A year away: Nepal, Part 2

Well I'm back in Kathmandu and I'm flying out to Bangkok this afternoon. I'll try to give you all a quick recap of the second part of my trekking in the Everest region at least...still wishing for a fast internet connection and a keyboard without sticking keys. In Nepal, yeah right!

The view from Kongma La

On top of Kongma La, I was pretty tired!!

From Chhukung I headed over my first pass - Kongma La (5535m), starting at dawn. The ascent was long and arduous, first crossing a large, rocky glacier followed by a long climb up a grassy valley and then an incredibly steep ascent to a group of high lakes just below the pass. The higher I went the tougher it got - the altitude really starts to slow you down at 5000m+ - but the views just kept getting better. I reached the pass after about 4.5 hours and rested there for maybe 45 min, taking in the mountain and lakes all around. The weather up there was perfect - just a gentle breeze, bright sun and even though I was above 5500m it was really quite warm. The descent was steep but the real killer came right at the end - the last hour of the trek was traversing another large glacier. To get across this one I had to climb up one side (60 or 70m on gravel), follow a faint and tortuous path across the surface of the glacier, up and down on gravel and rocks, avoiding huge ice holes and lakes and the like then scramble off the glacier, first up to the top of the morraine then down. Finally the village of Lobuche (4902m) came into sight...it's a crap hole of a place but I really needed to rest!

From Lobuche I made a very early start the next day to get to Gorak Shep (5160m) - there is a big accommodation shortage here and I wanted a place to sleep that wasn't the lodge dining room. I secured a room, ate a big breakfast and walked the couple of hours north from Gorak Shep to Everest Base Camp. Frankly there's very little of the actual camp to see here in this season - teams use the camp only in the Everest climing season (April, I think) so it's deserted and only a few signs of habitation remain. The setting however is amazing - you can't actually see Everest because you're too close but the shear walls leading up to Pumo Ri (to the west) and Nuptse (to the east) are beyond massive, and you're right at the foot of the Khumbu Icefall and beside Khumbu Glacier, the craziest and most convoluted glacial surface I've ever seen. The other plus is that pretty much no one makes the trek all the way to the actual camp area so I was alone on the glacier for awhile. Not bad at all! Next day I woke before dawn and headed up the nearby and very popular peak of Kala Pattar (5545m). For some reason I really struggled with this climb - I felt rather nauseous and unwell, but I made it to the top. The weather was a little cloudy and it even snowed a tiny bit on the way up but as I sat at the top the clouds mostly cleared and I had some pretty amazing views.

At Everest Base Camp - massive peaks in the background (not incl. Everest)

Base Camp, looking south. Not a very comfy camping spot I'd say.

Sunrise through the clouds from Kala Pattar

Cool stepped glacier, from Kala Pattar

From Lobuche I headed down and then up again to Dzongla (4840m), the starting point for the second of the 3 passes - Cho La (5420m) which was to prove the trickiest of the lot. The scenery heading up the valley to Dzongla was amazing - the biggest and steepest glacier I've seen emptying into Chola Tsho - a stunning blue lake with a backdrop of vertical rock cliffs heading up a couple of thousand metres to the peak of Cholatse. Wow. As I neared Dzongla around 11am it began to snow...and didn't let up until the following morning. This was a bad sign for an easy crossing of the pass. In the morning as the snow stopped and the sun came out I tried without success to find others that planned to attempt the pass. In the end I made the decision to abort the crossing - without a guide it would be impossible to follow the trail - and to walk around (the long way) instead. After 2 full days of walking and passing along some roads (OK, tracks) less travelled I arrived at the village on the other side of the pass. The walk was in parts interesting since I passed some really cool summer grazing villages with stone buildings that seemed trapped 400 or 500 years in the past, but mostly long. I arrived pretty much exhausted. Next day I passed over the nearby glacier - this one wasn't so tough - and reached the village of Gokyo on the shores of the amazingly picturesque Gokyo Lake.

Chola Tsho on the way to Dzongla - massive glacier in the background. It's HUGE

Chola Tsho the next morning

Waking up to clear weather and snow...beautiful but not good for crossing a high pass.

The start of the walk from Dzongla instead of over the pass - everything looks very different with a dusting of snow

Stone cottages along the path on the long walk from Dzongla, around to the other side of the pass

Yak above Gokyo Lake

From Gokyo I walked up the popular Gokyo Ri, a peak of 5480m with amazing views over the lake and beyond. The colour of the lake is amazing as you can see in the photos. The next day we climbed up to the last pass - Renjo La (5345m) - the lowest and easiest of the passes by far. It took only 2 hours to get up there from Gokyo, taking it really slowly. From Renjo, 2 more long downhill days of walking had us back in Lukla and eating meat and drinking beer for the first time in over 2 weeks - well deserved I'd say! From Lukla I set out on the next stage of my trek, 9 days to the SE to the town of Tumlingtar, through mostly lowland forest and farmland. It was certainly very different to the 2 weeks in EBC area and I'll write about it soon.