Hi Razzu
 
Thank you to you, Sham and all the team for making the trek up to Kala Patha such memorable and exciting adventure, for me, and I am sure for the others in the group as well.For me it was truely an experience of a lifetime. Thank you for being a willing helper at the end of the phone for Marian when at Chitwan and on route.
 
I have now been back in my own bed for three nights. But only really functioning today and half of yesterday.  I have been into my garden and planted vegetables as well as flowers instead of just flowers after seeing how industrious are the people of Nepal.
 
I am back to work tomorrow by this time next week life will be back to normal; but I will be a richer person for my experience I now appeciate all I have and hopefully not take it so much for granted again.
 
Thank you
 
Dianne

The trek was not just successful but it was truly amazing and as I said long ago from Namche Bazaar, we were blessed. I stayed on in Nepal after the trek for several days with Dianne, my sister-in-law from NZ so that she could see a little more of Nepal with me while the rest of the group travelled home to Saudi Arabia. Dianne and I did talk about the trek but we were so busy travelling and experiencing the wonders of Bandipur, a medieval village and Chitwan Park where we rode elephants, saw many rhinos and even more birds (and even leeches, Duffy) that we did not dwell so much on the trek but rather enjoyed what we were doing right then and there. What we did as a group on our trek to Kala Patthar was as a team and I think all of us recognize that. We did well and apart from some minor symptoms of altitude sickness, we stayed remarkably healthy, a tribute to our support group, especially the cook and kitchen staff. They performed in very rudimentary conditions at times and no matter what the weather or camp facilities or even our own appetites, they took good care of us which allowed us even more chances for a safe and healthy summit. Our Sherpas Ganu and Kaliyan, and our Sirdar, Shyam were always there to encourage us on and Razzu, who I would call our director, managed the whole team in a way that made us all feel like VIP’s. Read the rest of this entry »

Since the side trip to Syangboche high above Namche Bazaar, we have made extremely good progress on the trek to Everest.  On Day 6, we left Namche (11314) heading for Tengboche - the most famous Buddhist high monastery in the world.  We past a chorten dedicated to the “True Tigers of the Snow”…the Sherpas…at 11765′.   After stopping for a break at Kyangjuma (11825), we slowly descended to the Dudh Kosi at 10867′.  We had lunch and started a difficult climb to Tengboche at 12701′  We were fortunate to see a Buddhist ceremony at the monastery, then walked down to our campsite at 12234′ (6.03 miles of walking).  On Day 7, we left at 7:45 am and trekked to Pangboche (1.87 mi., 12983).  Pangboche is terraced for crops, and the villagers were busy slapping yak dung patties against rock walls for drying as fuel during the hard upcoming winter.  Read the rest of this entry »

We have been truly blessed!
 
With torrential rain our whole full day in Kathmandu, I think many in our group had doubts about the coming days on the trek but Razzu and I never doubted that the weather would change. Also there was a bandh (strike) that day and so most shops in Thamel were closed. Razzu managed to get needed hiking poles delivered to our hotel and we all tried to pack to the “required” 15 kilos for our flight to Lukla. The rains stopped and though it was cloudy, our flight took off. I noticed Razzu and my husband Dick looking a little too serious as we flew towards the mountains and worried that mabye our excess bagggage did not get loaded, something, was amiss with our waiting trek staff, but did not know that our flight was close to being diverted as the weather deteriorated. Again, our luck held and we landed on the famous uphill runway in our Twin Otter aircraft. It took some time for our 7 yaks and 8 porters to load up with not only our slightly overweight duffels, but all the camping equipment, food etc. Read the rest of this entry »

Hotel Nirvana Garden: 00 977 1 4256333/4256300
Razzu Office: 00 977 1 4426463/4427074
Cell no: 00 977 98415391

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qfs3JegOFVk

Jan Rea, (Razzu knows Jan from our Annapurna trek), David Greer (who I sailed from Turkey to Spain with on David’s boat in 2004) and his wife and youngest son Allen and I hiked up Black Moutain early today well before the weekend crowds and were rewarded with spectacular views of the Coast Mountain Range as well as Vancouver Island and the city itself.  Jan was our leader and got us onto a little used winter trail which we had to bushwhack to get onto but once on it we were pretty much on our own as it appears that few people know about the route. Cypress Bowl where we started from, is one of the 2008 Winter Olympic ski sites and there is much construction going on. Once on Black Mountain, we hiked a few more minutes to Cabin lake where we shared our lunch with two large and rather majestic ravens. Jan had brought a couple of travel towels but said that since she and Mary had swum in the alpine lake on our last hike there 3 weeks ago that it was my turn. I found a  secluded spot around a corner and made the decision to go for it. I dived in rather than prolong the agony and have to say that ït quite literally took my breath away. I did a quick swim out into the lake to make sure that my companions knew that I really had got in but was soon out drying off and warming up. I was numb! We had a good hike down though this time we used the much travelled summer trail and were happy to see that we had beat the crowds as there were proably hundreds heading up as we hit the parking lot. What a great day with wonderful companions and it inspired me to think positive thoughts about the upcoming trek in Nepal. in just a little over 2 weeks we will start that amazing journey. I hope you are all as excited as I am!      

Carol and Duffy Russell traveled to Colorado Springs, Colorado on August 8-11 to make a dress rehearsal with their new equipment.  Looking at all the possibilities, the best test for the Everest Base Camp trek was to cash in some frequent flyer miles and head for America’s Mountain – Pike’s Peak.  Pioneers made Pike’s Peak the symbol of the 1859 Gold Rush to Colorado with the slogan “Pike’s Peak or Bust.”  Read the rest of this entry »

Click Here for the route map and elevation and oxygen information