Why we still don't have our instrument, and may not have it for days...

I suppose I am glad to be hanging out at the Pyramid instead of stranded down in Lukla or some other town, waiting to return to Kathmandu (see the BBC link below).  Things do not look good for the arrival of our instrument anytime soon.  Tuesday (8-Nov) looks like the next best day for weather, which means the earliest our things could arrive is Thursday (10-Nov). We are scheduled to leave the Pyramid on 15-Nov.  We will see how this plays out...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-15589982

Day 11 (Nov 4): First day at the Pyramid

I woke up this morning feeling a little bit better.  I slept pretty well, and my appetite was more or less back (at least more so than yesterday or the day before).  I did have a headache this morning, but that has since passed.  Mostly I now feel like I’m just fighting a cold, and I do not have a ton of energy.  I think in another day or two I should be back to normal.  For better or worse, we don’t have much work to do here without our instrument.  We did go up to the top floor of the Pyramid (where we will temporarily install our instrument when it arrives – in the spring we hope to move it to a nearby shelter on the top of a hill where we can sample air that is less influenced by the valley surrounding the Pyramid) and start thinking about how and where we would set it up. I can definitely feel the altitude here – when I got up to the top floor of the Pyramid I was pretty much out of breath! I am fortunate that the two technicians here with me are very competent and experienced, so once we have some work to do together I think it will go well.  Once we did about as much as we could do with nothing but a box of spare parts and no instrument to use them with, we took a short walk outside to get some fresh (albeit cold and windy) air.  I took a couple photos of the Pyramid before the clouds roll in this afternoon.  We hope our instrument will arrive in a few days, but we do not know yet if there are any flights going from Kathmandu to Lukla today.  The forecast does not look great for the next couple days, but the flights (when they go) go early in the morning so we will see.  Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Days 8-10 (Nov 1-3): Deboche to Dingboche, Dingboche to Thukla, Thukla to La Pyramide

I waited a couple days to write, so I’ll do my best to remember the events of the last few days.  On Nov 1 we walked from Deboche to Dingboche.  We started the morning by visiting a nearby Buddhist female monastery, and that was pretty interesting.  The walk to Dingboche was nice, but we definitely went up in altitude, climbing to about 4300 meters.  By the time we reached the lodge, I had a pretty wicked headache.  I assume it was due to the altitude.  We had hot tea and eventually dinner, and then went to sleep.

When I woke up on Nov 2, my headache was still lingering a bit but it was not nearly as bad.  I talked with Gianpietro and we agreed it was fine for me to move forward.  That morning, we made a very slow ascent to the small village of Thukla.  The views along the way were really spectacular and humbling.  The Himalayas are really incredible.  You can tell from the photo below, I felt pretty good that morning :)

In Thukla we had lunch and in the early afternoon we began our ascent from 4600 meters to the Pyramid monitoring station at about 5,050 meters.  Unfortunately, during the initial part of the ascent my headache came back as well as a bit of a stomachache.  I consulted with our trekking guide, and he spoke to Gianpietro (who was in Thukla at the time) by walkie-talkie and we agreed I should descend back to Thukla to rest and make a slower adjustment to the altitude.  This was an option Gianpietro and I had discussed earlier in the day, should my headache resume.  I was disappointed to leave my group but I knew it was the right thing to do, so I descended with our trekking guide.  My colleagues were very kind at that moment, handing over various articles of warm clothing to get me through the afternoon and evening.  I ended up staying the night in Thukla and Gianpietro stayed there with me. I did not feel great during the afternoon and evening due to my head and stomachaches, but Gianpietro took good care of me and by the morning I was feeling better. 

We took a slow morning, hanging out at the lodge for a few hours, and around 11am we started a verrrrrry slow ascent to the Pyramid.  Gianpietro was constantly asking me how I was doing, and thankfully my headache did not return; however, I am inclined to subtitle this portion of my post "Climbing 400 meters while fighting the flu".  We arrived at the Pyramid around 4pm, and all of my colleagues greeted us with open arms.  I am happy to be here now and will be heading to dinner shortly.  I plan to rest for a couple days (given that we are still waiting for our instrument to arrive from Kathmandu) and I think that will be very nice.  I have free wifi here, so hopefully I can connect with some of you by Skype or email more often now!

Day 7 (Oct 31) – Namche Bazaar to Deboche

This morning we started off from the hotel around 8:30 or 9am.  We first had to climb about 100 meters and then we had a nice reasonably flat stretch for a while.  A couple hours down the trail we stopped for a cup of hot tea in a small village where there were several vendors out selling the usual things.  Several people continued to stock up on gifts and trinkets.  We then unfortunately had to descend from 3600 meters down to 3300 meters, at which point we stopped for lunch.  Around lunch time the weather turned a bit and it was pretty cold and cloudy.  After a nice warm lunch we had to set out to climb from 3300 meters up to 3900 meters.  It was a somewhat difficult ascent, but we went slow and made it up without problem.  At the top was a beautiful monastery but it was very cloudy so it was hard to get a nice view.  We went inside for a few minutes and got to see the Buddhist monks meditating.  The clouds also made it hard for us to get many nice views during the afternoon portion of our hike, when we likely would have had a great view of the mountains.  After the monastery we descended a short way to our stop for the night in Deboche.  It is a small town (if you can call it that) with a few buildings and a lodge where we will stay tonight.  We have already had one cup of hot tea and are on to our second.  It tastes so good on a cold evening.  Overall it was a good day, but we are all tired from hiking.  Hopefully tonight will bring sleep for me, because tomorrow we will climb above 4000 meters, and the day after to the Pyramid at 5000 meters.  

Day 6 (Oct 30) – Namche Bazaar

The first night of sleeping at 3500 meters didn’t really go that well for me.  All night I was sort of asleep, then awake, then asleep, then awake.  One time I woke up and could feel my heart beating really fast, which was weird.  But this morning I was fine, just a little tired.  I think it will take time to adjust to the altitude.  After breakfast, we set off on a short walk in the area above Namche Bazaar.  We didn’t do anything strenuous, but we did get up above the town a little bit and we were able to see some beautiful views.  We even got a glimpse of Mt. Everest in the distance.  Then the group split in two – one group climbed up another couple hundred meters to get a view of the surrounding valley, while the rest of us took a lower elevation route around the back side of Namche over to the monastery.  We still had a really great view of the area, without the climb (which I felt was better for my knees and my adjustment to the altitude).  We got back to the hotel around lunchtime.  At that point I was feeling really exhausted, but some food and hot tea really helped.  After lunch, we walked over to the same café as the day before to have a coffee.  We then browsed the local shops and people bought various souveniers, gifts, and hiking apparel.  Now we are back at the hotel waiting for our dinner.  Italians are really not down with dinner at 6:30pm, especially since we keep eating lunch at Italian time (1 or 2pm), but we still manage.  Eating dinner earlier allows us more time to digest food, which I am told happens a bit slower at high altitude (as if my digestive system didn’t already work slowly enough…).  Tomorrow morning we set off hiking again, so tonight is a night to rest up and get our things in order.  

I spoke with one of our contacts in Kathmandu this evening, and he tells me that our shipment cleared customs (hooray!), so hopefully tomorrow the boxes will fly to Lukla and then the porters will carry them up.   We hope they will arrive only one or two days after we do, but we will see.  We’ll try to get some information tomorrow to see how things are progressing, but we made it past the first hurdle so that is good.  
Til next time...

Day 5 (Oct 29) – Monju to Namche Bazaar

Last night I finally slept for several hours when I fell asleep around 9:30pm and woke up on my own around 6am. It was great.  The porters were ready to take our bags by about 7am, but we were able to take a leisurely breakfast and start hiking around 8:30.  Shortly after leaving Monju, we entered the Sagarmatha National Park.  Although we still passed through a few small towns after that point, it was less developed than the day before.  A couple hours into our hike we stopped for a cup of tea. I think I am in love with Nepalese milk tea.  It’s so good!  We then continued hiking but had to go very slowly because from that point on we really began to gain altitude. Once we crossed above 3,000 meters I could feel it in my breathing, but we all just went really slowly and everyone did just fine. There was one point on the hike where we could see Mt. Everest in the distance for the first time, and that was pretty cool.  

We arrived in Namche Bazaar (our stopping point for the day) around 1:30pm.  We checked into a pretty nice hotel where we can all have a bed and a warm shower tonight and tomorrow.   Namche Bazaar is at about 3500 meters, and we will stay here all day tomorrow to adjust to the altitude.  We had a great lunch at the hotel (for me, white rice and chicken curry… yum!) and then set off on a short walk around town.  We first had a coffee in a nearby lodge and I am happy to say that all of my Italian friends ordered Caffe Americano… I think it’s because it’s cold outside and they wanted something large and warm to drink (although I drank mine nice and slowly like one should).  We went in a couple shops and our group leader, Gianpietro, introduced us to the storeowner who is a friend of his.  This is good because it means we can be sure we are getting a good price.  Trekking gear is pretty cheap here so it is tempting to buy a lot of things (although so far I have resisted)!  Now we are relaxing at the hotel before dinner. 

I am enjoying our group so far – they are all really nice and do a good job of staying together while we hike. Even if we split up a little, no one is ever alone and eventually the group ahead will wait for the others to catch up.  We also do a good job looking out for each other – sharing water and food when necessary, and making sure we’re all feeling alright.  They ask me often about my sore knee (which today feels surprisingly a little better than yesterday).  I think we should have a good time together over the coming weeks.  They help me with my Italian too and I occasionally help them with English.  We also have two Nepalese trekking guides with us.  One is quiet, and I’m not sure I’ve ever heard him say anything.  The other (Ves) is very friendly and knows Gianpietro well from traveling with him over the years (he calls Gianpietro “Sir Peter”).  It’s nice to feel like we are in good hands while we are here.  Tonight we’ll have dinner altogether and then tomorrow will be a rest day.  I look forward to taking a stroll through town and browsing in the shops where it seems less likely that the owners will immediately flock to me and try to get me to buy there things and haggle over prices. It’s much more relaxing here than in Kathmandu!  Monday morning we will set off again and continue gaining altitude, so it will be nice to have some down time before that.  

Side note for Tyler and Mike and anyone who has seen our photos from Pompeii: Earlier today I saw our luggage being transported along the trail while we were walking.  I realized that our bags aren't actually being carried on the backs of sherpas or porters, but instead they are strapped on the backs of animals - something resembling a yak.  I kind of feel like we have the Nepali version of donkey slaves!

Day 4 (Oct 28) – Kathmandu to Lukla to Monju

We started very early on Friday morning, meeting for breakfast at 5:30 and heading to the airport promptly at 6am.  The domestic terminal in the Kathmandu airport was an interesting experience, and I am thankful our trekking guides where there to help us through the process of getting tickets for an early morning flight to Lukla.  If you don’t get out early, sometimes you have to wait until the next day to depart because it can get cloudy in the afternoon and then the pilots won’t go.  We got a flight at 7:45, which was pretty good.  It was a tiny prop plane with only one row of seats on each side of the plane.  I think there were maybe 15 passengers total.  Needless to say it was an eventful flight.  It was only 30 minutes, but it was so interesting to get up out of the haze of Kathmandu and finally see the Himalayas on the horizon.  Of course we felt every wind gust and updraft, which at times made it feel like we were on a roller coaster instead of a plane.  Landing in Lukla is also an adventure.  The Lukla airstrip is right in the mountains so seemingly out of nowhere the plane touches down and comes to a very quick halt on a runway that is slanted upward.  You get ushered off the plane quickly so that the next group of outbound tourists can get on.  After that we went to a lodge where we met our trekking guides and had a cup of hot tea.  Our porters gathered our luggage and prepared to carry it up for us while we got our daypacks ready and organized ourselves for hiking.  

We set off in a very large group, even though there are only 8 of us who are actually traveling together.  Our hike started at about 9:30 with a break for lunch around 11:30 (which lasted until at least 1:00) and then we finally reached our destination around 3:30pm.  Our final altitude today isn’t very different from Lukla (about 2800 meters) but we had a lot of up and down during the hike – it was by no means flat but it also wasn’t anything too difficult.  I have never seen such a crowded trail.  We were surrounded by people all day and several times I had to make sure I could actually see one of my group members in front of and/or behind me.  We also seemed to just walk through towns and villages all day.  So although it’s in many ways very rustic, it’s also very populated around here and we are by no means out in the wilderness alone.  That has its advantages and disadvantages I guess.  


Overall it was a good day… beautiful scenery, good company, and a nice hike.  My knee is hurting just a little bit, but I wore a neoprene sleeve all day and that seemed to help (so far no swelling).    I am just trying to hike slowly and go easy on it.  I am thankful that after tomorrow we get a full day of rest.  I think that will help.  After that just 3 days of hiking.  Hopefully my knee can handle that!  I tried to get a lot of photos today but it was hard with my hiking poles in hand and the crowded trail that I had to dodge through.  But there are still many photo opportunities ahead!