HIGHER and HIGHER

Fifth day of the Everest Base Camp Trekking. Today it was an other day of trekking. We left Tengboche (3,900 meters) and after 4 hours trekking we got to Dingboche (4,400 meters). An other couple of days of trekking and we will be at the Everest Base Camp. We don't have yet any altitude sickness symptoms. And this is really good. When I left for this trekking this was my major concern, and so far, no problem. So we had a good time and we enjoyed the beatiful scenery of the Himalaya mountains, even if the sky was a little bit cloudy. This is the sky in the morning ...

... and these are some of the pictures that I took along the trail. The villages are becoming more and more scarse. But the mountains are getting closer and closer every day we hike. And it is amazing when you think that you are trekking at those altitudes ...

ABOVE the TREE LINE

Fourth day of the Everest Base Camp trekking. After a couple of days it is time to leave Namche Bazaar. We did a pretty steep hike from Namche Bazaar (3,400 meters) to Tengboche (3,900 meters). The tree line here in the Himalaya is around 4,000 meters. And we are going to see it today. After the tree line landscape everything changes. People is living and working here for the pure support to the trekkers. There are very little kids playing around. We started our trek almost in the dark. Kind of chilly. But this is the sunrise that finally started to warm us up a little ...

... and these are other pictures that I took during the 4 hours trekking. Mountains, yaks and of course the wonderful Sherpa people who is living here ...And finally we got to our destination. Tengboche. It is really a very small village. Actually it is a big Gompa (Busshist monastery) with four tea houses close by. And a wonderful viewpoint for the highest peaks of the Himalaya. The Gompa is the biggest in Nepal, but still not that big. We also attended the daily celebration ...And these are all the wonderful mountains that you can see from this little spot lost in the Himalayas. The first peak in the background is the Everest. In the second picture there is Ama Dablam. The third picture is the yard of the monastery ...I realize only now how much I am missing these mountains. Those mountains really touched my heart. Really a wonderful feeling.

NAMCHE BAZZAR

Still here in Namche Bazaar after the early morning acclimatization trek, I went to discover the village. This is the biggest village that we will found on the way to Everest. And it is also the capital of the Sherpa region. If you are coming from the rich Western World, you will find that the village is poor. But you have to think that this is still the richest in the mountain. All the trekkers stop here for acclimatization, and they spend some of their money, making the village pretty rich, compare to its neighbour villages ...So let's start from my bedroom in the teahouse. Here it is. Very tiny and very basic. And very much in the mountain style. I am so glad that I brought my sleeping bag ... :) ...It is a mountain village, but it is very different from the ones I am used to visit in Europe or in US. Of course there are no cars, no motorcycles and no bicycles here. You can only walk around, or try to ride a yak. And the yaks, provide also the fuel for the stoves. But before it can be used it has to dry a little ...But of course the best part of Namche Bazaar is its people. This is Tenzing the only monk who lives in the local Buddhist Gompa (monastery). Although he doesn't speak neither Italian nor English (and I don't speak Nepali) we managed to communicate. He was really nice and he show me all the Gompa. Here some pictures ...And this is the local post office. So different from a USPS post office, actually it doesn't look as a post office at all. It is a one man - one room business, but still the letter that I sent from here was eventually received. I guess it had to be carried downhill with a yak. Everything for 30 Nepali Rupees, 50 US cents. Pretty amazing. But maybe not. The beauty of this trip is also the fact that I see such a different lifestyle. But still people live here, have a home, have a job and is happy and kids go to school. It makes me think. It makes me realize that our lifestyle is not the only possible. Meeting this people I had the serious feeling that this people is much happier than the people that I see everyday in my city.

EVEREST

Third day of the Everest Base Camp trekking. And first day of altitude acclimatization for us. Above 2,500meters the lack of oxygen is really a problem. The more we go up and the less oxygen we will have in the air. Just to give an idea, at the highest point of this trekking (i.e. 5,600 meters) we will have only 50% of the oxygen that we have at sea level, and if we will try to climb the Everest on the summit (i.e. 8,850 meters) we will find just 30% of the sea level oxygen. Pretty crazy. That is why you need to give to your body the time to adapt. A good way to do it is to have acclimatization days. In the acclimatization days the golden rule is "hike high and sleep low". This is exactly what we are doing today. We will hike from Namche Bazaar (3,400 meters) to an Everest View point to 3,900 meters and we will go back to Namche Bazaar again to sleep. And yes, if the weather we will be clear, we will see the Everest! And judging from the sunrise, today will be an other clear day. This is the view from my room ...These are some pictures that I took during the trekking ...And this is finally the Everest. It is the highest peak in the middle of these pictures. It is still in the background, but there it is ...Everest official name in Nepal is Sagarmatha, and it means "head of the sky". Everest is the name that the English explorers gave to the mountains in 1865, when they discovered that that was the highest peak in the entire World. But funny enough the official Nepali name was given to the mountain only in 1956, 3 years after the Sherpa Tanzin Sir. Hillary summit it. Of course the Sherpas (i.e. local people living in the mountains) had a name well before the English and the Nepali. The name is Jomo Miyo Lang Sangma, and it is the name of the Goddess who lives in the mountain ...

VIEW of the HIMALAYA

Second day of the Everest Base Camp trekking, and we finally saw some of the wonderful Himalaya mountains. Yesterday it was a kind of cloudy, so we didn't have much of a chance to see them. This is the view from our teahouse (e.g. Himalayan hotels on the trekking routes) room in the morning, outside the room and inside the room ...... the one outside is definitely better. Ehehehe. And these are some of the mountains that we saw during the trekking. Very nice mountains. But also very steep paths, especially for the poor Sherpas. I am wondering how they can do this job. I can't really believe that these guys are doing this work up and down all year round. Curved under that weight, they can't even enjoy the view. And you should see their "equipment". These guys are able to trekk to the Everest Base Camp in flip flop ...But we saw also more beauties during our trip, here a very small collections of the pictures that I took, just to give you an idea ... The gate in the picture where I am standing is the entrance of the Everest National Park. Finally we are in ...... the trek was pretty steep. In less than 5 hours we went from Phakding (2,800 meters) to Namche Bazaar (4,200 meters). Namche is the capital of the Sherpa community, and it is just above the tree live (4,000 meters). Very lively village, but we will have more time to explore it tomorrow. For now, I tried to adapt myself to the local culture and I did some of my laundry at the local fountain. Very interesting to check how the local people steer at me. I guess they are not used to see foreigners to make the laundry there ...