I was hanging around Kathmandu for about a month before heading out to hike to Everest. The month was spent meeting new friends from my hostel, wandering the city, and rock climbing at a nearby gym.

The normal way to start the Everest base camp trail is to fly into Lukla, but I opted to start the trail by land. I took an 8 hr jeep ride from Kathmandu to Phaplu. The village was small and quaint.

Then next day, I took another jeep, 6 hr ride, which was supposed to take me to where the road ends in Paiya, but the road was blocked by rocks. It looked liked they were blasting the cliff sides, perhaps as a kind of avalanche control, thus starting my hike earlier than anticipated. That first day of hiking ended at Surke. The next day I hiked till Phakding, then to Monjo. Typically, people will hike from Phakding to Namche in one day, which is a bit farther than Monjo, but my backpack’s weight was starting to take a toll and I had an additional day before I had to be in Namche to meet up with a friend.
The hiking up to this point was slowly gaining in altitude. There were many lodges (tea shops) and restaurants along the way. The path was shared with groups of donkeys transporting goods up the mountain. The donkeys follow an alpha leader.
The hiking was lovely. There were sites of clean rivers, waterfalls, bridges, and Tibetan text etched into boulders and mounds of stone tablets.

After spending the night in Monjo, I hiked a steep 3-hour uphill trek that lead to Namche. I would say this was one of the hardest parts of the trek, but I think that’s only relative to what was prior to this part of the trail. The rest of the trail was arduous as well, just in a different way.
Namche was a surprising town. At this point, being so far along in the trail, I expected the villages to get smaller, but Namche was actually a bigger town than the previous villages. It had a grand entrance with a fountain, multiple giant prayer wheels being spun by a stream, and a stupa. The town had upscale lodges, restaurants, and shops. I met up with Udaya and his expedition team here. Udaya’s goal was to summit Everest.

While on the Everest base camp trail, you have to stop a day to acclimatize in two places. Namche was the first. During this “rest” day, we hiked up to an Everest view point. Everest is the mountain in the middle. It is not easy to view as it is surrounded by other mountains.

The next stop was Deboche. Just before hitting Deboche, we passed an intriguing monastery at Tengboche. I’d come back later to explore. The forest at Deboche was just lovely. It reminded me of the moss forest over at Therapati, the kind that grows around 3600m altitude, magical!

After Deboche, we headed to Dingboche. We spend another acclimatizing day here. During this “rest” day, we hiked up to get a view of the surrounding the mountains. The views here seemed to just go on and on.

Our next stop was Lobuche. Arriving in Lobuche, I began to experience my first signs of difficulty with the altitude. My chest felt tight. It could have been because I tightened the straps on my backpack too much, whatever the case, the discomfort subsided within a few hours.

The next day, we arrived at the Everest base camp. On the way we past Gorkshep, the last village before hitting the base camp. It was really incredible to be able to spend a night at the base camp and to be able to meditate the next morning in front of the literal highest form of relative wisdom on earth. It was quite a powerful experience.

Before leaving, I asked a Sherpa to take me across a glacier to a mountain just in front of Everest to make an offering. I once heard from a shaman in Ecuador, that when in the presence of a holy mountain, we should offer chocolate.

I left Udaya at the Everest base camp to prepare for his expedition as I set out back down the mountain, alone once again. The way down was a kind of literal decompression. The hike up after Namche was so intense and fast, keeping up with pace of the expedition group. I was glad to be able to trek down at my own pace. I spent a bit of time at the lovely Deboche forest and visited the monastery at Tengboche. The decompression was really quite powerful. Its hard to put into words. I felt like I underestimated the rigor of this journey at the onset, and now that I was on my way back down, it was like something was catching up with me. It was definitely an emotional trip back down. I don’t think there can be a separation between the physical and psychological. In a way I felt like what I was seeing on the way down was looked upon with new eyes. Three days after leaving the base camp, I made it down to Surke. After that I took a jeep to Salleri. It was good to be back in a place that wasn’t so remote. While there I saw an ayami chicken! I’m beginning to think with all the sightings of this bird on my journeys, it’s my spirit animal.

The next day I made it back to Kathmandu. The trip took 15 days, although time had a kind of non-existent quality while on the hike. I was glad to have the comforts of my being at my hostel again. I feel like if I said, “This was the hardest thing I’d ever done.” it would feel a bit contrived and tawdry, so instead I’ll just say, “That was quite a journey.”