Namche Bazaar

We are spending three nights and two and a half days here at Hotel Namche, a fairly decent hotel. Namche Bazaar is actually a small city. Tibetan traders used to come here to trade goods and every week they still have a market. All kinds of stuff is brought up from Phaplu by mule trains and porters. People come from all around to stock up on supplies for their tea houses. There is an airstrip here that's not used anymore but helicopters fly in and out. No one gets supplies by helicopters because it's way too expensive.

Our rooms are not fancy but after some of the tea houses we've been in, they feel quite luxurious. We have our own bathroom and although the rooms are not heated, our beds have electric blankets. It is absolutely glorious to crawl into a nice warm bed.

On our first day here we took it very easy and walked up to have a look at the market. After that, we walked up to the Sagarmatha National Park interpretive centre. From here you can get your first glimpse of Everest but unfortunately it was covered with clouds. As I looked at the clouded Everest, I was wondering how the people who were attempting to summit it were doing. We've had a fair bit of cloud the last few days and apparently the trail to base camp got one foot of snow the other day.

After the interpretive centre, we walked to another monastery for a quick look around. Back on the main drag, we found a bakery and had a bit of lunch, then spent the rest of the afternoon and evening taking it easy.

The next day Jon, Reig and Elizabeth walked up to Everest View Hotel. This takes about 2 hours up and 2 hours down and is a good way to acclimatize. I was feeling quite unwell and so I stayed in bed. In addition to dealing with the upper respiratory tract infection and the effects of altitude, I developed tummy troubles yesterday afternoon and haven't been able to eat much. I did a little shopping for supplies we will need and had some tea and a bun in a German bakery. Go figure! They have free wi-fi so I was able to upload some blog posts. I mostly spent the day resting. After supper I took a cornucopia of drugs and crawled into my nice warm bed for more rest. Jon was asleep by 8:30 pm. Tomorrow we head to Tengboche.Read more