Day 10: Gorak Shep to Everest Base Camp to Gorak Shep

The trek to Everest Base Camp was no where near as lame or boring as we were led to believe. It was not an anticlimax in any way. Perhaps this was due to the heavy dump of snow that had left everything in brilliant white. The trek there took nearly 2.5 hours and travelled along the lateral moraine of the Khumbu Glacier.

Just as we were about to cross the glacier we looked up and realized that we had to cross a section of track about 100m long that passed under some incredibly overhung rocks about 30m above us. Right before our eyes rocks were tumbling down the slope, one of them was as big as a television. Some of the rocks at the top were the size of small houses and though they may well have been secure we had no way of knowing. We plucked up the courage and dashed through this "kill zone" as fast as our altitude effected lungs could take us... Thankfully making it through with no injury (or death).

We then set across the glacier taking time to look at the beautiful lakes and deep crevasses that were scattered along it and then we reached the prayer flags that symbolised "Everest Base Camp". Many people don't know this but there are actually two base camps, one is for the day trekkers and one is for the actual expedition teams that are climbing Everest.

On account of the heavy snow all expeditions had pulled out of the climbers camp except one, the Korean Expedition. They would not let the snow defeat them and were determined to make a summit attempt. As there was no one around to object we trekked the extra 300m and took some photos around the real Base Camp and the awesome views of the Khumbu Icefall before heading for home.

We again had to cross the "kill zone" which we again managed without incident. The walk back to Gorak Shep was nice and easy and took around 1 hour.

Anyone who comes up this far and skips Base Camp is making a huge mistake in my opinion, it was one of my favourite things so far.

Day 9: Lobuche to Gorak Shep to Kala Pattar to Gorak Shep

We set off early for Gorak Shep, the highest camping site for our trip, as we had heard that accomodation was hard to get. Unfortunately it seems that we were not the only ones to think of this and along the way we must have passed over 100 trekkers, Sherpa's and porters. We followed the lateral moraine of the Khumbu Glacier all the way up the valley.  We were  pretty fast and got into Gorak Shep before most but still had some difficulty securing accomodation (which we eventually managed for 300/- per night).

Gorak Shep is the last town before Everest Base Camp and is located right at the foot of Kala Pattar. There are perhaps 7 buildings in the town all together and one gets a sense that no one wants to be here for too long.

We got in around 10am and made plans to head up Kala Pattar (5550m) for what would probably be our best views of Everest. Before heading off we sat up on the helicopter pad that over looked the town and Khumbu Glacier and had a nice relaxing time. We saw some beautiful native fowl which were not afraid of us at all and also got an amazing view of an avalanche some 5km away.

After lunch we started off for Kala Pattar and I must say that it was one of the hardest treks we have done so far. The heavy snow fall had left the path covered with ice and snow and there were several times where we slipped and nearly fell. After a very difficult almost 2 hour trek we reached the top, marked by a huge assortment of Buddhist prayer flags, and what an amazing view we had!

The sky was cloudless and blue and Everest could be seen in all her ugly glory. We were treated to views over the back of Kala Pattar of blue glacial lakes and pristine snowy mountains. We witnessed a massive avalanche down the face of Nuptse and were kept company by some native birds that were so fearless they were almost eating out of our hands. Ama Dablam stood strong and high way off in the distance, it was amazing to think that only 2 days ago we had been standing at its base. The view of the Khumbu Glacier was like no other and we were in awe of its brutal power, pushing aside mountains to get where it wanted to go.

We stayed up on the mountain for the sunset where we were treated to an amazing view. Everest and the surrounding mountains slowly went from brilliant white to an amazing orange as the sky changed from blue to purple to grey. Clouds crept up the valley way below us and the entire view was just incredible. The temperature dropped suddenly below freezing and as we made our way down by the light of our head torches over slippery ice and snow we couldn't help but be amazed at what we had seen.

When we arrived back to Gorak Shep we were covered with ice and as we entered exhausted into our room we realised that it would give us no comfort as temperatures inside were close to -10 degrees.