With quite a few people suffering a bit of altitude sickness, we al took the trek up to 4850m very slowly – a breath after each slow step, kind of like walking on the moon I guess, except they get way cooler outfits. And can fly.
Anyway, I was one of the few who had a great night sleep the night before, and wasn’t suffering any breathlessness or headaches at all, so really enjoyed the walk. Once we hit the top of the mountain we sat behind some rock boulders that sheltered us from the ever-present freezing winds, and sunbaked for about an hour while our blood thinned and we acclimatised to the altitude. It was lovely.
Unfortunately a couple of peole in the group didn’t make it to the top, but only one wasn’t able to make it to the minimum altitude required, so I’m not sure if she will be able to trek with us tomorrow.
It was encouraging to think Base Camp is only another 500m higher, and only about 4 days away. As we have been taking one step at a time, it’s surprising to see how far we have really come. We have seen some groups with really bad altitude sickness, even people coming down from Base Camp with blue lips, and a lot of them seem to be rushinjg through without acclimatising properly, which is pointless, but each to their own I guess.
After we descended, the free afternoon was spent chilling out (literally, it was cold) and dreaming of food. I don’t think any amount of food could have satified our appetites at that point, we were burning so much energy. But it seemed the higher we climbed the less they fed us, which I’m sure was for the benefit of our health at that altitude, but still left us dreaming of food.
-Sarah
Sarah