Everest Trek - Day 4

Day 4 - Let the suffering commence!

Runway on Lukla

Ian looks out the cockpit window of the twin otter plane twin proppeller plane. The runway is in full view of and covers the whole window. That usually doesn't happen when you're about to land. A huge "thunk" and jostle and the plane lands.

The flight in, you fly through the valley of the khumbu glacier melt, which comes from Everest. On one side you can see the bottom of the valley, the other, the mountain wall of some snow capped Peak.

Lukla. The worlds most dangerous runway. The biggest planes are twin engines that can fit on the run way. The runway sits on a 11 degree incline and its very short. The way the plane takes off is pretty much dive bombing down the end of the runway. We land and use the uphill incline to slowdown and stop.

The valley heading up

We get our packs and follow Pema. This route is actually more popular than originally thought. But most people are only going as far as namche bazaar. Few make it to base camp and even less go to Lobuche.  We also meet our porters for the first time. We have two porters, one for each of our packs. They're to carry our food, tent, kitchen and more climbing equipment later on. Our packs together already total 40 kgs. Were expecting to meet up with our climbing guide and cook later on when we get closer to lobuche. What logistics to get 2 people up a peak! We eat a simple egg breakfast and start our trek!

Half way through the hike, we realize Christa'as hiking shoes decided to die on her. The soles literally ripped apart. And then even more a little further down the road. It was fixed temporarily by tying a hair band around the shoe. We jimmied it at night so hopefully we can get to our next destination to get shoes.
Ian's stomach bug loves his bum. He left in the morning realizing there is something still brewing inside. Time to call the insurance! Lets hope it works out.

We get into our first stop and stay in a tea house. There a so many tea houses along the way its ridiculous. We wouldn't have to bring anything! Along this route, its so based on trekker tourism that everything is catered toward that. We have dinner at the same place. There really isn't much option otherwise as far as food goes.

The tea house is basic, 2 beds with shared washroom. You have to pay for hot water shower and for electricity to charge your phones and what not. Luckily, we have our solar charger so we don't need it... yet.
After dinner at 8 everything shuts down and everyone goes to bed.  Its party central here! Good first day of actual hiking.

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