10-05-2012 – Base Camp – Getting out!!

Altitude: 5300m to 3950m

Trek: 21kms / 4 hrs

I slept fairly well, considering I knew we were going home, perhaps the pressure was off, now that the decisions were made, and there was nothing I could do, perhaps I was finally accepting the facts.

At breakfast, Adrian told Sergey and I he would be walking down with us!! Hourrey!!!!!

Having Adrian go down with us guarantied a steaming pace!! We will be having fun!!

We’d agreed with Sergey to go up to see the Patagonicas Brothers and Georgie before we left to apologies for not joining them and thank them for their welcome.

Adrian had also organized an early lunch for all 3 of us, just to make sure we get to the lodge in daylight.

As we got to the Patagonicas brothers, we were, yet again welcomed with snacks and a great friendly atmosphere……. meaning we stayed a little longer than planned!

The early lunch back at Himex almost turned into a late lunch, and we finally set off at 2pm, with 20+kms to go, keeping in mind we were still at 5300m, that could take us a while.

Sergey and I have always been fairly well match in fitness, pace and stubbornness, even at altitude, and I enjoyed having somebody to share the pain with.

Knowing that Adrian would be able to catch us up, we set off with our light day pack and Sergey set the quick pace on the way to Gorek Shep, every now and then, spending time on the phone to try and organize his flight back home.

We were pushing hard, overtaking trekkers, porters and yaks. What a pleasure to be acclimatised!

Sergey, listening to music, was, like me, still chewing about not being able to go back up the hill, letting out occasionally some Russian swear word.

Adrian caught us up at Lobuche Base Camp, 2 hours in. Although this was expected, as he is awesomely quick, despite us pushing hard, I wasn’t quite ready for the size of his backpack, my shoulders were aching, just looking at it!! He’s a beast!!

To add to the mood, it was slitting, the chilling wind in our face and visibility reduced to 50m ish. We stopped off at Pheriche for a short break, drink and energy food, before setting off again.

We finally arrived at Pengboche at 18:00 after 4hrs of fast walking, up and down the multiple hills thrown at us, and full of aches.

We set out to re-hydrate while waiting for our overnight bag, Sergey electing to go for beer while Adrian and I asked for tea.

Despite my trekking shoes being well broken in, as I’ve had them for years, I can feel blisters on my feet, probably from the slightly higher pace than usual…..

Our night bag arrives as we’re having dinner, so none of us stay up for very long, eager to get some rest, ready for tomorrow’s journey.

We’ve come down quite a bit on altitude and the extra oxygen should delight my body, but I’m still coughing a lot, probably from the cold and humidity and my ribs are hurting.

Eventually, I manage to go to sleep, lucky I have my own room so I didn’t keep the others awake too much.