Day 1 – Lukla -> Phakding
We started off with an early morning. A 5:30am departure from our hotel would hopefully put us on the first plane from Kathmandu to Lukla. But one thing to note, is that the Nepalese function on organised chaos. So we got to the airport, made our way through all that chaos and then waited for our flight. We waited for an hour or so at the boarding gate, boarded the bus to our very little 14-seater plane, then proceeded to sit on the bus, parked on the tarmac, for another hour, before being bussed back to the boarding gate and sent back inside, for about another hour. The weather at Lukla was too foggy, so the airport was closed.
Eventually around 10am we departed. Better late than never! Especially since recently, most flights to Lukla were being cancelled due to the weather. The flight itself was not bad, but between the fog and smog we couldn’t see much. The landing certainly wasn’t any less exhilarating than the first time I flew into that airport. There’s a reason Lukla is considered one of the world’s most dangerous airports. But by 11am we were cozied up in a tea house at Lukla, having our first cups of lemon tea.
Due to the delayed start to our day, we didn’t have time to get to Jorsalle as originally planned. So we trekked from Lukla to Phakding, about an 8km journey that took around 2.5 hours. Luckily for us it was a reasonably flat leg of the trip, meandering our way up and down hills. In comparison to Kathmandu, it was cold – about 5C it compared to Kathmandu’s 25C. However that did not stop our excitement. Everyone was buzzing to finally be up in the mountains, excited of what was to come.
Day 2 – Phakding -> Namche Bazaar
All I can start with is it was a bloody cold day (if you keep reading you’ll be able to tell I wrote this as it happened – it only got colder). The day started with -5C weather at 7am, and fresh snow on the nearby hill tops. We always knew this day was gonna be a big one, it’s a long day of climbing up the Namche hill. This was a day I vividly remembered as long and hard from the first trip. We started out at about 8am, and arrived in Namche at about 3pm. Over the course of those 7hrs, we covered about 11kms and climbed over 850m in altitude. It was long and gruelling, but we all made it.
We encountered many swing bridges, lovely trackside toilets (not), donkeys, yak-naks (hybrid cow/yaks), and even some goats. During the last hour or so of our trek we were walking through sleet, it wasn’t enough to settle, but it was enough to excite us!
Namche Bazaar is the biggest settlement on the trail, sort of a gateway to the higher villages. This means lots of shops, cafes and bars to explore! We spend 2 nights here, with a acclimatisation day here tomorrow. That’s all for today, we are living in layers, and off lemon tea!
Day 3 – Namche Bazaar
Day 3 started off as our coldest day yet, -11C overnight, layers upon layers were needed. Today we had an acclimatisation day in Namche. The purpose of this was to allow for our bodies to adjust to the altitude, currently 3,400m, and to ensure we would be fit to continue our journey. Namche was the perfect village for this, as it’s quite the shopping hub!
While we had time for a sleep in today, most of us were up early anyway. 4am seems to be the common wake up time for most of us. It was a stunning morning to be awake early as we watched the sunrise over the mountains, and spread down into the town. It was absolutely stunning!
Following our breakfast we wandered up to the Sagamartha National Park Museum, where we got our first view of Mount Everest – and we couldn’t have had better weather for it.
After this, we returned to Namche and just hung out. We visited a cute little cafe – Sherpa Barista, did some knick knack shopping and enjoyed sitting in the sun. While the sun was out it was lovely, but it still wasn’t particularly warm. I did have a hot shower for the first time today, which was absolutely worth the 500NPR ($6.5nzd). The rest day was exactly what we all needed, we are all feeling revitalised and excited to continue onwards tomorrow!
Hopefully I’ll write again soon, only 6 days until we (fingers crossed) reach Everest Base Camp!
~ Nikitas Nomadic Notes
Nikita’s Nomadic Notes 