A Walk to Everest

"Some people will tell me I'm crazy, and I tell them that's the only thing that keeps me sane." 

Somewhere in eastern Nepal...  it was well after 8pm when the bus finally stopped.   For the last 12 plus hours that we'd been bouncing along terrible dirt tracks of roads and twisting in-and-out of hairpin turns, I'd thought that I couldn't wait for us to arrive.  But now as I looked out into the darkness at this strange (and seemingly deserted) little town, I started to think we might have been better off before.  A guy on top of the bus grunted a little as he struggled to lift each of our backpacks, and slide them over the side into our waiting arms.  Mine landed with a thud and almost knocked the wind outta me as I caught it.  And then our bus turned around and drove off...  leaving us standing there in the night.  This was the moment I started to wonder if I had lost my mind. 

We were in Shivalaya.  And we chose to stop here because, well, it's literally as far as you can travel on a bus before the road disintegrates into a yak trail.  For me, the trip had already been long... from Cambodia 16 hours on a bus, then 24 more in airports.  My one afternoon in Kathmandu was a blur of running around and stocking-up on last minute cold weather supplies and then cramming it all (plus a mountain of granola bars) into my backpack.   Sometime after midnight I stretched out on the living room floor and went to sleep.  The next day we were up early for another mind-numbing day on a bus... fallen trees in our way, motion-sick passengers, chasing the bus down the road because we thought we were being left behind...  now all I cared about was a soft place to close my eyes.  Happily, along the trails here a guesthouse and gluttonous portions of Dhal Bhat are never very far away. 

The next morning shortly after dawn I splashed some icy water on my face, wriggled into my pack, and started walking up a hill.  And that's pretty much what we would do every day for the next three weeks...

The five of us crossing one of the mountain passes between Shivalaya and Namche Bazzar

Up mountains and down mountains...

Down, down to cross a pretty green river or high suspension bridge... and then back up UP a mountain again.  

The days were defined, not by the distance we had walked, but how many vertical meters we would rise and fall.  Up and down, up and down, up and... One guy we met on the trail said this kind of trekking is called "sewing".  One of my favorite quotes from this part of the trail: "Downhill makes me grumpy; uphill makes me cry."  True story. 

It was so great to be out of the city and surrounded by simple country life.  Another day plowing the potato fields in your favorite red saree.  Most guesthouses where we stayed didn't provide lavish eccentricities like toilets or showers, but they weren't without their own particular kind of charm. 

cute. 

curious.

false advertising!

(but they did have yak cheese)

Back in NY these Rhododendrons would, at best, be modest shrubs in someone's garden.  But here they're entire forests exploding in blooms of pink and white or red. The animals we saw didn't seem too bothered by having people around.  This blue bird was AMAZING to see!  They told us it's a kind of Himalayan Pheasant.

On and on we walked... slowly climbing in altitude.  Past the famed Namche Bazzar and other places I'd always read about in old mountaineering stories... following the footsteps of those who've ventured up Everest before.  After about a week on the trail we were high enough where trees would no longer grow and unbelievable panoramas of giant mountains started to appear.  

Can you see us walking, way down there in the right corner? 

Most of the trekkers who come here use porters, but we carried our own stuff.  

Our packs felt heavy, but it was nothing compared to what Sherpas carry.  They say a typical load for them weighs about 90 kg, or almost 200lbs!  Although some will carry even more- and that in extreme altitude and over dizzingly steep terrain.   Check out the size of those baskets they're hauling-  they support all that weight with only a forehead strap!  Incredible!

What a place!

Maybe it'd been the drastic change from the suffocating heat and humidity of Cambodia- to this freeze-dried icebox?  Maybe it'd been those first long days with little sleep?  Maybe just a lousy coincidence?  Who knows?   But for whatever reason, the second day of our hike I started to get sick.. and sicker... and wouldn't eventually feel better until I was back home being treated  for pneumonia.  As we climbed past 4,500 meters, it became harder and harder to breathe, and I was feeling increasingly miserable.  But... we walked on.  Happily I had some pretty amazing views to keep me distracted.  This golden mountain is Ama Dablam.  Maybe you've heard of it? 

By now it'd been nearly 2 weeks since we'd seen the last paved road.  The only way in or out was either on our feet, or by helicopter.  Although, I did see one hand-painted sign offering horse rental for a mere $400 USD a day...  

Once you get high enough, nothing can grow anymore and it starts to feel like you're on another planet.  Look down and all you can see are rocks, sand, and ice.  Squint up into the thin air, and sunlight pounds through a blindingly blue sky.  And of course the mountains.  Everywhere you look are the mountains; whitest white and impossibly huge. 

Standing in these places, you can't help but feel small.

This part of Nepal is called the Khumbu; home of the Sherpa people.  Here skies are criss-crossed with prayer flags and the hillsides dotted with stupas, colorful temples, and walls of Buddhist prayers carved into stone tablets.

  Only a  few times  we got snowed on.  

AMA DABLAM WITH SNOW AND TOILET

And I call this one "YAKS IN THE MIST".  And, Yes,  he's wearing an earing!  

Our first real destination was Island Peak.  On the left 7873m  (25,830 ft)  Nuptse is glowing in fresh powder.  Island Peak, on the right (at just over 20,000ft), looks like a little baby mountain by comparison.  But not so.  At 20,000ft the oxygen is only around 50% of what it is at sea level. 

Near the base of Island...

These photos can't even really begin to convey the scale of these mountains.  Waaaay down on the glacier below, I watched a Sherpa walking in search of small pools of fresh water.  I tried to follow him with my eyes, but even with the highest zoom of the telephoto lens, he was soon out of sight.  What looks like gravel on the surface of the ice, is actually a carpet of boulders.  And the man walking there was just swallowed up in their shadows. 

Island Peak base camp

A million pounds of glacier spilling over the side of Island Peak.  It's a massive frozen waterfall

From here we continued west to Everest.  Walking and walking... Up here I really started to feel the thin air.  Even the smallest hills felt like giants.  Looking back now, it seems funny to have felt so tired... but at the time I sure wasn't laughing. 

In my mind I'd sing to pass the time.   "...and if your glass heart should crack,  and for a second you turn back,  Oh no, be strong.  Walk on, Walk on..."   and sometimes take a few liberties with the lyrics  "Coughing, wheezing, totally freezing, Oh no! Walk on..." 

 

"I have walked 500 miles, and I must walk five hundred more......."  (how many songs about walking do you know? :)  Eventually we arrived at Everest Base Camp; colorful clusters of tents snuggled-up against the edge of a glacier at 5356m, or 17,570 ft.  

It was incredibly beautiful there, but surprisingly Mount Everest isn't visible from here.  The summit is still 6 miles (and many days) away and it's surrounded by other high peaks.  The photo below is the view from EBC.  To the left, you can see part of the infamous Khumbu Icefall which marks the beginning of the climb to the summit of the world's highest mountain.

On the glacier wind and sun have sculpted some of the ice into huge pinnacles. 

 cracks in the ice

To get a better look at Everest, the next morning we peeled ourselves out of our sleeping bags at 3:30am and started walking up a modest hill called Kala Patthar.  Maybe if it were in New York, it'd be impressive enough to be called a mountain.  In Cambodia it'd be colossal.  But in the Himalayas this was barely a bump in the landscape.  Even so, at 5545 meters (18,200ft) for me it was high enough to make an impression.

I jumped around for hours to keep from freezing while trying to catch the perfect sunrise picture.  The black mountain behind the ridge... that's the one. Everest! 

It was beautiful there, but sooo cold!  On the walk up, my water bottle turned to frozen slush in my hands.  I wore 5 shirts, 3 pairs of pants, an enormous orange puffy- and was still freezing.  Ha!  I guess I've definitely turned into a tropical kinda girl! 

Everest

.

...and some of it's friends.  Slopes so steep they can't hold the snow.

And just like that, 3 weeks had flown by.  All our clothes were filthy and most of our granola bar reserves had been depleted.  It was time to go home.  Instead of walking all the way back, we'd opted to hike a few days to Namche, and then Lukla, where there's a small airstrip. 

Turns out, it's one of the shortest commercial runways in the world, and also one of the most dangerous.  The airport has one dollhouse-sized airstrip perched on the edge of a relatively steep little hill.  As our flight took off, the pilot raced our 21-seater plane down the hill full throttle....  I felt the wheels lift off pavement literally inches before the runaway dropped off into the river, thousands of feet below...    And all the trails that had taken us 8 days to cover on foot, we passed by in only 30 minutes.  It was, like so many things, all about perspective. 

"There is, I have heard, a little thing called sunrise, in which the sun reverses the process we have all seen the night before.  You might assume such a thing as mythical as those beast who guard the four corners of the earth.  But I have it on the finest authority, and have, from time to time, regarded it with my own eyes."  -Lauren Willig

It was a mad cow kinda day

It's April.  

Everywhere you look there's tinsel draped over tiny banana trees and an unnerving lack of traffic on the streets.  This can only mean one thing.  It's New Year's again!  I mean, it's the beginning of 2056 B.E. (Buddhist Era).  This is the one time of year that everything in Cambodia comes to a stop.  /  Es Abril.  Por todos los lados se han adornado matitas chiquitas de guineo y hay una absencia inquietante de traffico en las calles.  Eso puede significar una sola cosa.  Es el Año Nuevo otra vez!  O sea, el principio del año 2056 según el calendario Budista.  En Camboya eso es el unico tiempo del año que todo se para. 

Schools are out for vacation, factories and businesses close, and most people begin preparing some sort of altar in their homes to make gifts to the spirits.  Wealthier families might prepare a table like the one in the photo below;  with things like:  beer, soda, cake, candles, flowers, fruit, incense, blinking lights etc... whatever they think might attract and appease what they call in Cambodian "angles".   Their belief is that inviting these spirits into your home can bring good luck for the coming year. /  Las escuelas tienen vacacion, fabricas y negocios se cierran y la mayoria de las personas se preparan algun tipo de altar en su casa para ofrecer dádivas a los espiritus. Si la familia tiene recursos, tal vez se preparen algo como se ve en la foto abajo- con cosas como cerveza, cola, tortas, vellas, flores, frutas, incensio, luzes de "navidad".... qualquier cosa ellos sospechan puede complacer a los espiritus, que ellos llaman "angeles".  Ellos crean que invitar a estos espiritus puede traerles buena suerte. 

Often, somewhere outside their home they'll hang a small model of a house for the spirits to live in.  It might include, food & water, a tiny ladder for the "angles" to climb inside, or clothes.  On this one they've hung little paper pants and shirts protected with plastic. / Muchas veces ellos cuelgan una casita de muñeco afuera de su casa para que los espiritus moran allí.  Puede inclyuir comida, agua, o hasta una escalerita para  los "angeles" subir.  En este,  ellos han puesto pantalones y camisitas chiquitas prtoejidos con plastico. 

Officially the New Year's Holiday is 3 days, but in practice it last about about a week.  The first day is usually a mass exodus out of Phnom Pehn.  Roads become an endless river of traffic; bus fares and border fees skyrocket; and just about everyone piles onto the nearest moving vehicle and heads home to the provinces to spend time with their families. / Oficialmente se celebra el Año Nuevo durante solo trés días, pero en realidad es toda una semana.  El primer día hay un éxodo masivo de Phnom Pehn.  Los caminos se convierten en ríos interminables de traffico-  Los precios de los pasajes suben sin control- y casi todos se amontónen en cualquier automóvil que les encuentran y se van al campo para pasar las vacaciones con sus familias. 

So, since everyone was leaving the city, we did too!  It was a great time to meet people who'd ordinarily be busy everyday at work.  A neighboring cong had organized a long day visiting some of their distant rural territory and a huge group turned-up to join them. (The top floor of the white bldg in the pic is rented as a K.Hall for the Takamao cong) / Bueno, como todo el mundo estaba saliendo de la ciudad, nosotros nos fuimos tambien!  Era un tiempo excelente de encontrar personas quienes normalmente estarán ocupadas en el trabajo.  Una congregacion vecendaria habia organizado un día largo de predicar en el campo, y llegó un grupo gigante para ayudarles. 

But getting there was a little unusual because we had to cross a small river first.  

Pero la llegada fue un poco interesante porque tuvimos que cruzar este río primero. 

No problem.  We just drove our bikes over this sturdy pier..

No hubo problema.  Solamente manejamos por este puentecito muy bien hecho.... 

Attempted to roll our motorcycles onto the ferry as it bobed up and down...

Y intentamos subir las motos al barco, mientras el se bailaba por arriba y abajo....

And we were on our way! 

¡Y nos fuimos!

It was a lovely day and we had many nice conversations with curious people. The better I become at speaking the language here, the easier and more enjoyable the days become.  I wish we'd kept track of how much literature was place, because I'm sure it was a lot.  /  Fue en día muy lindo y nos tuvimos muchas conversaciones buenas con gente curiosa.  Mientras más puedo hablar este idioma, más puedo disfrutar de la predi.  Que pena nadie se anotó la cantidad de literatura que nos coloquemos hoy, porque se que fue bastante.

Some of the sights outside the city...

Unas de las escenas lindas fuera de la ciudad...

There were so many of us out in service, that we had to break-up into smaller groups.  But at lunchtime we all met back together in an abandoned grove of fruit trees. - Habian tantas personas predicando hoy que era necesario dividirnos en grupos más pequeños.  Pero para almuerzar nos reunimos otra vez en un huerto abandonado.  

This spot under the mango tree was the prefect place to have a picnic together and play games. 

Este lugar debajo del mate de mango era perfecto para comer y jugar.

Usually banana trees are huge, but this one was more like a Banana Bush 

Normalmente las matas de guineo son grandes pero este era más como un arbusto de guineo

So, you knew there had to be a cow involved in this day somehow....   Sure enough, on the way home we ran into a small band of grumpy bovines blocking the road.  (Maybe you know that I have a completely stupid and irrational fear of cows?)  It's usually no problem because they're generally too busy munching on things to bother with people.  But today, this one was in an especially bad mood. / Bueno, sabias de algú modo este día iba a incluir a una vaca.... de hecho cuando ibamos de regreso nos topamos una manada de vacas bravas bloqueando el camino.  Tal vez sabias que yo me tengo una fobia super tonta de las vacas?  Normalmente no se presente ningun problema porque, por lo general las vacas estan demasiado ocupados chupando hierba para q gente les importa.  Pero hoy, una vaca tenia un malgenio especial. 

After a few rounds of our ferocious stick-shaking had failed to get it off the road,  I decided to try and be brave.  I took one end of the rope it was tied to, with the intention of leading it into a field...  "Just be cool", I told myself, "Cows can smell fear!" /  La soluccion obvio era tirarle piedras y palitos.... . pero cuando este no funcionó, yo decidí probar la valentia.  Cojí su cabito, con la intencion de animarla que se valla a su podrero.  "Solo actua normal!" me diji " Las vacas pueden oler miedo" 

And everything went perfectly- for about 4 seconds.  That's when the cow attacked.  And like any good cowaphobe, I ran- leaving my bike behind, still running.  The cow encircled it, entangling the rope around the muffler and tires...  If you've ever seen the movie Tommy Boy, you know the scene where a deer destroys the car?  At this point, that's what I was envisioning the cow doing to my bike.  All that'd be left would be shredded bits of chrome and plastic, littering the field like confetti. / Y todo salío perfect- por 4 segundos.  Es fue cuando la vaca atacó.  Y como todo buen cobarde, yo corí- dejando mi moto allí.  la vaca se le dío las vueltas, enredando su cabo por las llantas y tubo de escape... yo me imaginé que ya no había salvacion.  Pronto solo me quedarán miles de pedazitos de  plastico y metal.  

Fortunately for us, cows are not very smart.  Perhaps credit for our escape goes to our collective expert-wrangling/cow-distracting skills... or maybe the blazing hot afternoon just made her a little extra lazy today?  Either way, once we confused the cow sufficiently to get my bike free, we decided to leave her where she was, and  instead went off-roading through some muddy pastures (where the cows should have been) to get home.  Guess the cow won.  / Afortunadamente, las vacas no son muy intelegentes.  Tal vez el credito para nuestro escapa se da a nuestro talento inato como vaqueros.... o tal vez fue porque el calor insoportable hizo la vaca volver perezosa?  No se... pero el fin de la historia es que despues que  haber confundida la pobre vaca lo suficiente para rescatar a mi moto, decidimos no pelear más. Dejamos la bestia alli y nos manejamos por los podreros enlodados hasta llegar a otra calle.  Supongo que la vaca ganó. 

It's true that sometimes the days here are challenging...  But when I go to the hall, or to a convention, and I look around at all the smiling faces of brothers and sisters who have learned the truth here...  I hear them talk about what knowing Jehovah has meant for their lives.... and I know that out there in those cow-infested territories there's still more people like that; just waiting for us to come wandering into their front yards with Good News....  Then somehow it doesn't seem all that challenging anymore.  /  Es verdad que  a veces los día aqui se presentan ciertos retos dificiles.... pero cuando voy al salon o una asamblea y veo las sonrias de personas que han aprendido la verdad aquí.... escucho ellos hablar de como conocer a Jehova ha cambiado sus vidas.... Y yo se que adentro de estos territorios (infestados con vacas) hay más personas como ellos, solo esperando que nos llegamos a sus patios con las buenas nuevas........ Entonces, no me parece un reto TAN grande. 

"Always rejoice in [the] Lord. Once more I will say, Rejoice!"  -Philippians 4:4-  "Simpre regocíjense en [el] Señor.  Una vez más diré: ¡Regocíjemse!"