After Shailesh’s talk last night regarding his theories on the Yeti, we set off in brilliant sunshine again at the usual time of 8am. I was pleased to see the sign which said direction ‘Gokyo’ to the left so that we could get away from the Everest Base Camp (EBC) traffic. As we started the sharp ascent we caught our first sight of the majestic Himalayan golden eagle ‘lagmargai’. Circling at our level along the valley we got a real sense of the size and wingspan of the Himalayas’ largest and most fearsome bird with the white beak to differentiate it from the Griffon vulture we had seen yesterday.
At the top of the ascent we had mid morning tea at the Hill Top Sherpa Lodge at 3,975m before descending through the tree line down to the Phortse Tenga Lodge at roughly 3,600m where I endulged again in noodle soup with the owner’s adorable young daughter joining us at the table.
I felt overall much better today after feeling a bit ropey yesterday afternoon with the 2 hour run in hindsight perhaps a bit silly at this altitude.
Soon after lunch the weather changed quite dramatically as we ascended sharply again toward Dole at over 4,000 where we are staying for the night. We came across the usual train of yaks ferrying goods up and down the mountains (one memorable pink haired one) as well as the sherpa boys nonchalantly talking on their cell phones. This side of the valley was sheltered which meant that all the water falls were frozen. Approaching Dole and now exposed on the upper side of the valley the wind got up and it started snowing. It was here that I got the goretex jacket out for the first time of the trip arriving in Dole around 3pm.
It’s really remote here with no phone signal, practically no WiFi and minimum electricity. The killer is no hot water and that was the final excuse I needed to not put on the running shoes. The weather meant we also missed our pre dinner acclimatisation walk.
Today we only walked 9k (4 hours 40 minutes) but basically all around the 4,000m mark with 850m of climbing. The heart rate averaged around 83 per minute and my resting heart rate is around 7 clips higher than at sea level. On that there are now very few of us that are not taking Diamox. I am trying to hold off for as long as possible knowing that it will negate all the gains with being at altitude. Today I tried to focus on my glutes. With them fired up it makes the climbing so much more easy and also helps with carrying the rucksack which am guessing is 10+kgs with all my camera gear.
It’s bloody cold at night which means I am wearing both down jackets. From here it’s just going to get a damn sight higher and colder. I really hope the weather holds otherwise it’s going to be grim.
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