Mt Everest At Last

The highlight day. Up at 6 in the dark, with the stars still out, for a communal breakfast, and we were on the road at 7:30 before the sun came up. The first of a number of checkpoints was the police just after we turned off the Friendship Highway onto the dirt road to Everest. We had to queue in the order we were on the permit, and have our permission papers, passport and visa checked. In all, our passports were checked 3 times, and our visitation permit checked twice, all in 100km.

Finally after climbing for 2 hours through innumerable switchbacks up about 1000m, we finally crested the ridge, and there it was, glinting in the sun - Mt Everest. In total we could see 4 of the 5 highest mountains in the world in one view. It was obviously what people had come to see, and we had a good half hour of photos in various combinations, before descending again into the valley below. 

We climbed steadily up the valley until we reached Rombuk Monastery, our destination for the night, about 1pm. After a brief photo op, the group debated the two options we had - visit the base camp in the afternoon, or wait for the morning, The view is better in the morning, but after a night at altitude many people feel unwell and don't enjoy it. We settled on going straight up, even before having some lunch, to get the best possible view as the clouds were rolling in.

So it was back on the bus for about 4km to go to the end of the line at a tent village, from which you could either walk or take a government bus to base camp. Some opted to take the bus, and six of us opted to walk. It was great. About 4km, but the time flew by.

Mt Everest was benevolent. Whilst not completely clear, it stuck it's head out of the cloud from time to time for photo ops. We also had good mobile phone reception, so I messaged a few people at home to tell them I'd made it, and Mandy rang for a short chat. If you'd told Edmond Hillary that he'd be able to ring home from Everest, I'm not sure he'd ever have believed you.

Walked back down the trail with the group to the tent city where we finally got to have lunch at 4pm. Checked in to the Rombuk Monastery Guest House about 5pm. Very basic, but quite adequate when you think of where you are. No water, power or light in the room, but comfy beds. Drop toilets outside.

Spent the evening in the room marveling at the photos and writing up the blog. The weather has been very kind and, despite the height, I've not even broken out my coat or gloves. I've just needed a jumper, although sleeping at this altitude could be a bit colder.

Tonight's going to be interesting. The general rule of thumb is that you should only sleep 500m higher each night, but in the last two days we have gone up from 3600 to 4200 to 5100m, so there will be some sore heads tomorrow.