche Bazar seems to go on forever, every time you think you are near the top you notice yet another path to climb, even when you catch your first glimpse of Namche you are still at least an hour away. Although the climb was extremely arduous the weather was sunny and the views magnificent, unfortunately I was unable to catch my first sight of Everest as it was shrouded in mist and cloud. Having climbed down to the river we lunched close to a waterfall, lunch was the usual hotchpotch of Nepalese and English food cobbled together on the grass by the cooks. Although the food throughout the trip could at best be described as unexciting, the conditions under which it was prepared were hard and the entourage of Nepalese cooks, porters and Sherpas who laboured every day to sustain us did a fantastic job. I should also mention that due to the snow and freezing conditions there was no running water in most places and the boiled water necessary for drinking, cooking and washing everyday was produced from melting and boiling snow, the collection of the latter being an added burden for our already overworked entourage. After lunch the climb was exhausting and the group strung out along the route as it became clear that some were finding it a lot harder than others. I was close to the back, in part due to it being harder than I ever imagined it would be, and also because I wanted to savour every view and photographic opportunity, the only hurry after all was to get to Namche before dark. By the time I entered Namche, which incidently was still 30 minutes before I reached the tea house as it is a vast, tiered town, and we were staying near the top, the sun had disappeared, the temperature had taken a huge nosedive and the mist had rolled in, so I had put my layers back on. The tea house wasn’t very inviting as the stove couldn’t be lit, due to the ration of wood having been used up; chopping down trees is regulated by the government in an attempt to halt de-forestation. No stove was rather a problem for me and one or two others as the extreme wet from constantly trudging through snow had resulted in leaking boots, something which plagued me throughout the rest of the trek. Namche was completely covered in deep snow and water was frozen so although we had toilets you could sit on in this tea house you couldn’t flush the chain so huge tubs of water were provided along with a jug so that you could attempt to ‘flush’ away whatever you had deposited !! The tea house also housed a museum and the grounds played host to a crashed military helicopter, a military base being situated just above. We are now at 3440 metres.