To Everest ... and back!
Mission accomplished! We have seen Everest up close and personal!This particular blog needs to be written in two parts, one dealing with the destination (Everest) and the other dealing with the journey. They were two completely different experiences. ;-)
First, Everest, a.k.a., the "Big E". Absolutely glorious, spectacular, awe-inspiring. We had the good fortune of seeing Everest and the surrounding peaks under absolutely perfect conditions: clear, sunny skies. The two most incredible views were 1) the view from 'Gyo La' pass (altitude 17,125 feet) of Everest and the mountain ridge containing 3 other peaks over 8200 meters (which I believe is over 25,000 feet) ... Wow (see the group photo below), and 2) the close-up views of Everest from the guest house where we spent the night (see the other group photo below) ... stupendous! I've also included another photo of just Everest, which I took from the 2nd floor balcony of the guest house. This is what we could see from the balcony, our rooms, and the 'restaurant' (I use the term loosely).
Seeing Everest was clearly a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and the students will remember it for the rest of their lives.
Luckily that was the case, because the journey there was, shall we say, a tad difficult. The trip was probably 20% wonderous (e.g., we crossed three 5000-meter (16,000 ft) passes, including one during a snowstorm that included Tibetan yak herders and snow-covered yaks -- almost surrealistic), and 80% misery. The roads here are, generally speaking, horrible. Imagine all of the ingredients of a bad road. Tibet has them all: narrow, unpaved, rutted (to the point of being teeth-rattling), numerous obstacles (boulders, tractors, donkeys, sheep, yaks, piles of rocks that seemed to have absolutely no purpose, etc.), traffic! (including Chinese army convoys), steep dropoffs (right when we pass the Chinese army convoy of course), and DUST -- lots and lots of dust(this part of Tibet is essentially a desert, complete with some sand dunes). That was our journey for 5 days.
And THEN, when we got to the guest house, we had to ride donkey carts from the guest house to Everest Base Camp (about 5 miles). And THAT was WORSE! Horrible! Some of the students couldn't take it any longer and decided to jump off and walk. The carts themselves looked as though they were nailed together using scrap lumber from someone's garage ... I'm not kidding! I was sitting in the back of my cart, and during one particularly nasty bump, the back almost fell off. So I held onto the front seat -- they're two-passenger carts -- for the remainder of the trip. PLUS, the cart drivers were all 12 year old boys who decided they wanted to race each other. I tried to yell at them, but unfortunately none of them spoke English, and my Tibetan is a little rusty. Trying to get back to the guest house was even worse. Instead of taking us, the cart drivers wanted to transport their relatives and big sacks of whatever -- they can be a bit disagreeable. Our national guide yelled at them in Chinese, but they didn't know Chinese any better than English. ... But the good news is that we all did indeed get back to the guest house, albeit with some strategically placed bruises!
All of this notwithstanding, it somehow seems right that a place like Everest should not be easy to get to. It's a test of the spirit!
Tomorrow we leave for Chengdu. We'll be there only for a short time before leaving for Xian. No rest for the weary. ;-)
Photos below. More to come later!
posted by Dr. William Spangler @ 4:16 PM
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