Friday, July 25, 2008

07 Days Everest Panorama Trek

Day 01: Sat, 19th July 2008: KTM -Lukla -Phakding
Team Member/s:
Jack Coffin - Traveller
Krishna Lamsal -Guide
Leave for Kathmandu airport at around 05:00AM. I am always used to hate fordealing with taxi drivers because I am always used to feel being cheated while I used them. At the time, I didn't think that I wasn't feeling being cheated. I paid NRS 350, which was reasonable because the time was early in the morning "night" time according them, just fuel price hiked and fuel shortage. By all of these, I felt that was reasonable. Next thing we did, we flew Lukla on time (It's normal to be late at least 15-20 minutes than mention time and it's rare to fly on mentioned time). Next thing we did, the plane took only 28 minutes to reach Lukla. Normall I had experienced be taking 35-40 minutes. It seems trekking will be favoulous because things are moving by the plan. We took breakfast once we arrived in Lukla. The weather was excellent. The weather was pretty fine even if we were trekking in Moonsun season. After breakfast, we started to walk from Lukla at 08:00AM. The walking speed was as if we could reach Namche same day even though Namche was our next day's destination. We took only one and half hour to reach Phakding. We could reach Namche if we had iven the walk continue but I didn't talked about that topic with Jack because that was our first day trek. Jack took nap and I tok my lunch once we arrived at Phakding. After lunch, we did side trip around Phakding. The Pema Chholing Monastery is one of the attraction in Phakding. Yeah, it's preety hard and longer walk (probably 250m up and about one hour hike) but worth to visit for whom love Buddhism religion and monasteries. After spinning prayer wheels and taking some pricutres, we returned to teahouse and took rest until dinner time. There wer four trekkers on the teahouses and chat for long; especially by Jack. Jack is one of the funny and talkative guy I had ever trekked. He could make friend once he meet the people. I also was introduced with many trekers by Jack. We played a card game named KING with them.

Day 02: Sun, 20th July, 2008: Phakding -Namche
Started our walk Seven-thirty, thirty minutes later than our fixed time because of the rain. Passed the village called Benkar and reached Monjo at where we took entrance permit of Everest national park. We had good walking pace. We reached Namche at 11:20AM, less than four hours. The average time duration for Phakding to Namche is five hours and normally I had taken seven hours for the same route with two Aussies and eight hours with English woman. Today we missed many mountains, including mighty Everest because of clouds but we had good time during walking. The rain started once we arrived at Namche. THanks to the weather because I had left to pack m rainjacket unfortunately. Took lunch, nap and did short walk. We took bakery items in German Bakery (don't think that how German people are doing thier business in Namche, that is just brand name of Hermann Helmer Bakery) which was really nice bakery. There were four trekkers in teahouse in Namche as well. Jack is lucky because he had met the people from his country all way up. Chatted with them, took dinner and went bed.

Day 03: Mon, 21st July, 2008: Namche -Tengboche
Woke up 04:30AM and checked the weather frequently but completely cloudy with no rain. After breakfast, started to walk at 08:00AM. The first fifteen minutes was really struggling. Jack started to sweat and his face became red because of the hard walk. After than the walk was fine. Crossed Kyanjuma (the first village settlement after Namche) and way down to Phunki Tenga. Took rest and had a coconut cronchy before starting to attempt the uphill; dificult part of our today's walk. That was really difficult; more difficult than yesterday (the way up to Namche from Phakding). Attempted that damn uphill in one hour. Tried to checked in to diffrent lodges but almost were closed. Luckily, one teahouse near to Monastery was open! After taking lunch and about three hours nap we entered to Tengboche Monastery and spent about an hour there. Took some pictures and special ceremony of monks chanting then back to teahouse. After some discussion, we came into point to change our mentioned plan (our previous plan was reaching to Tengboche and same way back to Khumjung!). According to our new plan, we will be reached to Pangboche at where there is a nice Sherpa village and famous Pangboche monastery.
Day 04: Tue, 22nd July 2008: Tengboche to Mongla
I woke up at 04:30AM and checked the weather which was completely cloudy. Fortunately, it was opened for a moment (merely five minutes!). That's the first time we saw snow capped mountain (Mount Everest and more!). Jack was so excited when he saw Mount Everest but the view closed immediately by cloud. After that, we headed on to Pangboche village, spent few minutes and returned by way up to Phortse. The walk from Pangboche to Phortse was awful. Arrived in Phortse village with drowsy, tried to take lunch but here was also same problem, almost teahouses were closed due to offseason. Luckily the Phortse Guest House was opened. The owner of the lodge was same to whom we met in Kathmandu Airport when we were flying to Lukla and we had helped her to carry her some of stuffs. Had lunch and way down to Phortse Tenga. After passing 2o minutes downhill, we reach Phortse Tenga (3600m) from where we had to climb Mongla (3975m) within an hour. Our walking speed was unbelivable, we reached to Mongla top in less than 45 minutes. Our overnight stop place (Khumjung Village) was still next an hour downhill but we made our mind to stay at Mongla quickly and checked in to Teahouse. There was nothing to do because when we reached at Mongla, started to rain and full of cloudy.
Day 05: Wed, 23rd July 2008: Mongla -Namche
Unfortunately, there was full of cloud and raining sincethe morning. That was unfortunately because I had forgotten to pack my rain jacket. Waited till 07:45AM but still rain so headed down to Khumjung village. After an hour continuously downhill (including 20 minutes uphill near to village) we reached Khumjung village and explored around (the Khumjung village and more...). Then walked upto the hills and way down to Namche Bazaar. Hada look to Museum and checked in to teahouse. Evening we chatted with two Lithunian guys; one was doctor and next one was former Defense Secretory according them. First, we didn't knew that he was that high figure. We introduced each other by name and i compared his name with Russian name but he was so aggressive. I cursed myself, lack of knowledge foreign affairs among the countries. Jack and he started to talk about the politics specially defense and foreign affaris of US, Russia and China. Middle of the tak, we knwe that he was former Defense Secretary. At that time, I remembered my former boss who is now Counselor of Nepal to Lithunia.
Day 06: Thu, 24th July 2008: Namche to Lukla