Christmas in the Khumbu (a/k/a Toughest Vacay Ever(est))

Remember when I mentioned my grand idea to spend nearly three weeks in the remote Everest region of Nepal? Remember how I was totally enamored with the thought of Christmas and New Year's completely cut off from the world? Remember how I thought I was totally tough and could hack 18+ days of unlimited hiking, highly limited plumbing, chilled-to-the-bone cold, and meals restricted to two major food groups -- starch and deep-fried starch?

Well, I DID hack it, but I won't say it wasn't a bit of a -- ummm -- challenge. To be honest, since we've been back, I've had a hard time answering the simple question of "Well, how was it?!" But I'll give it a shot:

Incredible. Painful. Freezing. Awesome. Dirty. Exhausting. Spectacular. Fascinating. Cold. Ridiculous. Tedious. Exciting. Hard. Chilly. Frigid.

Did I mention it was cold too?

After trekking to Everest Base Camp and the peak of Kala Patthar, I can honestly say I've never seen anything half so spectacular as the Himalaya. That said, after this vacation I can only think about how much I need, well, a vacation.

RP and I headed off a few days before Christmas to start our little adventure. After 36 hours of travel (20 in the air), we actually arrived in Kathmandu. But not before we could spend a lovely day in Hong Kong. Please note that these pictures were taken after 8 hours of work, three hours in the airport, and a 16-hour flight.

After leisurely wandering around the city, checking out the old-school Chinese market, visiting a Buddhist temple, trying our hand at authentic Chinese food (orange chicken was nowhere to be found), and taking a Victoria Harbor cruise, we headed back to the airport for our flight to Nepal - and the end of civilization as we knew it.

Oh, what to say about Kathmandu? Pure, unadulterated chaos. In our 4+ days in the city, I never once saw a traffic light, stop sign, street sign, or any kind of road markings -- in a city of more than 1 million. In fact, driving in Kathmandu was very much like playing bumper cars -- if bumper cars also involved heaps of downed power lines obscuring the roads and pedestrians wearing pollution masks trying to dart between a bus and 7 motorcycles without stepping in one of 12 potholes on the way across the street.

But Kathmandu had it's good points too -- like our daily breakfast buffet and our "traditional" Nepali night of Dal Bhat and dancing.

That said, when it came time to leave on trek, we were all-too willing to set out. Despite our transportation: 

Not to mention our destination airport. The Tenzing-Hillary airport is famous -- albeit mostly for its unreliability, history of plane crashes, and the world's shortest runway (which ends in a 3,000-foot cliff).

 

Anxiety, thy name is Lukla.


Once on Trek, we followed a steady schedule of morning tea, breakfast, hiking, mid-morning tea, hiking, lunch, hiking, afternoon tea, rest, dinner, sleep -- rinse, wash, repeat. Our itinerary went something like this:

Day 1:  Kathmandu to Lukla to Phakding (8,700ft)
Day 2:  Phakding to Namche Bazaar (11,280 ft)
Day 3:  Acclimatization Day - Namche Bazaar: Day Hike to Everest View Hotel (14,000 ft)
Day 4:  Namche Bazzar to Tengboche (12,694ft)
Day 5:  Tengboche to Dingboche (14,300 ft)
Day 6: Acclimatization Day - Dingboche: Day hike to 16,000 ft peak
Day 7: Dingboche to Lobuche (16,207 ft)
Day 8: Lobuche to Gorak Shep (16,961 ft) to Everest Base Camp (17,594 ft) to Gorak Shep
Day 9: Gorak Shep to Kala Patthar (18,500 ft) to Pangboche (13,074 ft)
Day 10: Pangboche to Namche Bazar (11,280 ft)
Day 11: Namche Bazar to Lukla (8,700 ft)
Day 12: Lukla to Kathmandu

Luckily, it wasn't until around day 3 that I wanted to pack it up and take it home. Fortunately for me, our guide, Chhewang Sherpa, would not hear of us quitting -- or of us skipping tea or us not eating dinner or of RP peeing close to a cliff.

Sherpas can be total buzz-kills

The one nice thing about day-in, day-out hiking, is that there's always something interesting to see in the Himalaya -- whether that's local children hoping for a piece of chocolate, bell-sporting yaks blocking the trail, 300+-foot suspension bridges, chickens tied together at the foot to keep from wandering off, carved prayer rocks (always pass oh the left) and prayer wheels (always spin clockwise), views of Ama Dablum, Nuptse, Lhotse, Island Peak, Pumori, or Mother Everest herself, massive glaciers, rock cairn memorials, porters carrying twice their body weight on their backs, or even -- wait for it -- Santa Clause on Christmas morning.

RP and I were pretty partial to Namche Bazar -- where we spent Christmas dinner (eggs and popcorn for me, Dal Bhat for RP). The town looks like it's precariously balanced on the side of a mountain, but is as spectacular as it is charming. Not to mention our accommodations were DELUXE: a western toilet, shower, and heated dining room. Of course, it also had rats scurrying through the walls (quite audibly) all night, but our standards were pretty low by this point. 

Our time in Namche also gave us our first view of Mt. Everest -- which was a pretty surreal moment. She's a beauty, albeit obscured from view for most of the trek by Mt. Nuptse (she's such an attention whore).

On the trail again, we passed through Tengboche and its famous monastery, stopping in to hear the monks chant. As we got into the higher elevations (Dingboche, Lobuche, and Gorak Shep), we more or less stopped sleeping and started getting accustomed to a lack of running water and the presence of "traditional" Nepali toilets (check it out here).

Yes, I'm one tough cookie.

On our way to Lobuche, we passed by several memorials to Everest climbers. The site was spectacular, albeit haunting, and brought out my inner mountaineering nerd when I found tributes to legendary climbers like Scott Fischer and Rob Hall.

We reached Everest Base Camp on New Year's Eve, just after my second (and second-to-last breakdown of the trip). Although it wasn't much to see so far from climbing season, it was amazing to be at the foot of the Khumbu Ice Fall and Everest herself, not to mention the massive Khumbu glacier. Rick built a rock cairn for his brother, while I snuck a rock into my pack to keep a piece of Everest with me forever (or until I mistake it for a regular rock and lose it).

With base camp met, I thought we'd be home free. Wrong-o. At 4 a.m. on New Year's morning, we set out to summit Kala Patthar, an 18,500 peak at the base of Mt. Pumori. The (excruciatingly cold) climb ended up work it when we saw the sun rise on New Year's morning over a spectacular Himalayan panorama, and said Happy New Year to Pumori, Everest, Lhotse, Nuptse, Island Peak, and others I can't remember/pronounce.

New Year's Day didn't end until 4 p.m., giving us a lovely 12 hours of hiking. Unfortunately, the "way down" wasn't all roses either. The steep inclines meant steep declines, and the up-and-down nature of the trail meant that "going down" very often meant going up again. As our new friend Chris, a friendly Welsh man stated, "Can't they build a bloody straight road in this country?"

Once back in Lukla, and after my last breakdown of the trip (the last two hours of hiking all but stripped me of my sanity), RP and I thought we were out of the woods -- or the mountains, as it were.

Wrong again.

Remember that unpredictable, unreliable Tenzing-Hillary Airport? Well, RP and I held two shiny (handwritten) boarding passes for the second flight of the day the morning after we arrived in Lukla. When flight one came and left, we had our bags checked and were ready to board. Until no other planes showed up. After four hours of waiting, someone finally let us know that the flights had been canceled.

Awesome.

Ever the optimists, RP and I booked for the next morning, then woke bright and early to make sure we were ready for our flight if and when it arrived. Which never happened. That's when we realized that trying to get definite information in Nepal is like asking a 3-month old to explain Pythagorean’s Theory. Whenever we'd ask if the flights might be leaving we heard one of the following answers:

"Ah, we'll see? Maybe planes come?"
"See the trees? It's windy!"
"The planes, maybe they come?"
"No planes come yet!"
"Ah, maybe wind maybe fog?!"
"Maybe better weather, maybe the planes come?"

You get the idea. After two days of no flights, we gave it up and called a helicopter with four other new American friends who were also tired of eating fried rice and huddling around a wood-burning stove.

At least now we can say we got that helicopter evacuation we'd been craving since the first day of the hike.

Back in Kathmandu, RP and I pampered ourselves with REAL HEATED showers, a dinner that included meat (buffalo steak), and some uber-luxurious Kathmandu shopping (i.e. bargaining over the equivalent of $2 USD). We also had a bit of time to make it to the Monkey Temple, Kathmandu's oldest religious site (2,000 years old), which is inexplicably inhabited by hundreds of -- you guessed it -- monkeys. One of which tried to steal my souvenirs. Dirty monkey.

After 18 days away from home, RP and I were all-too ready to board our flight. And 24 glorious hours later, we were on American soil again, wherein I got a froyo and a diet coke faster than a monkey in heat.

I'm sure that, someday, I'll miss my time on the Khumbu trails. But for all its beauty and intrigue, right now I'm happy to say Hello, America; Namaste, Nepal!