Yin and Yang

Tuesday 30th May, Thyangboche, 3875 MASL

After all the excitement of the last two days including the Himalaya Day celebrations in Namche, today we reverted to our trekking regime.  Distance travelled was probably in the region of 10klms, with the elapsed time of around 9 hours, allowing for tea and lunch breaks along the way, so maybe 7.5 hours on foot.  That'll do for a technical report.

The mountain gods both frowned and smiled today.  The first frown – my own silly fault – was that I clumsily dropped my camera, and have done some damage to my fancy new lens.  It’s not working properly,  and it appears not to be fixable from here, so I guess it'll have a trip to the Sony repair shop upon my return to Oz.  But mustn’t grumble; it’s not the end of the world, just rather bugging. 

The second frown was one of our number got a bit crook from altitude sickness, but thankfully some speedily administered dexis seem to have fixed that. That’s the frowns, the Yang.

The Yin was the spectacular weather we enjoyed. And therefore the views. Leaving Namche we had excellent views of the town, and as we traversed the hill behind Namche we were treated to ever improving views of the great mountains. Those of the group who had not seen Sagarmāthā/Chomolungma/Everest before were understandably quite awestruck. Even those of us who had seen it previously cannot help but be amazed by the grandeur. At each switch around the track the view of Everest, Lhotse and Ama Dablam magically improved.

It was an around, down, across and up again walk, after cro the Dudh Koshi at Phungi Thenga. The "up" component was a rather relentless challenge, but the views from. Thyangboche on arrival made it worthwhile.

And as a bonus I found a sunny spot near the Monastery from which to call home and have a long chat to Janet for the first time in a few days, which was lovely.

All of that's the Yin.

I’ll let some pictures tell a little of the scenic story, with a little commentary:

Early morning across Namche from the bedroom window

Leaving Namche

First view of Everest. Lhotse in the middle. Ama Dablam on the right

(Photo courtesy Mike Dillon)

"None shall pass ..."

Everest is of course the iconic mountain, but Ama Dablam holds a special place in my heart. Here she is in all her grandeur

Thyangboche Monastery gates

Sunset from the Monastery. Spot the big mountains.

Without in any way detracting from the simply wonderful, historic events of the last two days, or the support for the fabulous work of the AHF, it was today's walk, and the views of Ama Dablam which was my initial motivation to join this trek, and today delivered.

Tomorrow we start to sort of reverse our course, arriving back in Namche on Friday.