I Don’t Like Snow

5:00 AM:  I awoke to see a thick blanket of snow on the ground.  Since we weren’t called at 4 am, I guess we won’t trek Kala Pathar.  I had mixed feelings, because, while I’d love to get a great photograph, I was not looking forward to trekking up and down a snow covered mountain.

6:00 AM:  Wake up knock on the door, followed by a bowl of wash water and a mug of hot Sherpa tea.  I packed my gear and dressed for trekking in the snow.

7:15 AM:  Med check

8:00 AM:  Headed out.  I tried to keep my mind off the cold morning air, the slick ice and snow, so I decided to occupy my mind by singing 100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.  I wondered how many rounds of this song it would take before arriving at our lunch destination.  I only sang down to 35, before I lost my concentration.  I was trying to keep up in the footsteps of the trekker in front of me, but he had a longer stride than mine.  To my total embarrassment, I slipped down a narrow passage into the crevice next to the rock wall.  It didn’t help my ankle’s recovering progress.

The icy downhill trails and snowing slowed me more than my usual slow pace.  I’m from the Bay Area of California with only limited experience with snow – that is, I’ll go to Lake Tahoe for a half day to no more than two days in the snow – even then it’s a few hours on a cross country trail – if that.  I had hiking boots, and trekking poles, not snow boots, snow shoes, or ski poles.

After observing my sliding downhill every few steps, Annie lectured me on having the proper footgear.  Never mind that I was wearing hiking footwear costing three digits.  I politely listened and agreed as I watched all the locals and Sherpas pass me by wearing knock-off street shoes or rubber slippers.

Eventually, I slowed to a pace that worked for my comfort level.  I was separated from the group with Kumar as my guide.

Kumar and I stopped at Lobuche for lunch.  No one was there.  I said to Kumar, “I thought this is where we were picking up a boxed lunch.”  Kumar replied, “They’re all gone.”  I knew I was behind, but not so far they’d have eaten and left without me.  We stopped for the outhouse at the edge of “town”.  The one I used was up a snowy hill.  It had steel grating for flooring.  I sanitized my hands then shared a handful (about a teaspoon) of glucose with Kumar before heading for Pheriche.

Kumar and I stopped at the Sherpa Memorial where we had made an acclimatization hike a few days ago.  I asked some resting trekkers for the time.  “11:30.”  To their amusement, I responded, “Really?!  It feels like 5!”  Thinking I made Kumar miss out on lunch, I pulled out two Power Bars and insisted we stop to eat.  Kumar declined at first, but after my insistence, he gladly chose a flavor and ate with me.

12:15 PM:  We arrived in Tukla.  Upon entering a lodge’s restaurant, the group, all seated around the tables, broke into a round of applause at my arrival.  I thought they were done eating, but they were actually waiting for lunch to be served.  I looked at them with surprise.  I wasn’t expecting to see them here.  I said, “I thought you guys ate and left.  We had lunch already.”  David later commented that we were smart to just stop to eat when we were hungry, because they wished they could have done that instead of pushing to get to this restaurant without any breaks.

12:30 PM Lunch:  Chicken ramen, spring rolls, fried rice and salad.

1:30 PM:  Head out.  Trudged along through the snow, wishing I would stop sliding.  I made another attempt to see how many rounds of 100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.  Aww, who am I kidding?  Lady Gaga’s songs are so much more fun.  I had Bad Romance, Love Game and Poker Face randomly playing in my head.

2:30 PM:  Arrived in Pheriche!  Thanks, again, to my guide Kumar.  Ming greeted us and assigned me my room.  Ming gave my key to Kumar to show me to my room:  Room 101, a corner room with a queen sized bed!  As I was settling in, Lily visited to congratulate me and recommended that I get my name on the shower list because there’s already 13 people signed up.  I removed my wet outerwear, rested on the big, firm bed, and then took out 500 INR:  400 INR for the shower and 100 INR for the Internet.  I proceeded to the dining room where the counter for laundry and shower sign-ups was located.  I signed up for a shower, number 15, after Tim.  With that accomplished, I went upstairs to the sunroom to journal.

4:01 PM:  Journal caught up; time for tea!  Ginger tea with popcorn.  Looked like it’ll be a while for the shower, so I stepped out to the Internet Café, which is/was a free standing one room structure constructed of plywood containing three computers set up for Internet and a few molded plastic lawn chairs for waiting your turn.  I checked my Gmail.  No news from the kids.  I wrote to my kids and responded to friends.

Yea!  My turn for the hot shower (after they finished running buckets of freshly boiled water to the rooftop cistern).  Another opportunity to do my laundry.

Med check before dinner.

7:00 PM Dinner:  Chicken broth, rice, curry chicken, potatoes and cauliflower; and for dessert, a dense chocolate cake decorated with “Congratulations on EBC”.  Our cook is the best.  I had my camera on hand, so I took a picture for the group.  Annie said, “The person with the camera has to cut the cake.”  I cut it into 18 slices, no problem:  in thirds, then each third into thirds.  I have three kids, eyeballing thirds is not a new skill for me.  The cake was really dense.  It was like cutting through a three inch high block of cold fudge.  That cake seriously needed a cold glass of milk to wash it down.  Alas, a tall glass of yak milk was not available.

Annie announced tomorrow’s new agenda:

•  6 AM wake up
• 7 AM breakfast
• 8 AM head out
• 12 PM lunch at the nunnery
• Tea and biscuits halfway to Namche
• Arrive at Namche in about 5 hours, using a different route, which would get us arriving from the top of the hill with the Lodge instead of the bottom of the hill the way we arrived the first time.

Annie said, “Anyone broken by this will be helicoptered out because there is no helicopter service between Namche and Lukla.  We will stay two nights in Namche.”

Our group was not happy with the new plan.  We had no choice.

Ming gave another cultural talk during cake devouring.  Ming gave us a brief history of Nepal.  Where we are situated now used to be part of Tibet.

8:30 PM:  We left for our rooms.  I visited Lily for some Vaseline for my dry nose.  It really helps stop my nose from running.  We talked about the new plan and what others were feeling, but wouldn’t relate to our guides.  I took out my Diamox.  Lily said we didn’t have to take it anymore, since Diamox is for ascending altitudes and we were now descending altitudes.  Maybe now I won’t have to pee so often.  That would be so convenient.

9:00 PM:  In bed journaling with my gloves on by the light of my headlamp because the 1 watt solar powered bulb wasn’t bright enough.  Also, it was so cold; I didn’t want to get out of bed to turn off the light using the switch next to the door.