“Ja’aum, ja’um,” says our lead guide Bir Singh, the Nepali equivalent for “ready, let’s go!” Our group of nine pick up our day packs and excitedly pass through the Pasang Lhamu Gate, built to honour the first female sherpa to summit Everest, for our first steps on the Everest Trail.
I’m on an eight-day trek with World Expeditions, hiking from Lukla (2,860 m), to just above Pangboche (4,032 m), a distance of 17 kilometres. This distance could easily be done in a day or two in the Canadian mountains, but in high altitude destinations, the ascent is slower to allow for acclimatization.
Trekking guidelines recommend avoiding an ascent to a new sleeping elevation of greater than 2,750 metres in one day and ascending at a rate not greater than 500 metres per night once above 3,000. Our first overnight, after a 2.5-hour hike, is at the World Expeditions eco-camp at Ghat (2,530 m) which is actually lower in elevation than our starting point at Lukla.
The 30-minute flight that morning from Ramechhap to Lukla was spectacular, offering a birds-eye view of the arid Eastern Himalayas from a thunderously loud, tiny 12-seater plane skimming just above the mountain tops.
The runway at Lukla, which strangely slopes upward, makes landing interesting. This is the first airstrip built by Sir Edmund Hillary and friends to service the Everest region when he began his work of building schools and hospitals for the Sherpa people.
There are still no roads up here, only access by small commercial planes, helicopters or via the trekking trails. I’m mentally preparing myself for the remoteness.
I arrived off the plane in Kathmandu two days before with a heavy chest and cough, so I’m not feeling in tip-top shape to be embarking on such an adventure.
Fortunately, the next day on the way to Monjo my health doesn’t detract from the exotic experience. The trail is edged with small villages made up of immaculate stone buildings adorned with bright shutters and colourful flower boxes, and friendly smiling locals.
A member in our group comments that since a previous visit, there are now many more greenhouses, where the locals are growing their own fresh food, a favourite of which is mustard greens. Many trail-side fields are cultivated with another staple, potatoes. These local ingredients show up often in the delicious, ample meals we are treated to each night at camp, along with Nepali dishes like momos (dumplings) and dal bhat (lentil curry).
The next morning, when I prepare to leave camp as the soft early sun lights up the surrounding snowy peaks, I receive a khada (prayer) scarf from the camp custodian, a custom to wish upon the receiver a safe journey. None of this gives appropriate foreshadowing for the shortness of breath that is to come for me that day.
On the trail from Monjo to Namche several suspension bridges take us back and forth across the Dudh Khosi river and are fun to take playful, bouncy steps across. My group often has to wait for herds of mules or long-horned yakows (a cross between yak and cow) wearing tinkling bells and carrying loads of supplies to cross before we pass.
It’s immediately after we navigate the longest suspension bridge on the trail that the steep switchback section to Namche begins, and our group splits – a faster group, and our group at the rear that would sometimes have to stop every few metres to catch our breath. I start to realize that, with the added complication of a chest cold, this is going to be much harder than I’d expected.
Uphill from Namche, known as the gateway to the high Himalayas, there are fewer villages and the landscape becomes more rugged. Today we also cross into Sagamartha National Park, known for its dramatic mountains, including Everest, the world’s highest peak at 8,848 metres above sea level. The park was created in 1976 to protect the area and, in 1979, it also became a UNESCO World Heritage site, to protect its extraordinary scenery and wildlife.
I appreciate the medical training that Bir Singh has, and that night I start to take altitude sickness medication, with the hopes that it will help the cough and shortness of breath problems. Although I didn’t suffer some of the overnight altitude maladies that others did, the next morning my breathing and cough are no better, so I choose to take the shortcut to our next eco-camp at Kyangjuma.
Despite my cough, the ascent to Khangjuma is a highlight day, with the villages giving way to remoteness and vistas of the high Himalayas becoming more and more amazing.
As I ascend, behind a magnificent stupa I get my first clear glimpse of Everest and its neighbouring peaks, Lhotse and Ama Dablam. I’m left absolutely stunned, and even as a Canadian who lives in a gorgeous mountain range, seeing the highest peak in the world is magical.
Nepal’s main religion is Hinduism but the principal religion in Sagarmatha is Buddhism.
Religious relics like stupas (or chortens as they are called here, the Tibetan word) are numerous, as well as mani stones, inscribed with the six-syllable prayer mantra, which are placed in significant places at entrances to villages and alongside trails and rivers.
Prayer flags are blowing in the wind around every corner, as are prayer wheels, which devotees spin to accumulate wisdom and good karma as they pass by.
The higher altitude is bad for my cough, and the next morning it’s worse. Rather than joining the group for the last day of ascent to the camp above Pangboche at 4,000 metres, I opt to head back down to the lodge at Namche for a rest day. The group will pick me up on their way back.
Although I know this is the right thing to do for my health, I’m sorry I’m going to miss the visit to the monastery at Tengboche, re-built with the assistance of Sir Hillary after it was destroyed by fire in 1989.
As we descend, our treks are longer, and in three days we’re already down what took us five days to ascend. It’s easier to descend in altitude, and there are less steep uphill sections. My lungs and cough start to feel better, and I feel more in the flow of the daily treks.
The Himalayas have long been symbolized in the literature as a sacred place.
When we return to Lukla and the flight out, I feel celebratory.
Making it as far as I did, despite being ill, was an accomplishment. |
When you go:
Nepal Tourism Board – https://ntb.gov.np/
World Expeditions – https://worldexpeditions.com/
Video highlighting this trek’s experiences- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chZPF_Ji3ZQ&t=327s
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