Mountain to valley

After a lovely stay at the Dhulikel Lodge we have now arrived in Kathmandu. The valley suffers from air pollution, but so far it has not seemed bad and our biggest problem is the heat. No matter how much we drink we are always thirsty!

Our first day was a walking tour with our guide, and the ancient city seemed easy to navigate. In Tibet they have no maps, and as all the wording is in Chinese we could never find places.

Women here still do a lot of manual labor but our guide said that girls have much more opportunity than before. His own mother was illiterate, but after he completed his college education, he taught his mother to read and write. You see school children and schools everywhere, and all the kids wear uniforms.

From barren to lush

Crossing into Nepal meant saying goodbye to our trusty driver Yambil, and our sweet young guide, Samden. We also crossed from the barren brown colors and endless mountains of Tibet, to the green gorges of Nepal.

The border crossing was thankfully without problems. Their main questions concerned reading material, especially guide books or literature about Tibet neither of which we had. They did not mind me having a small Hong Kong guide book however.

After entering Nepal, we spent an hour or so just people watching in the narrow street waiting for our ride. Nearby Mount Kailash is an attraction for serious climbers, and the women function as porters carrying all their heavy supplies to be loaded on buses. It is the only work they can get, and it pays $6 each trip. Once they leave their load they climb back up the hill to find another one, carrying infants and toddlers along with the heavy load on their backs.

After at least 5 hours driving on the edge of gorges where I could not even see the bottom, we arrived at a beautiful lodge on a hillside overlooking a valley, and in the evening we enjoyed a Nepali curry on the terrace. Considering we spent two evenings where dinner was a protein bar, this was luxury.

I made it

Yes, that is me at Mount Everest, we had the same beautiful weather our whole trip. Deb refused to do the whole climb, so we took the buss up with our guide. Once the buss lets you off, you still have a short steep climb for a clear view of the mountain - it really is spectacular. Later Deb took the buss down, while Samdun and I hiked back to the camp which is about 4 miles.

In the second photo you can clearly see the row of orange pup tents which is the base camp for those actually climbing Everest.

Our Everest Hotel

We made the choice to sleep in the tented camp, which is the base camp for tourists. It is like a small village of large rectangular tents made of woven black Yak hair. However, what a difference inside, carpet, weavings, beds around the perimeter, and a stove in the center. The young man who runs it does everything, makes hot tea, cooks food, makes pancakes for breakfast and tucks you in with big puffy quilts. That night six of us slept in the tent, Deb and I, our driver Yambil, our guide Samden and 2 Chinese girls, so as you can imagine it was a sleep in your clothes night. I won't describe the toilet but you had to go outside. It was really toasty inside, until nightfall came when the temperature plummeted, but we were very snug under our pile of bedding. Quite an experience!

Moving to high altitude

We are beginning to climb to very high altitude, so hopefully my luck will hold and I will continue to feel OK. We are going to cross 2 high passes at 16,000ft an follow the banks of Yamdrok Tso Lake for more than 40 miles. The scenery is spectacular, and I am seeing more mountains than I have ever seen in my life, but we are still a long way from Everest.

The piles of stones on the beach are made by people adding a stone for a prayer.

Monk training

Please forgive me if I already wrote about this, but at our last hotel before we dropped off the grid 3 days ago the service was sketchy, and I am not sure it went through.

On a visit to the Drepung Monastery one of the richest and most powerful of the Yellow Sect monasteries, we happened to witness some of the 200 monks training for their final oral exams. They are split into two groups and one monk from each group is chosen to wear the yellow hat, before being blistered with questions. If the answer is correct the lead questioner slaps his left arm with his right hand, palm down, if wrong the hand will be palm up. It looked very intimidating.

The huge pile of wood is used for the fires which burn under the enormous cauldrons which cook food for 200 monks. It is the largest monastery kitchen in Tibet.

Cute kids

On our long drive we stopped by the roadside in a small village. Apparently our driver's mother in law lived there and she had brought some of her grand-children to wait by the roadside so that Yambil (our driver) could drop off some food supplies. I do not know how long she had waited, but after handing out some cookies that we had, and taking a picture, we were on our way. That is my friend Deb in the picture.

The other little two some were on some steps in Lhasa - I am sure he was flirting with her.