Altitude: 2850m to 3400m
Atmospheric Pressure: 750mbar to 700mbar
Trek: 6.5Km / 2:30Hrs
A good night sleep, the stomach is improving but I was still
awake from 4am, must be jet lag, I
waited for the 6:50 alarm while
listening to music.
650m ascent planned for today, getting up to Namche Bazar at
3400m. Yet again a very iconic name and place for any trekking in this region.
Breakfast goes down without problem, which is sign of things
getting better on the stomach side.
We’re off at 8am
for this ~2hours trek to avoid the heat and people on the trail.
The path undulates a little for the first hour, then goes up
for the full 650m for the last hour.
We’re really deep in the valley, surrounded by cliffs rising
up to 4000m and the cobalt blue river running at the bottom, quite a pretty
site.
The path crosses the river in multiple places and there are
many swing bridges to go through.
Theses days, the bridges are made with steel cables and
fencing material to improve safety as well as be “yak” compatible, and obviously,
people can’t help themselves and jump up and down and side to side to see who
has a poor balance.
However, in the old days, Russell recalls, the bridges were
made from wooden tiles and very often some were missing and you had to be
careful when crossing the bridges.
Every now and then, we can spot the top of 6000m+ summits
sticking out, covered in snow.
About half way up the last hour, we get our first glimpse of
Everest and Lhotse, far in the distance and in between
the trees. Still, it’s nice to see it’s still there J, although it looks far
away and tall.
As we carry on going up, we catch up with porters carrying
timber to build houses. The loads look huge, in size and in weight. A few of
them are carrying 3m long posts, across their back, making it almost impossible
to overtake them, but also, very tricky for them to get up the path whenever
the trees make it too narrow. As we arrive in Namche, I discuss this with
Monica and Adrian, who say there is a 40Kg limit for porters, but very few people
stick to it, and Monica reckons some of the loads were more like 80Kg, crazy!
And with the amount of building work going on at Namche and
all across the valley, there are plenty of needs for timber and stones.
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