The thing is, all this traveling isn't something I can take pride in. Well, I am proud of it, so maybe pride isn't the right word. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I had nothing to do with flying to Southeast Asia, or going to Europe. I didn't do anything to make all those experiences possible.
And for me, that's what makes my experience in Nepal so important to me. I actually had to work hard--not just sit back and look at all the sights.
In Nepal, we planned to trek to Everest Base Camp. The journey was eight days up, three days down, at higher altitudes than I had ever been before. And, to be clear, I am not an athletically inclined person. All five members of the family were coming, including my then-eleven (now twelve) year old brother. I won't deny I was incredibly anxious. For the past few weeks I had been dreading the trek, terrified I would have to stop halfway up.
We took a helicopter from Kathmandu to Lukla, a tiny village in the Himalayans and the starting point for trekkers. The airport there is dubbed "the most dangerous airport in the world," due to the slope of the single runway and the cliffs surrounding the area.
Each day we hiked through the valleys and mountains, jostled by pack animals carrying goods as we made slow and steady progress. Each night we stayed in rudimentary tea houses, in rooms without insulation, huddling in our sleeping bad cocoons.
It was the second day where we first saw Mount Everest. It was a distant mountain, nestled in a gap in the trees. I recall staring at it, still unable to really believe I was looking at the tallest mountain in the world.
I can still remember the moment I realized we had passed the tree line. The landscape was so startlingly bare, only thin scraggly bushes in place of the tall pine trees from that morning. The day after that it started snowing for the first time. We saw monuments for fallen climbers on Mount Everest. Old Buddhist prayer flags flapped in the wind, wonderfully colorful against the mist obscuring the sky.
It snowed every day after that. The landscape changed from wild-west reminiscent wasteland to large boulders dominating the landscape, crowned in soft white snow. It was much more like what I had expected it to be like in the Himalayans.
It was the eighth day that we finally arrived at Everest Base Camp. It must have been early afternoon, or perhaps very late morning. Like always, Buddhist prayer flags were strewn from boulder to boulder, pops of color in the white-grey landscape.
We snapped a few pictures, and stayed there for a little while. And I? I also ate a Mars Bar. Just because. I mean, when was I going to come here again?
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| The five of us at Everest Base Camp! The two other men, one in front, and one on the right, were our guides. |
The trek to Everest base Camp is something I'm proud of, and something I feel like I have the right to be proud of. We hiked in high altitude, often uphill. One day alone we walked fifteen miles. I'm happy I did it, even if, honestly, I was terrified.
