Everest Trek, Day 11 - Kyangama to Monjo

On Monday, April 11 in the middle of the afternoon I made it to the Mt. Everest Base Camp, along with all 13 members of our group and our guides and porters.  It was an amazing and difficult experience, so much so that I haven’t even processed it yet.  At the base camp, we all took photos and celebrated for a few minutes, I hung a prayer flag for Dunquin, and we headed back on the 2-hour trek to Gorek Shep.

Base Camp is situated in a cold, forbidding place. I am in awe of  the people who actually live there for months as they acclimatize and get ready to attempt their climbs. As it was, it was hard enough for me with the cold (ice on the inside of our bedroom windows for 5 days straight), dirty squat toilets, and long hard days of trekking. But we saw so many marvelous things, which I will write about in subsequent posts. Right now we are heading back to Lukla, so we're taking a quick break in Namche to get more money, food, etc. 

Last night we had a real treat - separate bathrooms in our rooms! With western-style flush toilets!! We felt like queens and kings. And you wouldn't believe the view from the window next to my bed. I'll post the photo later. 

So all is well. I had a 5-day headache from the altitude but that's gone now that we've dropped below 14,000 feet, my knees are sore and I've developed a sore throat. But that's pretty good, considering. Of course, I've taken more medicine (Diamox, Cipro, Advil, Immodium, and some other things I can't remember) in the past two weeks than I did in the past year.

More later!