Today we should hit base camp. I’m writing this first bit at our lunch break (10.00) after setting off at 7.15. I am absolutely knackered and was really struggling for the last 20-30 minutes. Caught my first glimpse of Everest behind another mountain. Just a tiny glimpse. So we are at Goremshep. This is our overnight stop. After lunch we do an out and back to base camp. It’s about two hours still to go and I guess a similar amount back. I think I’ll rest well tonight.
The trip to Everest Base Camp is after “lunch”. Lunch is in inverted commas because of us having set off so early. But we're calling it lunch. thereafter it's a trek of about one hour and a half to EBC. This is on about the same altitude as Gorakshep so most of the trek is on the level. In fact there is a descent into the camp itself.
Now when we arrive there it's a bit odd. There are a bunch of tents as can probably be seen from the photos. But we don't really go into the camp itself as these are simple the tents of people about to go up. There is no coffee bar or anything similar to hang out at. What there is is a big rock with Everest Base Camp written on it and the altitude which if memory serves is 5364 meters (17598 feet). People pose at this for their photos. But there isn't really anything else to do. So we take our photos and rest. Everest itself has cloud swirling around it so I don't have the best photos. But there are a couple here which my guide Sagar took on an earlier trip.
After about 30 minutes we set out back to Gorakshep. Unsurprisingly this is the most basic of the tea huts. Room and toilet is about it.
May 12 in Nepal ⋅ ☀️ -12 °C