Namche Bazaar to Tengboche

Had a bit of a shock when we paid our bill at Moonlight Lodge, turns out there's a marked inflation in hot water prices between Phakding and Namche. Better to have learnt that lesson earlier rather than later though - from now we decided to break into our Aquatabs water purification tablets, which continued to serve us very well for the rest of the trip.

'Garlic toast'

After a hearty breakfast, including James' garlic toast (yes, it really was just a few cloves of raw garlic smeared on marginally buttered toast), we headed off to our next destination, Tengboche. The morning saw probably the only cloud we would encounter for the rest of the trek, causing us to fumble for our cameras every time a teasing view of Everest was briefly unveiled at every turn.

Ama Dablam peeking out of the morning mist

Descending toward our lunch spot was a mixed blessing, as we knew we'd have to make up for all the lost altitude (and then some) later in the day. Seeing the zig-zagging path on the other side of the valley also brought a certain level of dread, but at least it would be no worse than the climb up to Namche the day before yesterday, we thought.

Crossing more bridges

At lunch we had our first food fail, a 'macaroni with tomato sauce' served by the slowest kitchen ever. This consisted of some sad looking pasta served with an alien, pinkish sauce which bore no resemblance to real tomatoes whatsoever. Even after a liberal dose of ketchup and chilli sauce, it was still barely palatable and we left Mark to force down most of it while we stuck to the other dishes.

Waiting for lunch

At least there was some amusement in the form two cute grey kittens, one of which was particularly fond of jumping on our guide (who did not share the kitten's affections).

What a cutie!

After lunch came the dreaded climb, and while it was fairly slow going we made good pace and even managed to pass another group, reaching Tengboche in 1.5 hours - and feeling a lot better than we did when we arrived at Namche!

Our first view of Everest from Namche

We checked out the famous monastery, though unfortunately as it was heading into winter there was only one monk on duty and no chanting to watch. The richly decorated prayer room was still very worthwhile to see though.

Heading into Tengboche monastary

The richly decorated insides

As we huddled around the fire waiting for dinnertime, we finally decided to be a bit more sociable and start chatting to our fellow travellers. There was a Dutch couple who had been pretty much staying at exactly the same places as us the entire way so far, and we discovered it was actually their first trip abroad and first trekking trip, ever. Nuts! There was also a big Singaporean group doing the walk, one of whom was a piano tuner. Apparently it's a lucrative trade in the small island nation, as pianos require tuning every 6 months due to the climate (usually it's a year), plus it's not hard to imagine the multitude of little Asian kids toiling away at the keyboard for hours on end...

Seems to be a given that if you look out the window anywhere, you get an awesome view

Tomorrow, another short-ish day and then off to Dingboche!

Phakding to Namche Bazaar

The morning portion of our second day of walking was fairly easy, but it was a completely different story after lunch - a constant slog up the hill for about two hours which had us seriously out of breath after each zig and zag. At least we were eventually finally rewarded with our first view of Everest, and when we saw the first signs saying 'Namche Bazaar' we breathed a sigh of relief.

Finally reached Namche Bazaar

Prematurely though, as it turned out there was yet another 130m of punishing climbing through the steep steps of the town before finally reaching our stop for the night - Moonlight Lodge. The last 50m were probably the hardest and even once we were in the hostel, even climbing two flights of stairs to get from the entrance to our rooms was nearly all too much.

Hard to get a better town view than this

Fortunately we were able to rest for the rest of the day and amused ourselves with a retro Monopoly set which was available in the common area.

The common area in Moonlight Lodge

The next morning we were all to happy to have a rest day, apart from a short trudge up the hill to visit the local museum, take some more photos of Everest, and a visit to the town proper which we pretty much ignored the day before in our efforts to just get the walking over and done with.

Shops in Namche

As promised, Namche has everything a trekker needs, from official North Face outlets (accordingly priced), to Irish Pubs, it was by far the most developed settlement we came across in the entire walk. Plenty of souvenir shops abounded as well, with the usual knitted animal hats and yak wool scarves. Prices varied greatly from store to store and we mostly refrained from purchasing anything. No doubt the find of the day were Snickers Crunchers, a favourite of James' and not commonly seen anymore elsewhere.

Probably one of the best things about the whole trek were the consistently amazing views we'd get from whatever place we were staying at, and usually from our rooms themselves too - something which definitely helped us get over the freezing cold temperatures!

The view from our room in the morning