 |
||
 |
||
 |
|
|
 |
||
|
|
|
 |
||
Alpine Ascents International's
Khumbu Trek Fall '99
|
 |
||||
|
|
»Home »Dispatches »Photos »Trekking Map »Trek Itinerary »Bios |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|||||
|
|||||
 |
|
|
|
Hear the Team's Call from Nepal LISTEN: [RealPlayer] [Windows Media]
Download a FREE media player to listen.[Windows Media] [RealPlayer]
Barbara Wentworth
Namaste, [Unintelligible] family and friends who are tracking the Everest '99 Base Camp Trek. We just came from the Panorama lodge yesterday at the Namche Bazaar and we traveled up to a village called Thame. The Namche Bazaar is the commercial hall of the Khumbu regions whereas everyone must pass through here if trading or travelling in any direction. Namche is in an amphitheater set into the side of a mountainside. Houses, hotels, lodges, agriculture, the monastery, yak farms are all here. Some houses are visibly painted, expect for no fancy trim, they look like they're set into a Swiss mountainside. The digiwalker, those that are following the steps, the number of steps that it is taking to get to Mount Everest's Base Camp, as of Namche, we have 54,500 steps, starting in Kathmandu. We are currently, now that we're in Thame, have over 70,000 steps. So it's going to be a long walk. I'll have to reset that down to zero again to start when the digi breaks 100,000.
We have a wonderful crew. The Sherpas are doing a wonderful job of feeding us. There hasn't been one meal that I haven't liked and we're all doing well with the altitude. And the children, I want to tell you about some things about the children that we've seen. The children attend school from about age five, they wear navy pants; in Namche, they wear school uniforms of navy pants, white shirts and blue sweaters. The girls wear long navy skirts instead of pants. They don't have any "specials;" they only do academics and are lucky to attend through eighth grade. Some are able to go to high school, but it's hard when family income is important. The average per capita income for a family is about $200. They have military posts here. They actually have probably about the highest altitude basketball court I've ever seen — so, we took a picture that.
Right now we're going to be travelling, we're stopping, going up to the monastery here in Thame, which is a village, which is just a perfect little village. I wish you could see the sunrise as it shines off of mountains this morning surrounding us. All of the mountain peaks around us — we're kind of in a valley — and all of the mountain peaks around us have this beautiful sunlight glow on it.
Well that's it for today, hopefully we'll check in with you tomorrow. We're going to be going to Thyangboche later today and we'll see you then. Check in at the Zone.
Pete Athans
Right now I'm looking down at the incredible view of not only Thamserku, which is easily seen above Namche, but the incredible peak of Kantega which really does look like a horse's saddle, which is, incidentally, what the name means. There's also Peak 29, just an amazing spire here as well. I'm going to try to try to capture this on some digital so I can send that back to you. But also up to our, what would be our west, we're looking at Khunde peak and several other peaks that I'm sure are unclimbed and really just have some local names in Tibetan.
A really fabulous morning; we're starting to see the sun bleed down from the upper tops of those peaks and down into the valley of Thame, which is where we are. We'll be taking a walk up to the monastery this morning and I hope having an audience with the Rinpoche up there for a few minutes, and let people take a look around the newly refurbished monastery up there, which is probably the most beautiful one in the Khumbu in many ways.
That's it for now, we'll try to send you some digital photos tonight. Take care and look forward to talking with you. Bye, now.
—Barbara Wentworth and Pete Athans, MountainZone.com Correspondents
| EXPEDITION DISPATCHES | |
   |