Hello my
friends and lemme welcome you all to this brand new series of articles. I’m
sure you know what it’s all about from the heading itself. Yeah, I’m going to
take you to the base of the highest mountain (that I’d rather call Lady) which
I believe is a dream of many trekking lovers. The following is the order will
show how I’m planning on holding your hand from Kathmadu, Nepal all the way to
the EBC and I’m not gonna let go of you until we’re safely back at Kathmandu.
- Everest Base Camp Trek.
- How to Plan Your EBC Trek.
- Detailed Itinerary for EBC Trek.
- Useful Tips & Tricks for Your EBC Trek.
- Things to Carry on Your EBC Trek.
- Day-to-Day Story of My EBC Trek.
Everest
Region also known as Khumbu Region is the home for one of the toughest groups
of humans on earth. They’re the world-famous Sherpa People. The Sherpas are
renowned for their extreme survival techniques in one of the unforgiving
environmental conditions as well as for their sheer strength. Carrying a 100kg
weight is no more difficult for them than for us to go for a walk in the park.
Their adaptability to the harsh environment have helped them survived many
climate changes and natural disasters, including the 2015-Earthquake and continue
their unique tradition up-to-date.
Trekking in
this region takes to the past and away from the hustle and bustle of your
respective concrete jungles. You’ll feel closer than ever to the Mother Nature
and would be able to enjoy the true serenity of our world. It’ll also give you
some sanctuary from your constantly buzzing mobile phones, utterly useless TVs,
eye-irritating computers and most of all ever-nagging bosses, partners,
colleagues, children, etc. This is a true oasis for our sun-baked,
sanity-deprived and robotic lives.
You can do
the EBC in two ways. The first is the most popular one which will start from
one of the most dangerous airports in the world, Tenzing-Hillary Airport at
Lukla. It’s named after the famous duo who conquered the Mount Everest (also
known among the local Sherpas as Sagarmatha or Tibetans as Chomolungma), the New
Zealander, Sir Edmund Hillary and local Sherpa hero, Tenzing Norgay in 1953.
The second
path starts from a village called Jiri below Lukla and adds about another 4-5
days to the overall Trek. Typically a trek to EBC and Kala Paththar Hill takes
approximately 12-14 days but it solely depend on your being able to acclimatize
to the high altitudes where oxygen levels plummet down dramatically. The secret
to a successful EBC Trek is the acclimatization thus you’d have to take it nice
and slow with plenty of breaks. Another factor is keeping yourself hydrated.
I’m sure you’d wonder how come your body loses fluids at cold environments but
it really does as much as if you were on a desert. This is why it’s necessary
to keep drinking water and other fluids at the rate of 4-5 liters a day.
 |
| Map of the EBC Trek (Click image to enlarge) Source: Google Image |
I won’t go
into a lot of details as you can find thousands of such articles with
information on Mt. Everest and getting to the EBC. However, I’m giving you a
list of the key villages with their heights you will trek through in order for
you to get a better idea. This list includes the places I visited during my
trek to EBC. Therefore you might or might not choose to trek to some of them if
and when you do your trek. Or, if you’ve already done yours, you might have
visited them.
Lukla – 2840m
(9318 ft)
Phakding – 2610m
(8564 ft)
Monjo – 2835m
(9300 ft)
Namche – 3440m
(11,286 ft)
Khumjung –
3790m (12,435 ft)
Khunde – 3840m
(12,600 ft)
Khunde Ri
View Point – Approximately 4200m (13,780 ft)
Tengboche – 3860m
(12,664 ft)
Pangboche –
3930m (12,894 ft)
Ama Dablam
Base Camp – 4600m (15,092 ft)
Dingboche – 4410m
(14,468 ft)
Dughla aka
Thukla – 4620m (15,158 ft)
Chola Lake –
4590m (15,060 ft)
Lobuche – 4910m
(16,110 ft)
Gorak Shep –
5140m (16,864 ft)
EBC – 5364m
(17,600 ft)
Kala
Paththar Hill – 5550m (18,210 ft)
On the way
back, you might visit Pheriche between Dughla and Pangboche bypassing
Dingboche.
Pheriche –
4200m (13,780 ft)
Do refer to
my handwritten page off my note book where I’d also calculated the elevation
gains to get a better idea.
 |
| This is the page I was telling you about in my notebook. Note the elevation differences I've marked both gains (+) and losses (-) (Click image to enlarge) |
All in all,
the total distance from Lukla to EBC/Kala Paththar is approximately 60-70km
one-way. Even though this is a highly debated topic and many groups end up with
many different figures, this is probably the closest to reality. In fact this depends
on the paths you take, whether you do by treks just like I did or take short
cuts. Just to give you an idea, I’d walked approximately 160-175km during my
15-day trek to EBC in total.
 |
| This shows the distances and the variations of elevation. (Click image to enlarge) Source: Google Images |
Well folks,
this is all for now. And I do hope you have a fairly good idea on EBC
especially in terms of heights and distance so that you can prepare yourselves
mentally for what you’re about to get into.
I know what is going on your mind
when you reach this stage of this article.
“Can I
really do this?” – Simple answer, “Yes you can”. We’ll talk more about how in
the coming articles. Until then stay tuned and this is Sri signing off for now.
Take care
and travel safe!
Sri
Abeywickrema – Trek with Sri
P.S. Do
comment with your feedback and questions if you have any and I’ll try my level
best to answer them.
Exciting News: You can read "How to Plan Your EBC Trek" in the next article with videos.
Exciting News: You can read "How to Plan Your EBC Trek" in the next article with videos.
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