My new favorite restaurant

On the trail I ate almost entirely vegetarian. I ate a ton of vegetarian food, but still managed to lose weight. So to fatten up for the next trek I've been eating every day at the Everest Steak House in Pokhara. The original, which I didn't visit, is in Kathmandu. I wish I had. Look at this:



They have 28 types of steak. You get two huge hunks on a sizzling metal plate with fries and veg. Wash it all down with a bottle of cold Everest beer for a grand total of about six bucks. It's the best steak I've ever had, which is odd, since this is primarily a Hindu country. Cows are sacred to Hindus. In fact, I found it pretty hilarious that I was eating a steak while watching traffic go around a cow that had decided to rest in the middle of the street.

I asked how they were able to serve such wonderful steak in an area where cows are considered sacred. I was told the meat is imported daily from Calcutta. In India. Another Hindu country. So now I'm even more confused ... Seriously, though, because the country is so geared towards tourism you can get a reasonable interpretation of your national specialty here, no matter where you're from.

Here's a better look at the beer bottle, which has the Coolest Label Ever:



It's the famous picture of Tenzing Norgay from the first ascent in 1953. In the western world, for decades, it was said that Sir Edmund Hillary was the first man to climb the world's highest mountain. The fact that he had a partner was rarely mentioned.

Much like Matthew Henson, the African-American who actually planted the American flag when Robert Peary's expedition reached the North Pole for the first time in 1909, Tenzing was a brown person, and so at that point in history he simply didn't count in the western world.

Incidentally, there are no pictures of Hillary on the summit because Tenzing didn't know how to use a camera. Oops! I can't belive that didn't come up in conversation all those weeks when they were preparing and climbing. Try to imagine the conversation of the summit. "Ok, that's good. Now you take a picture of me ... You WHAT?!

Actually, Hillary was quoted late in life, with his usual good humor, as saying "Tenzing did not know how to operate the camera and the top of Everest was no place to start teaching him how to use it." The deep and abiding friendship and respect the two men had for each other is that for most of their lives they refused to say who set foot on the summit first. They did it together. That was their story and they stuck to it until late in life when Tenzing divulged that Hillary was the first.

The Nepalese have a deep and genuine affection for Sir Edmund, and with good reason. He spent the rest of his life using his fame and notoriety to help the Nepalese people through the Himalayan Trust, which he founded. The Lukla airport, site of the recent crash, was originally built to help transport materials for the building of hospitals and schools.

I saw the first school he built, in Khumjung, which also has a monastery famous for having what it claims to be the scalp of a yeti.



Don't laugh. Most of the "evidence" of yetis comes from serious mountaineers. The first yeti prints were taken on Eric Shipton's failed Everest expedition in 1951, which Hillary was actually a member of. Reinhold Messner, the greatest mountaineer of all time, claims to have seen a yet and wrote a book about it called "My Quest for the Yeti".

I slept twice in the village of Machhermo, site of the most credible account of a yeti. In 1974 a young girl was abducted (but managed to escape) a yeti and three yaks were killed. Most of this can be explained, of course, but I haven't heard a decent explanation of how the yaks ended up with broken spines.

In "The Snow Leopard", Peter Matthiessen's account of a trek he made to the remote Inner Dolpo region and simply one of the best books ever written, the author's companion is George Schaller, one of the world's most esteemed field biologists. Schaller thinks the existence of a yeti is entirely possible. After all, Matthiessen named the book after the animal he hoped to see on the trip, but never did. People spend years in the mountains looking for the snow leopard without ever seeing one. The elusiveness of the yeti, then, is not necessarily evidence that it doesn't exist.

Just last week a Japanese expedition on Dhaulagiri, a mountain I can see from my guest house when the sky is clear, took photos of what they claim are yeti footprints.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/21/nepal-japan

But Sir Edmund himself sent this scalp to the US, where it was determined it was made from the pelt of a serow, a goat-like Himalayan antelope. He and Tenzing reported seeing giant footprints when they scaled Everest, but as they grew older they both became more skeptical.

Aside from that one macabre piece of decor the monastery is pretty and cozy.



They use the scalp as a means to solicit donations from the steady stream of tourists that come through every day. More power to them.

Abode of Snow

In Sanskrit, hima means "snow" and alaya means "abode". So the translation of Himalaya actually has a ring to it in English!

I did a 16-day hike through the Everest region of the Himalayas. There were six hikers in our group, plus three guides and three porters. Because of the thin air, the bright glare of the light and the sheer magnitude of the scenery it's hard for a point-and-click photographer like myself to take decent photos. I took nearly 1,000, and they're going to require a lot of Photoshop magic. But you get the idea.

There was just too much to see and talk about in a blog post!

We flew from Kathmandu into Lukla, the airport where the fatal crash was a few days ago, then hiked on from there. I already posted a pic from the second day of the trip, when I got my first view of Everest from the ground. We spent the next two nights after that in Namche Bazar, one of the bigger towns in the region despite the fact it looks like it was nailed to the side of a hill.

This is the view from my window at the Moonlight Lodge.



And this is a picture looking down on the town during a day hike we did to acclimatize. Because it's at the confluence of two rivers, the Bhote Kosi and Dudh Kosi, this was considered a good place to build a city.



Namche is listed at 3,440 meters, although there's a quite a bit of altitude difference between the and bottom! (I'm trying to learn to think in meters since everyone else in the world does. I'm too lazy to do the conversions so multiply all the numbers by 3.3 to get the number of feet.) The town ends abruptly at a cliff that drops down to the Bhote Kosi river, with Kwangde (6,187 meters) looming on the other side.

We did see some rain but on the days we really wanted good weather we got it, like the day we did the hike from Namche. Just at the top of the hill we got a glorious view of three of the world's most famous mountains. On the right is Ama Dablam, then Lhotse in the center then the big guy himself.



To get an idea of how the skewed the sense of space and dimension is, consider that Ama Dablam is a mighty 6,856 meters. But it's nearly 2,000 meters shorter than Everest (8,850). They look like they're sitting nearly side-by-side but Everest is a 1.25 miles higher than Ama Dablam.

Everest is a big, hulking brute of a mountain. It's famous blunt summit looks like a boxer's nose. Although it's much shorter, Ama Dablam is a much more beautiful mountain. It almost looks sculpted.

The Everest region basically looks like the letter Y. From the Namche area (behind me in this photo) you make a hard left to get to Gokyo Ri. The valley on the right side leads to Kala Patthar and Everest itself.



The town in the center of the picture is Phortse Tenga, which is on the other side of the river, and which we would hike through several days later. The plan was to climb Gokyo Ri, then cross a pass called Cho La to get to the other side, and then climb Kala Patthar and visit Everest Base Camp (EBC).

Cho La is scary and dangerous under the best of conditions -- a hiker died there three days before we were scheduled to climb it -- so we decided to skip it and instead walk all the way back down and up.

My Lonely Planet travel book has a section in the front where the authors talk about their favorite trip within the country. One author wrote his "second favourite was watching people see Cho La for the first time -- everyone without exception responding with a squint and an appalled look on their faces. 'Up there?! You've got to be ****ing kidding me!!'" (His italics, not mine.) So I wasn't sorry to skip it.

I did the hike specifically for the view from Kala Patthar, but I decided to do this particular hike because it also went to Gokyo Ri. The scenery there was supposed to be fantastic.

I simply can't imagine a more spectacular place.



In this photo are two of the five bright turquoise glacial lakes (they really are that color), the tiny of town of Gokyo and the Ngozumpa Glacier, Nepal's biggest. The tip of Ama Dablam is visible in the far distance, about a third of the way from the left side of the photo. And in the center a U-shaped dip in the clouds -- Cho La.

Oh, but the really good stuff is in the other direction. Not only can you see Everest, but you can also see the fourth-, fifth- and sixth-highest mountains in the world: Lhotse, Makalu and Cho Oyu. (I believe Makalu is the peak just to the left of Ama Dablam in the above photo.) There are only fourteen 8,000-meter peaks in the world and here you can see four of them!

In this picture you can't see any of them, but you can see Gyachung Kang, which is the world's 16th-highest mountain but just misses the prestigious 8,000-meter cut (7,897). Beneath me is the glacier and, yeah, it's a pretty scary drop.



The hike to the 5,357-meter summit was a killer, partly because the mountain looks so plain. It looks like a big, round hill. But it's quite steep, and there are no real landmarks, so it's just and endless series of switchbacks over monotonous terrain. Doesn't look like much, does it.



In the foreground you can see someone drying yak dung into patties. Because most of the region is a national park, cutting of trees is forbidden. In many places there are no trees, anyway. Dung is a common and surprisingly efficient source of fuel. In a harsh environment, you use what you have. People would go down the trails and collect dung left behind by yak herds. We'd see them walking with their big baskets strapped to their backs, full of poop.

The Himalayas are a relatively new geological phenomenon, and the growing pains are evident everywhere. You can't really see it, but scientists say Everest is moving about 6 cm northeast every year. The evening before I climbed Gokyo Ri (the mountain) I climbed the ridge separating Gokyo (the town) from the glacier. In the distance I could hear avalanches or landslides.

I walked along the ridge towards Cho Oyu as the sun was setting. The top of the glacier, at the foot of the mountain, had been melting in the sunlight all day. The cracks and booms of the splitting ice sounded like a battle in the distance.

On the right is the glacier, which does a hard right turn around the gray, rocky hill on the right. The ridge is on the left side of the photo. In the center is Cho Oyu, considered to be the easiest 8,000-meter peak to climb, which is like saying it's the easiest alligator to wrestle. And on the other side is Tibet.



So we zipped down one side of the Y and back up the other to the village of Gorak Shep, the jumping-off point for Kala Patthar and EBC. By this time two people in our group had split off because they were doing a shorter version of the hike. I ended up climbing Kala Patthar by myself.

This is the sun rising behind Nuptse.



This is why you climb Kala Patthar: An unobstructed view of the world's highest mountain.



And this is looking down on Everest Base Camp. In the center, just to the left of the glacier, colored tents are barely visible.



To put the extreme terrain in perspective, consider that EBC is at roughly 5,360 meters, or 17,688 feet. The highest point in the Rocky Mountains is 14,440 feet, more than half a mile lower than the bottom of Everest.

Put it another way. One of the goals of serious mountaineers is to climb the Seven Summits, the highest mountain on each continent. The second-highest of the Seven Summits is Aconcagua, in Argentina. There are 23 mountains in Nepal higher than Aconcagua.

And this is Kala Patthar.



No, not the majestic, snow-capped peak. That's Pumori (7,145). Kala Patthar is the lump in the foreground. Like Gokyo Ri, it's not much to look at, and probably wouldn't even be mentioned on a map if the views from the top weren't so fantastic.

The Tibetan name for the mountain is usually transliterated as Chomolungma, the name of the goddess who lives on the mountain. Oddly, there was no name in Nepali for the mountain, so in 1956 it was christened Sagarmatha, "head of the sky". Well, it sounds nice in Nepali...

The English name was given by British Colonel Andrew Waugh, the surveyor general of India, in honor of his predecessor, Sir George Everest. I haven't been able to find out for sure one way or another, but it doesn't appear Sir George every actually saw the mountain! It's not as bad as naming two continents after an obscure Italian explorer, but it's pretty high up there on the list of cool things named after people who really didn't deserve it.

However, the name does fit. "Ever" implies timelessness, and "est" is a suffix used to express a superlative. I guess we should be thankful Sir George's last name wasn't Klunk or Flatt.

Oddly enough, there is no agreement on how high Everest is. Nepal officially considers it to be 8,848 meters but most of the world agrees it's 8,500.

I didn't actually make it to EBC. I made it down to the Khumbu Glacier, but then a snowstorm blew in. I wasn't prepared. And EBC really isn't much to see. It's just a bunch of tents. And due to q quirk in the geography, you can't see the summit from EBC because what's called the West Shoulder blocks the view. It was a disappointment, but Kala Patthar was the real reason I did the hike.

The hike back took us through Tengboche, famous for its monastery, and its views. In the bottom right-hand corner is an internet cafe. On the top left is the trail we took to get to Kala Patthar, and on the bottom left is the trail we took on the way back. It was really cloudy, so we only had glimpses of Ama Dablam through the clouds on the right. But the center of the view magically opened up long enough for me to take a photo of Everest and Lhotse.



I could go on and on. So I'll add one more pic and end the post. In a village called Pangboche we at the Everest View Lodge. This was the view from my window.



(Seriously, though, in the morning we could see it, and Ama Dablam was right there.) Ok, then, one more.

Self-portrait, Kala Patthar

I'm back in Namche Bazar after hiking around the Himalayas. I just had my first hot shower and cold (well, lukewarm) beer in about two weeks! Yippee! I am as sore and tired as I have been in a long, long time. But, oh, the things I've seen...

This is me yesterday on the summit of Kala Patthar. It's an ugly little lump in the midst of otherwise spectacular Himalayan peaks, and "only" 5,545 metres (18,192 ft) high. That's over two miles shorter (that's two miles straight up) than its most famous neighbor. But what this otherwise unremarkable mountain can boast is the best unobstructed view of Everest, seen here with a wispy cloud halo.



The peak just behind my head is Nuptse. In the bottom center is the Khumbu Glacier. To the left is the Khumbu Ice Falls. Just off-camera to the left is Everest Base Camp. Climbers go up the Ice Falls through the gap between Nuptse and Everest to the ridge in the center of the picture, then up to the summit on the other side.

I have now seen Everest from just about every angle except one: the summit. And I never will. Climbing little Kala Patthar was about as much as I could handle!

I'll be back in Kathmandu in two days. At some point thereafter I'll post more pix when I have a cheaper and quicker connection.

Mt Everest, Part II

Yes, I'm on the internet in the Himalayas. And the connection is good enough for me to upload a couple pix. I was looking forward to being offline for a few weeks but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to see how Lindsay is recovering from heart surgery. (No new updates, so I'm hoping no news is good news and that she's up and walking now.)

I'm on day two of my Everest Base Camp trek. Today we hiked to Namche Bazar, a town built almost literally on the edge of an 11,000 foot cliff. Clouds have rolled in, but I can't wait to see the view in the morning. The first day of the trek was miserable. Rain all day, muddy trails. The scenery was awesome but in a spooky, gothic sort of way.

I woke up this morning to this.



There was a 6,000-meter peak just outside my window that I couldn't even see yesterday because of the weather. It's not even on my map. My guide said that's because it's not considered an important peak. Only in Nepal is a 6,000-meter snowcapped peak considered unworthy of mention on a map!

About an hour before we arrived there is a point where we were told that on clear days it's possible to see Everest. When we arrived there the pass was clouded over, so we joked that we weren't leaving until the clouds cleared. Then, magically, they did.



That's me in the front, Everest in the center, and to the right, behind the trees, is Nuptse, at a mere 7900 meters or so.

I've already got dozens of photos, and this is just the stuff we have to walk through to get to the "good" stuff!

Everest, here I come

After a few days resting and recharging in Kathmandu I finally booked a trekking tour. There are two tours I want to do here, the two most popular with tourists. One is to Everest Base Camp, the other a circuit through the Annapurna region. For my first trek in Nepal I figured I had to see Everest.

I was planning on doing a self-guided "teahouse trek" without porters or guides. Because these routes are so popular there are lodges all along them that cater to tourists. So you don't need to carry food or a a tent.

But hiking at over 15,000 feet in the Nepal Himalayas is not something to be undertaken lightly. I decided I should err on the side of caution and joined a tour group. I'm going with 5 other tourists, a guide and porters on an 18-day trek to Everest Base Camp. All I'll need to carry is a small knapsack.

When I return I'll decide whether I'm willing and able to do an Annapurna trek on my own.

Last night we had a group meet-and-greet dinner. The food was good and there was a group of young performers doing traditional dances to the accompaniment of a live band. There are plenty of other tourists visible in this photo. Oh, and a yeti too.



As a result I will not be updating the blog or responding to email for about three weeks.

Mt Everest

Ok, it was from the seat of my plane, but it was still pretty darn exciting to see it. It doesn't look so high, until you realize that it's poking through the clouds. In fact, on the plane's video screens they showed flight statistics shortly before we saw it and we were actually flying lower than the summit! Almost six miles, straight up...

I'm in Kathmandu, Nepal. I can't believe I'm finally here. I tried to plan a trip here in 2001 but the political situation got a little messy after the crown prince gunned down 10 members of the royal family, including the king, the queen and himself.

I woke up at about 7 a.m. yesterday in Xi'an, China, knowing I had a miserable travel day ahead of me. It's now 2:44 p.m. I haven't slept since yesterday morning. and I just I am way to tired to deal with it right now. I've never been anywhere so chaotic. It's wonderful, but I'm way too tired to deal with it today!

I wasn't looking forward to an 8-hour layover in Chengdu after arriving at 11 p.m. I figured I'd check in as early as possible so I could get a good window seat, then either try to sleep a little or just read.

Chengdu is a city of about 5 million people with a decent-sized international airport. The last flight arrived around 1 a.m. And then they closed the airport. Kicked us all out and locked the doors. I had to sit out on the sidewalk with about a dozen similarly shocked tourists. I was the only Westerner. Needless to say I didn't sleep.

I figured out how to ask for a window seat on the right so I could see the Himalaya from the air. She gave me a seat on the window, on the right-hand side and -- all together now -- on the wing!

It was quite cloudy in sections but even so I managed to take quite a few pretty amazing photos. I could barely open my eyes when we left Lhasa -- yes, I actually set foot on Tibetan soil -- but as soon as I saw the wall of mountains stuck my nose against the window like a little kid!

This was the initial approach into Tibet.



The white at the bottom is clouds, and then there are clouds over the peaks as well. And the Tibetan side is the low side.

The landscape was stupendous. Glaciers, glacial lakes, and in the valleys there were little villages where it didn't look like there was enough flat land to pitch a tent. I came here to trek. Maybe I'll even use this path.



This is going to be fun.