Kathmandu Again 23.05

Today, we woke up at 5.30am, hung-over and deprived of sleep. Our guide met us in the lobby and told us that the drive to the river would be about 3 hours. So we left, and followed him out the door, but there was no car there. He told us to follow him. We did so for at least 20 minutes, winding in and out of the Thamel streets, then along the dusty roads of Kathmandu. We started to wonder if it was a 3 hour walk to the river, not a 3 hour drive.

Eventually though, we arrived a busy road full of people and buses. The guide put us on one of the furthest buses down the road, and told us to stay with a guy that he was talking to. It was a long bumpy ride, but we managed to catch up on some sleep on the way. Eventually we were told to get off, and then wait at the side of the road. We found some shelter on the steps of a house, and then waited for about half an hour. In the meantime we met the other rafters. There were 2 Swedish girls, 3 locals, and a Canadian girl.

Finally, everything was ready, and everyone had arrived, so they gave us each a helmet, a lifejacket and an oar. We went to the river, where they gave us a quick safety demonstration, teaching us what to do if we fell off the raft or if someone else did. We also learnt the rowing instructions that we were to follow, like 'All Forward!', 'Right Back!', or 'Stop!'

We grabbed the seats at the front of the raft, because we knew they were the most exciting, as the waves crash onto the front. Within minutes of leaving the shore, we were soaked with water! Loren was thrilled, as this was her first experience of rafting.

The rapids were very exciting when they came, but she never realised that there would be so many slow parts of the river, where nothing happens except floating along watching the scenery. During one of the slow sections of river, the guide said we could jump out into the water if we wanted. Loren took the opportunity, and had great fun floating along with the current, next to the raft.

After we stopped for lunch on the riverbank, one of the Swedish girls mentioned that she didn't feel well. Not long after we continued, we hit another rapid, and she started vomiting out the side of the raft. We felt very sorry for her, and decided that swimming in that water no longer looked inviting.

After we finished our rafting experience, we waited to see how we were going to be getting home. The guides started hailing local buses, looking for places for us. The first bus that came apparently had one place available, but we decided we'd take it anyway. We figured people would get off at some point, and we'd be able to take their seats. Bad decision!

No one got off until we got to Kathmandu, and our 'seats' were sitting on the extremely hot engine box, with a compartment above our heads that restricted sitting up straight. We spent 3 hours sweating, squashed between locals, with our bottoms burning from the engine, and our backs bent in half because of the box above us. Not fun!

Journey from Kathmandu to Europe!

Kathmandu - Delhi - Helsinki - Warsaw

Today, our last morning in Kathmandu, was spent rushing around looking for souvenirs and birthday presents. When we finally left our hotel for good, we were pleasantly surprised with a free ride to the airport from our trekking company. We checked in to our flight, with the assistance of a trainee employee, who offered to direct our baggage to Poland, our final destination. We thought it would be easier that way, so we agreed. She looked a little lost though, and Artur jokingly said to Loren that it would be a miracle if our bags arrived in the right place and on time. Unfortunately, that miracle didn't happen.

The flight to India went smoothly, and we decided to go out of the airport and find an internet cafe, as we had 8 hours before our next flight. We took a cab to the backpackers district, where spent a few hours updating the blog, as we were too tired for sightseeing. Loren made the most of her time though, and bought some pretty anklets.

Himalayan Trek Part 4

Day 8 – Dole to Namche 20.05

Today, we trekked from Dole (4200m) to Namche Bazar (3446m). We expected the walk to be quite easy, as we were heading back, but Loren remembered that we had gone down quite a steep hill on this leg of the trek, that meant we would be going up that same hill today. She was right, but we didn’t remember just how big it was.

It was actually a mountain, not a hill, and the trail zig-zagged back and forth, up and up and up. It was one of the worst and most difficult climbs of the whole trek. The other two were the climb up to Namche Bazar and the climb up Gokyo Ri. Still, we managed to do the walk in 4 hours and 50 minutes, instead of the predicted 7 hours.

We finally saw some landmarks that told us Namche Bazar was not far away. On the way we saw some more mountain goats and neks, and we were lucky enough to see the Nepali pheasant again! It’s not a common sighting, as they are very timid, so we crept close and watched them for a while. There was the colourful male, and the brown female.

Sherpa Museum

Just before we arrived in Namche Bazar, we stopped to see the Sherpa Museum, which was located just above the town. The first thing we saw at the museum was a display of traditional Sherpa household items. There were cooking utensils, food dishes, big pots and urns for storing wine, butter and water. There was also a range of traditional hats, which we surreptitiously tried on, and some clothes storage boxes, covered in fur. The Sherpas are quite religious, so there was also a prayer room, with lots of religious items on display.

After this, we went down to a basement where they showed us a slide show of pictures of traditional Sherpa life. We saw religious ceremonies, weddings and feasts. In one part of the wedding ceremony, the young couple have butter smeared on their heads! They also showed us slides of beautiful pictures of the mountains and villages. These photos were taken by a Sherpa photographer. The name of each mountain appeared with it, which was veeerry helpful for us, as we had trouble understanding Narendra’s accent a lot of the time.

The next part of the museum to see was the photo gallery. A lot of the pictures there were the same as the ones in the slide show, but we saw some others too that we were interesting, and that we hadn’t seen yet. In another room, they had pictures of everyone that has summited Mt Everest, and related newspaper articles from all over the world about the climbers, and other Everest related stories. It was interesting to see which countries sent expeditions to climb Everest, and how often they went. One story was about a guy that did the Base Camp to Namche Bazar marathon in 4 hours!

Some of the interesting people that climbed Everest included: a 70 year old man and a 19 year old boy. The exciting thing is that although Mt Everest is the tallest, it’s definitely not the hardest mountain to climb. People make a big deal of it, but any fit person could climb Mt Everest, they just need to have enough money to pay for the expensive climbing permit.

Outside of the museum, there were lots of tents set up. We were surprised, as we hadn’t seen anyone up to that point who was using tents for sleeping instead of tea houses. We saw some more from our tea house window that afternoon as well. It was a relief to make it back to the tea house for lunch, and we welcomed the familiar sound of masonry from outside the window. A house was being built just behind our tea house, and both times we were in Namche Bazar, we became mesmerized by the hammers chipping at big rocks, sculpting them into bricks for the walls. They had completed one storey of the house since we were last there!

It started raining heavily two hours after we arrived, so we were very glad to be safely inside the warm tea house. We decided to spoil ourselves, and take our first shower in 8 days of trekking. It was so nice to be under hot water again, and to feel clean! That evening we had some beer and tried some more of Narendra’s local millet wine, while we played cards together. Artur was not impressed with the wine, as it reminded him of the rice wine we had in China. Loren found it much better than the one we’d had the night before, and much better than rice wine, so she enjoyed it.

Day 9 – Namche Bazar to Lukla 21.05

Today was our last day of trekking! We were both very relieved at this, as trekking back the same way can get boring. We had quite a long way to go, as we were trekking from Namche Bazar (3446m) to Lukla (2800m). The first part of the walk was going down the huge mountain we had climbed to get to Namche Bazar.

Hundreds of prayer flags hang from the suspended bridges

It is not very comfortable going down such a steep slope, as your knees take the impact of every step down. It was nice to finally be on a fairly flat trail again once we were back down from the mountain. The trail was fairly easy from there until Phakding (2652m) where we stopped for lunch.

After Phakding, the trail sloped upwards fairly steadily. Loren was getting anxious to arrive in Lukla, and Narendra was walking fairly slowly, so we overtook him and charged on ahead. We quickly realized that the trail was not going to flatten out anytime soon for us to catch our breaths, but that it continued rising even higher.

We had not been overtaken by anyone on the trail at that point, and we had overtaken some fast-walking Americans not long before. We heard them behind us, so we sped off with renewed vigor until we made it all the way to the top of the mountain! At the top, we waited for Narendra, and walked with him to our tea house. Once we arrived, it started raining, so once again our fast pace had saved us from getting wet!

That evening we met some people from America who had been trekking in the opposite direction to us, and had been camping the whole way. Their guides cooked dinner outside for them and set up a buffet inside. Looks like camping can be done in style! It was their last night too. We had some beer to celebrate our engagement and finishing the trek, and we played some more cards with Narendra. Loren continued her winning streak, but refused to give up her secret. We didn’t party too hard though, as we had to get up at 5.30am the next morning so we could take the plane back to Kathmandu.

Day 10 – Lukla to Kathmandu 22.05

We were rudely awakened by Narendra the next morning, just after 5am. We forced ourselves out of bed, and had a small breakfast. Just after we finished breakfast, we were told that the weather wasn’t good, and the airport was closed until further notice. We were more than a little worried, as Narendra had told us that once he was stuck in Lukla for a week because the weather kept the airport closed. We decided to go back to bed, because we had no idea of knowing how long it would be until the weather cleared.

This time when Narendra woke us up with his knocking, we were very grateful, and we rushed out the door to the airport. By 7am we were on a plane and staring out the windows at the beautiful mountains. Loren appreciated the view so much more than the first time, now that she knew what it was like to be high up in those mountains.

Back in Kathmandu

When we got back to the hotel, Artur decided to have a quick nap so that he’d have energy to celebrate his birthday which was today! Happy Birthday Artur! Loren went wandering around the Thamel, looking for some more things to add to his presents. After he woke up, we went to a nice little restaurant and had a birthday lunch, complete with big slices of chocolate cake from the patisserie nearby. Artur opened his presents, and was thrilled everything that he received. He got some souvenirs from the trek including a badge for Gokyo Ri, a big landscape poster of the Himalayan mountains.

In the evening, we caught up with Bishnu, the guy that organised the trek for us. He took us to an excellent pizza restaurant, the food was exceptional - especially after 10 days of tea house food! Loren surprised Artur by ordering him a fancy Tiramisu birthday cake.

After dinner, we went to a local rooftop bar with a great live band. The bar had a fairly bohemian atmosphere, so we decided to smoke a shisha. We tried coca-cola tobbaco first, then cappucino - they tasted pretty similar though. The bar had a great range of cocktails, and we managed to sample quite a few.

We managed to get comfortably sozzled, not excluding Bishnu who was interrogating us on dating techniques in Australia. We finished the night quite early, as we had to get up to go white-water rafting the next day. But Artur felt like he had a spectacular birthday, despite being away from friends and family.

Himalayan Trek Part 3

Day 7 – Gokyo Ri 19.05

The One You've Been Waiting For...

Today is the big day! Today we would climb to 5360m, and we would see the sun rise over Mt Everest! We woke up at 3.45am went off in search of our guide, who was still asleep. We had to wake someone up to help us find him, as the guides and porters sleep in rooms with several people inside. Once we had our guide, our puff daddy jackets and our torches, we were ready to set off at 4.30am. A little way into the distance, we could see one other set of torches. The Japanese guy had left with his guide ahead of us. We had to cross a river in the dark, by jumping from stone to stone. It was a little difficult as we were still half asleep.

We finally reached the mountain, and realized after a short walk, that this was going to be a very difficult climb. Loren’s head still hurt like crazy, and we were frequently out of breath from the altitude. Just like when we were climbing in Namche Bazar, we kept thinking that we could see the top, and that there wasn’t far to go, but we had barely made it halfway.

It was so cold, that the water in the tube of our camel backs froze! We had to bend the tube and bite the nozzle to loosen the ice, so we could drink on the way up. We didn’t need our puff jackets yet, because the climbing was very difficult, and we were very hot under our clothes, but our uncovered faces and lips were quite stiff from the cold. It was hard to talk. The moss and grass was covered with a light layer of snow from the night before, but the snow on the dirt had melted into the ground.

At around 5.15am, Narendra pointed out a mountain that was barely visible as it peeked around another mountain, and told us that this was Mt Everest! This was the first time we had been able to glimpse it, for the whole trip, and after seeing Klaus’ cloudy photos, Artur was worried that this was the best view we’d have. So he stopped Loren, and told her he had a question for her. He said, ‘Will you marry me?’. Loren said, ‘yes!’, and had a few tears of joy. She was completely surprised, she had no idea he was going to ask. Then he pulled a little box out of his backpack, and gave her a solitaire diamond ring. Our fingers were swollen from our strenuous walking, but the ring fit, and still fits perfectly.

We were both very puffed, and our faces were quite frozen, but we were very happy! We had seen the biggest mountain in the world (or so we thought), and we had declared our eternal love for each other, the biggest, highest love in the world. Running on the exhilaration of the engagement, we climbed the rest of the way up the mountain. It was still a long and difficult climb before we reached the top, so we had to put our minds to the task and save the celebrations for the summit.

The 'Real' Mt Everest, starting to appear as we climbed higher

On the way, Narendra told us he had made a mistake, and Mt Everest was another mountain that was just now appearing. We had a laugh, and took lots of photos of the real Mt Everest.

Finally we reached the top! We quickly rugged up in our puff jackets and beanies, and then stood in awe of our spectacular surroundings. On every side, we could see the enormous peaks of the highest mountains in the world! They were glistening white with snow, and reflecting the light of the rising sun. Mount Everest towered before us, now the tallest mountain on the horizon. Gokyo village was a tiny speckle of houses below us, and the lake was even more beautiful from above. We were so lucky with the weather, we had a good 30 minutes of clear sky and incredible 360 degree views.

It is quite difficult to adequately describe that 30 minutes. Some of the pictures might give a small idea of what it was like to be up there, but even the best picture cannot describe the sound of the wind as it rushed around us, the crisp air on our faces, and the idea of being so close to the top of the world with your beloved. This is something that neither of us will ever forget.

As we stared at the mountains surrounding us, our guide told us each of their names and how tall they were. Some of the best ones that we could see, apart from Mt Everest of course, were Lhotse, Makalu and Ama Dablam We could also see the glacier that was hidden from us the night before, and all three of the lakes that we had walked past on the way to Gokyo.

Not far from us, the Japanese guy who had arrived before us, was sitting on a rock facing Mt Everest, and meditating. If you’re into meditation, this is definitely the place to do it. You are so far away from normal life and you are surrounded by some of the most beautiful views that the world has to offer. Despite this, Loren had some fun imitating the guys pose. Eventually he and his guide headed back down the mountain, leaving just Artur, Loren and Narendra, alone looking over the top of the world.

Loren imitating the Japanese guy

At 6.15am, the clouds started to appear and obscured the horizon. So the newly engaged couple began their descent to Gokyo village. On the way, we met the usual suspects: Elad the Israeli guy, the dog from the climb the day before, and the big group of Canadians, we also saw the dysfunctional couple from the room next to ours at the tea house. We exchanged email addresses with Elad, and he told us that the dog had been following him and the group of Phillipino trekkers that he was now trekking with, all the way from Namche Bazar! Everyone was hoping there was still a view at the top of the mountain, but they all left too late to see anything.

The trek back to Dole

We had some breakfast when we got back down the mountain, then had a 1.5 hour nap, before we headed off for the long trek back to Dole. All together our walk today was supposed to be 9 hours, but we did it in 6.5! It took us 3.5 hours to go up and down Gokyo Ri, and 3 hours for us to trek from Gokyo to Machchermo to Dole. We were quite proud of ourselves.

The walk was quite cold, and it rained and snowed a little on our way. There wasn’t much visibility of the surrounding mountains, but we’d had more than our share of mountain views that morning. We were very glad to arrive at the tea house, thrilled that most of the hard work was behind us.

The tea house was very busy that night, and we chatted for a while to some Indian guys who live in Arizona. Later, Loren and Artur played cards with Narendra, and tried some local millet wine. Once again Loren won every game, which pissed Artur off immensely J We went to bed quite early, as we were exhausted from our big day.

Himalayan Trek Part 2

Day 4 - Namche Bazar to Dole 16.05

Today we hiked from Namche Bazar to Dole, elevating us to 4200m. We estimated that it would take us about 5 hours. The acclimatization walk from the day before definitely paid off, and we didn’t find it too difficult. Loren, who up to this point had been wondering how anyone in their right mind could enjoy trekking, started to actually enjoy it herself!

Our guide told us that today would be the last day that we would see forests, because they don’t grow at the higher altitudes that we would be climbing to. He also told us that we were very lucky, because the National flower of Nepal – the Rhododendron – is usually finished blooming by this time of year. Everywhere we walked there were Rhododendron trees in full bloom! There were so many different colours and shapes, it was like walking through a garden. We also took special notice of the forests, as this would be the last we’d see of trees for a while. There were mostly pine trees, so the air smelt wonderful and Christmassy.

Our trail took us along the side of some mountains, and the view over the valley was spectacular! One slip and you could end up over the edge and tumbling down the side of the mountain. The river flowing through the valley below seemed so far away, and the villages on the mountains on the other side of the valley looked so tiny.

Even more spectacular were the snow covered peaks that filled the horizon. The clouds were moving very fast, so we had moments of clear sky in front of the mountains. We saw the beautiful Lhotse mountain (8501m) and my personal favourite - Ama Dablam (6802m). Ama Dablam has the most incredible shape, and looks the scariest to climb. Sadly, Mt Everest was still out of view.

Ama Dablam

About half-way through the walk, we met a huge group of Canadians. They were heading to Annapurna – Mt Everest base camp. They were a group of friends who were all interested in trekking. A few of the fitter ones had decided to participate in the Annual Marathon from Annapurna Base Camp to Namche Bazar! They were hoping to complete it in about 6 hours.

An Unfortunate Episode

Unfortunately, one of them was a complete moron, and locked Loren in the toilet. The toilets basically consisted of a hole in the floor of a little hut, and a pile of leaves at the side to sprinkle into the hole when you are finished. The door of this particular hut had a lock on the inside and outside. Loren locked the inside, and some guy with a Canadian accent came up and fiddled with the lock and said ‘it won’t open’, duh! The idiot decided without even asking, that there was no one inside, and put a padlock on the door! Poor Loren was stuck inside the hot and smelly hut, calling for someone to open the door. She managed to loosen some of the screws on the lock, but couldn’t dismantle it, and the door was too solid to break. Artur was chatting with the Canadians, and didn’t notice that Loren was missing. Thankfully, the guide came down looking for her, then went to get the key. It was a hot and very irritated Loren that came out of the hut. She was ready to verbally abuse any and all of the male Canadians that crossed her path.

Before we left, we saw a huge train of yaks. Loren was thrilled with their beautiful long fur, and she reached out to touch one as it passed by. It tried to kick her, but thankfully it missed. After that, she was a little more scared of these creatures and their enormous horns.

We set off again, and made it all the way down a very steep mountain. At the bottom, we decided to have lunch at a little tea house, then continue our journey. The group of Canadians had the same idea, and insisted on talking to us further. Loren was still annoyed at the whole lot of them because of the incident that happened earlier, but they were very friendly and she started to like them.

The Night in Dole

We arrived at Dole by about 1pm, and decided to have a nap. It was freezing in our room, so after the nap, we moved to the main room of the tea house where they had a stove. We had heard that people can get sick in tea houses because of the sudden change in temperature from the cold outside, to the warm stove room. We were lucky though, because we arrived before the stove was turned on, and left after the stove had cooled down, so our bodies heated up and cooled down with the stove.

Our tea house was very busy this evening. The Canadians had come to the same tea house, and there was also a Japanese guy, an American guy and our old friend Elad the Israeli guy. We played cards with Narendra, our guide, and with Elad. Elad taught us the game ‘Shit head’, which he had been taught while travelling in India. It was a very simple game, and quite fun. We also played Remibridge (however you spell that). We had to change the rules though because we didn’t have enough cards for 4 players.

Daughter of the teahouse owner, fascinated by our wind-up torch.

The next morning we got talking with the American guy, who had a very German name, Klaus. He was trekking alone with just a guide and a porter, he had started trekking at 800m and he was planning to summit a 6700m mountain. He used to be a professional mountain biker and has been competing since 1991, but now he just does it for fun. As a result he is very fit, and even though this was his first ever climb, he was planning to go the top of a huge mountain!

Artur was very impressed by Klaus’ gadgets. He had a GPS that tracked his progress, his average speed, height of each climb, length of the whole journey etc. He also had a tiny laptop, which weighed only 0.5kg and was made to withstand high altitude. The laptop seemed like such a great idea for travelling, so Artur was very interested. Apparently you can only get it in America and maybe in France.

Starting mountain climbing from an early age

Day 5 - Dole to Machchermo 17.05

We started fairly late today, but the walk wasn’t a very long one. We were going from Dole (4200m) to Machchermo (4470m). It seemed like a waste to go such a short distance, but Elad told us that he’d been told to stay for two days in Machchermo, to acclimatize, before going any higher. We weren’t staying for two days, so a short trek to get there seemed fair.

The walk only took us 1 hour 40 minutes, which was good as it was cloudy, and there wasn’t much to see on the way. We saw some little wildflowers growing on the ground, but apart from a few scraggly bushes, there wasn’t much flora.

A field of wildflowers that still managed to grow at this altitude

We met Klaus again, and he and Artur chatted about their gadgets some more. Artur played with the GPS, and had a good look at the laptop. We saw the Japanese trekker again, and his guide and porter. Apart from that, our tea house was pretty empty. The Canadians must have gone somewhere else.

The tea house owner had some yaks, and fed them just outside the window. It was pretty cool to watch. One of the yaks stood right outside the kitchen door for most of the day, hoping for some more food. He had big blood-shot eyes and huge horns, so we stayed well away from him.

It started to get dark fairly early, which was frustrating because we were reading in the main room of the tea house. They wouldn’t turn the lights on because it wasn’t quite dark enough for them yet, so we had to read with our headlamps. Eventually they turned on the lights and lit the stove. So everyone was huddled around the stove, with no one talking. Eventually we pulled out our cards and played a few games of Shithead with Narendra. Artur became very frustrated with the game because Loren won every single time! He is still mystified at how she managed to do it, and is thinking she might be good in Las Vegas.

Day 6 - Machchermo to Gokyo 18.05

Today we hiked from Machchermo (4470m) to Gokyo (4800m). It was supposed to take 5 hours, but it only took us 3.5 hours. Narendra told us he thinks we are mountain people and that we were doing extremely well.

The houses that we passed on the way were all made of stones, and some sort of mortar to hold them together. Each property was surrounded by a small wall of stones. The walls were built on either side of the path we were walking on, and they looked a lot like the ones you’d find in an English village!

The sky was fairly clear today, so we had a good view of the enormous snow covered mountains. At one point we were looking at the river in the valley below, and thinking that it looked so tiny and distant. We started heading downhill very slowly and toward a distant waterfall. Eventually we found ourselves walking beside that very same river as it flowed down from the waterfall into the valley below. The water was almost a white colour and it was so beautiful as it flowed over the rocks in the riverbed.

We haven’t mentioned many of the animals we saw on the trek yet. We saw mountain goats, yaks, neks and horses. Neks are the females, yaks are the males, so it’s pretty funny when people try to sell yak cheese, because yaks don’t produce milk. We also saw the Nepali pheasant, which was very colourful, but the female was plain and brown.

Anyway, as we started to approach Gokyo, we saw lots of piles of stones. We were unsure of what they were for. They looked like they could be for ceremonies or maybe some were natural. We asked our guide, and he told us that the locals pile the stones like that just for fun. The sherpas and porters stop for breaks along the way, and sometimes they occupy their time this way.

Another really useful thing people do to stones, is to write the name of the town that you are approaching, how far you have to go, and an arrow in the right direction. We also saw a map drawn onto a stone, for the entire area we were trekking in. Very helpful for getting our bearings.

The rock with a map on it

It started to become very cold as we approached Gokyo, and we saw a few patches of snow nearby. The ground beneath our feet consisted of medium and small sized rocks, making each step important for balance. The landscape was covered with little towers of piled rocks, left behind by sherpas.

The most beautiful to see though were the three lakes. They were so clean and still, and such a beautiful clear blue colour. At the edge of the lakes you could see right through the water to all of the rocks at the bottom. All around us, incredible snow-capped mountains rose up on all sides, some were far off in the distance, but others were incredibly close. It felt like we were on another planet.

Gokyo Village

Finally we approached the little village of Gokyo. It was magical! The houses were clustered in front of a lake and on the opposite side of the water, a huge snow-covered mountain towered into the sky. On another side of the lake, we could see Gokyo Ri, the mountain that was our final destination. We would climb it the following day to reach 5360m.

We stayed at a tea house called Gokyo Resort, and they spoiled us with a spectacular view from our room. We were in the middle room on the top floor, and we could see the village below us, the clear blue lake and the huge mountain on the other side, all framed by our window.

Room with a view

The weather was quite cold at this altitude, so after a quick nap, we escaped to the stove in the dining room. Here we ran into our old pal Klaus, and the Japanese guy, who was a very loud eater by the way, not hard to miss. Klaus had climbed Gokyo Ri that morning, and showed Artur his pictures. Artur was a bit disappointed because it was very cloudy, and there was not much to see. Klaus had gone up the mountain at about 5 or 6 am, so we decided that we’d have to go earlier if we wanted to see Mt Everest.

After dinner, we decided to climb the mountain ridge behind our resort, so we could see the glacier on the other side. We were thrilled because the freezing weather meant we could finally try out our Puff Daddy jackets, and Loren’s new beanie.

At the base of the ridge, we found a big dog who seemed to be using a covered rubbish pit as a shelter. He seemed to like us, and followed us all the way to the top. The climb was steep, but not too hard. The only problem was that Loren had quite a bad headache, which hurt more when we were walking. She thinks it was from dehydration from digestion problems, not altitude sickness, and even if it was altitude sickness, the medication you can take for it causes further dehydration. So it was a no win situation.

Unfortunately by the time we reached the top, the sky was covered in fog, and we couldn’t see further than a metre or two in front of us. Then suddenly, it started to snow! Loren doesn’t see much snow in Australia, so she was very excited. Our dog found shelter from the wind behind a raised piece of rock, but apart from that he didn’t seem too bothered by the snow. We started to get cold though, so all three of us headed down the mountain ridge again. It was extremely steep for us, but the dog just ran straight down so easily. Loren was very jealous of the ease with which dogs can run up and down mountains.