Trip Reports

High Passes to Everest - 1 to 24 May '09

Written by Leader Alun Richardson, May 2009

Mount Everest is the highest mountain on the earth’s surface. This fact alone is enough to encourage trekkers to walk for almost two weeks to glimpse a view of it. However the trek to Everest Base Camp is more than just Everest. There is the wildlife, the other beautiful mountains such as Ama Dablam and Pumori and of course the warm and welcoming Nepali and Sherpa people with their confusing mixture of Hindu and Buddhist religions. It is a fantastic journey even when the sky is full of the pre monsoon clouds.

The flight into the mountains literally took some peoples breath away as we bounced off the Gods to land on Lukla’s mountainside airstrip - we were safe but it had been an exciting ride.

A continual mixture of snow, cloud and sun were to be the order of the day on this trip, but it only added to the adventure as the clouds frequently parted and the mountains found a way to peak dramatically through. The more remote ‘High passes trek’ is harder work, but it has the advantage that it escapes the multitude of trekkers winding their way up the standard route. It finds its way over two 5000m passes with great views to rejoin the normal route just below Gorak Shep.

The route to the first pass from Namche followed a pine and rhodendron forest and takes you through Thame, the home of Sherpa Tenzing and the Guinness book of records multi summit Sherpa Ang Pemba (19 ascents!). We found time along the route to visit a small primary school and talk to the teachers about education in Nepal. Kids are the same the world over and took the opportunity to lark about behind their teacher as we took photos. On our acclimatisation day at Thame we visited the local monastery and listened to the horns and drums that accompany the monks prayers.

There is one high camp on this trip at Lungden just below the Renjo La col, but it is in a stunning location and well worth the extra hardship. Our first view of Everest came at the Renjo la pass just as a small cloud hitched itself to the summit like a Buddhist prayer flag flying in the wind. We sat for an hour talking about the early ascents and how close climbers had come before Hillary and Tensing eventually took the honours and stood on its summit. We then wound our way down the old trading route to Gokyo lakes imagining the hardships of the early Sherpa peoples who travelled from the east over these passes to inhabit the Khumbu Region (Sherpa or Sharwa nmeans ‘from the east’).

Unfortunately snow thwarted our crossing over the second ‘Cho La’ pass and we scuttled round to rejoin the normal route. We crossed bridges over the Boht Khosi and Duhd Khosi rivers, passed Mani stones and prayer flags, traders and tourists, mules and Yaks as we wound our way to Gorak shep. We had a wildlife show on each day as Lammergeyer vultures, Blue sheep, choughs, and other birds put on a display for us.

Kala patar didn’t dissapoint and just as we thought the clouds were going to keep Everest hidden they parted and revealed the king of mountains towering above its neighbours. We could only guess where the climbers were on their crawl to the summit but as we finished our trek we heard that Adele and her team had in fact reached the top and we may have even seen them on the top!

Quote of the trip “ Cricket – is that the game you play on horses” from a Canadian team member.

Alun Richardson, Trek Leader

For images of the trip (available August) go to www.freedomphotographs.co.uk « Previous report | Next report »

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