Everest Base Camp Trek 2017 Part 2 -From Namche to Dingboche.

Part 2 ~ After the acclimatisation at Namche, it was time for some thinner air.

We knew that we were going to enter a realm of higher altitude and it was time for some real action.
This was time for our bodies to really start adapting.  Little did we realise that the transition from 3400m to 4400m would be that great.  This second quarter part of our trek was a period of reckoning. And time was not on our side. We needed to keep pushing, keep going. AMS and illnesses started hitting us. But the team spirit was still strong.


[In this Travellogue, I have tried my best to credit all the photos to their respective photographers, and I tried my best to recall verbatim what members said during the whole trip. Most events are as I could remember them. Those who have expressed clearly to me their wishes not to have their photos shared online I have post-processed the photographs so that their faces are pixelated to protect their privacies.]

Table of Contents:

1. EBC Trek Part 1 ~ An epic adventure.  Kathmandu to Lukla.  Lukla to Phakding.  Phakding to Namche Bazaar.   Acclimatisation in Namche Bazaar.
2. EBC Trek Part 2 ~ The air got thinner & the body got more tired.  Namche Bazaar to Tengboche & Debuche.  Debuche to Dingboche.  Acclimatisation in Dingboche.
3. EBC Trek Part 3 ~ The Final Push.  Dingboche to Lobuche.  Lobuche to Gorak Shep and to EBC and back to Gorak Shep. 
4. EBC Trek Part 4 ~ Kala Patthar
5. EBC Trek Part 5 ~ The unrelenting march from day to night - Gorak Shep to Periche.  Another long day to night march from Periche to Namche Bazaar.
6. EBC Trek Part 6 ~ No matter how tired... just go into Cruise-control mode walking from Namche Bazaar to finally arrive back in Lukla in the dark, yet again.
7. EBC Trek Part 7 ~ Flying back to Kathmandu.  Rest and Relax in Kathmandu and flying home!

EBC TREK Day 5: We started to raise the ante higher. Tengboche Monastery 3860m here we come. And retire this night at Debuche 3700m.
22 Nov 2017

Here is the Relive video of our trek on this day from Namche Bazaar to Debuche:

Relive 'Everest Base Camp trek Day 5- Namche Bazaar to Tengboche monastery finally to Paradise Lodge at to Debuche'

Here is the Strava Flyby for this trek. Just click on the image below, Play and zoom in to watch. It was interesting to see how fast Alex, Lai Peng, KC Tng, Kai Sing, Patrick and Darric were trekking.  We were all bunched up during the steep ascent right after Namche but once the trek evens out these power horse really cheonged ahead.  See how fast and how far ahead was KC Tng, Darric, Alex, Lai Peng, Kai Sing and Patrick, leaving Kong Wan and myself right behind. THIS, was the spectacular pace of trekking displayed by these power men and ladies. And see just how KC Tng was leading the pack all the way.

Here is my Garmin Connect's record of the trek. Total trekking time was about 8 hours 15 minutes, bringing us to Debuche just before 5pm, around 4:50pm.

The VIDEO: The long climb and trek to Tengboche... rather tired by then, and then another 30 mins trek to Debuche for one of the coldest nights.



8:15am

Setting off from Green Tara.

The whole group set off from a freezing Green Tara Hotel and started that unyielding climb up the steps of Namche Bazaar right up to the top of the village where the prayer wheel would be. Lonely Planet described the first twenty minutes of the trek to be a steep uphill climb. And indeed it was, not only the steps, but even after the prayer wheel.

The Namche prayer wheel. [Photo: Lai Peng]

At the prayer wheel, we turned right on this day, the opposite direction to where we walked towards Syangboche the day before, and this time towards Tengboche.

Photo: Fann.

The climb even AFTER Namche Bazaar.

But soon, the route levelled out to a nice gentle and gradual terrain. The paths were much less rocky and were actually smoother and flatter, much more pleasant to walk on. Dry and dusty paths were not exactly the best friends of noses and sinuses.

One of the very rare occasions when the rear and front paltoons met.

Times like these when the humidity was low every time one walked behind a front trekker, or when a herd of yaks or mules walked pass, with their neck bells ringing, they would kick up a whole fume of fine dust that would get entrenched deeply into the sinuses and the respiratory airways. Thus many would start developing nose allergies, sinusitis and the dreaded mountain cough. Adrian's constant nagging about pulling on the buff worked. But for some of us, yours truly included, after a while I gave up because it was really uncomfortable.

The front fast train. [Photo: Patrick]

Some more of the front train. [Photo: Kc Tng]

The power of Leica Summilux 35mm. [Photo: KC Tng]

Looking around me I found my whole family walking together, including Ah Sing surprisingly. Today she seemed a little tired. Khim, Mimi and Kong Wan were also walking among us. After the last two days, every one had begun to feel the strain on the body.
But Kong Wan walking with us too? Now that was strange.

"Ai Lin saw my eyes last night and she told me my eyes were watery. I asked Adrian and he said these were early signs of AMS. And I knew I had been pushing myself a little harder the last few days. So today I'd better guai guai walk at the rear," replied Kong Wan.

Ah, no wonder. It took a wise man to realise what was happening to his body and to adjust accordingly. My utmost of respect to Kong Wan. Here was the true Ironman who knew how to conserve. I was talking to the boys just a couple of days before:

"Hey, look... we are trekking an average of 7-8 hours or more a day at zone 2, occasionally zone 3 heart rate, for 11 consecutive days. Hey... that's literally like doing Half an Ironman race every day for 11 days leh!"

And of course we must conserve. Let no lactic acid even have a chance of accumulating in our muscles because otherwise the recovery will need lots of time. And up here where oxygen and calories were lacking, recovery will be even slower.

The pine trees, the dusty tracks, and the yaks. "SAFE SIDE!" [Photo: Fann]

Mani stones... We must be getting near. [Photo: Ah Li]

As we trekked, the rhododenron trees gave way to pine trees, and long-haired yaks started to appear in addition to Dropkyos. The yaks were really magnificent creatures - muscular, huge and hairy, but apparently of a less docile temperament than the Dropkyos. Beautiful were some of the albino yaks that were fairer in skin and hair tones. From afar we would hear the ding-dongs of their bells and as they closed in, someone in front or right at the back would shout out:

"Safe side! Mountain side!"

A video by Kong Wan of a herd of long-haired yaks, with one albino right in front, kicking up loads of fine dust.


It'd become a reflex action that once those words were uttered, one would mechanically step to the mountain side of the track. It was a funny sight to behold. And I loved it whenever it happened.

Poor Serene must have been really hot, because she ended up trekking just with one sleeveless T-shirt!

The temperature always started off sub-zero early in the morning, and gradually rose to mid single digit on this day's route to Tengboche. But Serene was still the champion, on this day as midday approached, she stripped down to just a single sleeveless T-shirt because she was feeling hot - the power of hormones! The way of the mountains was indeed erratic, for as the clock ticked closer towards 4pm, as we approached Tengboche, the overcast sky brought the mercury southwards and Serene had to put on her down jacket again.

Nuptse on the left, Lhotse on the right, and one of the bigger stupas en route to Tengboche. [Photo: Kai Sing]

Do a comparison of the peaks with this panoramic photo of an exhibit taken by Darric from the Sherpa Culrual museum at Namche.

Photo: Darric

Remembering that Tengboche was the earliest settlement for the Sherpa, en route we were treated to magnificent views of Chorten (stupa) after Chorten. With multicoloured prayer flags hanging from their crown. The relatively flat trail allowed us to finally look ahead and enjoy the scenery more. Far ahead in the distant, the snow-capped peaks of Ama Dablam and Lhotse appeared again and again. These two magnificent pearks were distinctly recognisable, especially Ama Dablam. Ama Dablam essentially meant Mother and Daughter, because it was two peaks side by side - a Mother and a daughter. I joked with the girls if ever we were to summit a previously unknown peak, we would have it named Apa-Dablam.

Lhotse was on the left of Ama Dablam. Personally I simply just recognised the three slanted deep grooves running down the front side of Lhotse to identify this peak.



The importance of portable Solar panels

The sun shone brightly on our back. All the solar panels were out in full force, each dangling from many of our day packs. These solar panels had been really life-savers. A full day of trekking with a 21W or 22W, 3 or 4 panel solar panel connected to a 20,000mAh power bank and a handphone would have both charged fully by the end of the day. Personally I believed if the sun remained like this, as it would usually be year end, I could easily charge two 20,000mAh power banks with a full day of trek. These solar panels essentially made all of us very independent of the need for electricity at guesthouses that charged exorbitant prices but yet only offered trickles of currents for our devices. Once at Dingboche, as we all sat down outside sunning our solar panel, Adrian jokingly asked me to help him charge his iPhone. In 5 minutes, it jumped from 40% to 59%. And another ten minutes it went up to 79%.

"Holy cow!" exclaimed Adrian. "I'm sold! Yes, these solar panels are really good. I am definitely going to get one of these."

It made no difference whatever brands- Vinsic, X-Dragon, Suaoki.. as long as they were of the high-effeciency 21-22W type, they would deliver their job. And these weren't expensive, about S$65 from Lazada.com would get one a good set.

This very nice gentleman from England demonstrating to Serene how to adjust the height of the trekking stick when
she climbed up and when she climbed downwards. [Photo: Ah Li]

We continued trekking downwards until we arrived for lunch at Phungi Thanga. Thereafter the Phungi Thenga Bridge would bring us up on a climb all the way to Tengboche.

Phungi Thanga Bridge

The climb up towards Tengboche. Mimi at a very steady pace.

YOLT Jason. [Photo: Ah Sing]

Tengboche Monastery


The trek kept meandering in a gentle fashion. Breathlessness I still was. But by now I had accepted that I would literally be panting for the whole of the trek, by attributing it to the low oxygen level and the Diamox.
I looked around me. Serene was her usual self, kao beh kao bo-ing... asking me to slow down whenever we came to a climb.
Khim was doing a good and steady pace, easy and maintainable. Importantly she was smiling and cheerful, chit chatting with Fann and the rest of the teammates.
Mimi was tired, but this lady had iron-will in her. Every 5-6 minutes she would take a short rest, a breather, and then she would continue her way in her slow steps.
Kong Wan was very conservative on this day as he trekked with Serene and I almost all the way. Personally I was happy to be seeing him all along the trek, because sometimes it could get a little lonely right at the back, with all the cheongsters disappearing out of sight soon after set off.

Oh finally! Tengboche Monastery!

"Hey Wee How, aren't you walking a little too slow for an Ironman?" once Adrian asked me.

I glared at him. "Hey I am conserving myself ok!"

"Hahaha.. ok ok.. I am sure you can easily do a much faster pace if you are on your own without having to look after the family.," he hastily justified his earlier statemtn.

"Yah, thank you, Adrian. What you just said more than made up for the insult" laughingly I verbally jabbed at him

"Actually hor, what you are doing is correct," emphasized Adrian. "This should be the way. Go at it easy, so that you can complete without pushing yourself to fatigue."

Tengboche Monastery. [Photo: KC Tng]

During this very very short and perfunctory visit to Tengboche Monastery, to me the most important thing was to pray for blessings.



For reasons beyond my comprehension, on this day, the sky turned dark rather early. Soon after lunch, the sky became cloudy and we found ourselves trekking in a more shady environment. Earlier on I remembered Adrian was asking if we would like to see monks at their praying sessions at Tengboche Monastery, and the response was a strong positive.

A panorama of Tengoboche Monastery by Kai Sing.

But as we approached Tengboche Monastery, it was just after 4pm, and the overcast sky made it seemed like it was almost evening. There was either no more monks' prayer sessions, or there was not enough time for us to linger too long at the famous monastery.
We had a short walk around the monastery compound. Before long, we were on our way down towards our final destination for the evening - Paradise Lodge at Debuche, where Serene and I spent one of our colder nights in the outer row of rooms.

Ka Lin really in fantastic spirit, arriving at Paradise Lodge, Debuche. [Photo: Kai Sing]

... that evening, during dinner...


Thinking back, this day's trek was one of the more comfortable days. Relatively flat paths with only the last stretch of climb up after Phungi Thanga bridge that was a little more siong. Walking around the central heating fireplace (actually a metallic barrel with either wood or yak dung burning inside, with an exhaust pipe leading up to the roof like a chimney) in the dining hall, some of our team members were starting to have some symptoms.

Suddenly Ah Sing came in: "Mr Tan is doing long exposure in the cold outside.  Can someone go help him?" And we all looked around at each other.  This man was most remarkable.  We were all so tired already and he was still doing long exposure shots out in that deep cold.

Fann had recovered completely from her food poisoning after the antibiotic. So had KL. Ah Sing was feeling somewhat unwell, some abdominal cramps. I was going the usual round - Khim was starting to have some throat irritation, but not too bad, Papin was starting a bad throat with cough and nasal symptoms. Clinically his throat was inflammed already - I dared not risk it so he was started on the necessary medicine. Casey was a little sick, but not too bad.

Papin's medicine for dinner that night. [Photo: Papin himself lor]

In general, everyone's oxygen saturation levels were still stable, but some had taken a bit of beating after the long trek up to 3800m. Some of us had come down to early 80%, and we were keeping a close watch on these few. Ai Lin, Ryan, Zaid, Ah Sing, Ah Li, Fann and surprisingly myself- all were still in the mid 90% range.
We were still tired despite it being a good day of trekking. Though cold it was, it never stopped us from our sleep. And I started using the sleeping bag from Debuche onwards because it was starting to be really freezing at night.






EBC TREK Day 6: The tiring tiring trek from Debuche at 3700m to Dingboche at 4410m
23 Nov 2017

Here is the Relive video of our trek on this day from Debuche to Dingboche.  It was backbreaking.:

Relive 'Trek from Debuche to Dingboche'

Here is the Strava Flyby for this trek. Just click on the image below, Play and zoom in.  This is a MUST watch.  We could see how Alex and Lai Peng were initially leading the pack, and as they neared Pangboche, Kc Tng, Patrick and Darric begun to push forward, and Alex, Kai Sing and Lai Peng were a short distance behind.  And after lunch at Somare, how Kc Tng really pulled the pack, with Patrick, Alex and Lai Peng together.  And Kai Sing and Kong Wan took it a little easier.  As always I was behind all the way.  I love watching this Flyby because it showed me how each person trekked. 

Here is my Garmin record for the day's trek.  We set off at around 9:12am and the moving time for the trek was about 6 hours, and we finally arrived at Dingboche at around 4:10pm, with time for lunch thrown in.



The VIDEO:  The back-breaking climb to Dingboche.



Back in Singapore...sometime weeks later.

Driving to work in my car, I saw the people walking along the pavement to work, all rushing, all hurrying in their steps. The vehicular traffic was heavy and there were people and cars everywhere as Christmas was drawing nearer. The heat and the humidity of tropical Singapore bore down on us. I watched the faces of the city people. Etched on almost everyone's expression was a hint of a frown, a mild suggestion of some stress brewing inside, as worries of work and deadline floated through their minds. Every one was in his/her own world, deep in thoughts.

I was deep in my own thoughts, but my thoughts were of a vastly different kind - I was thinking back of the open spaces in the mountains, of the freezing cold air, of looking afar and constantly having the companionship of familiar peaks, of the smiling Sherpa people we met along our ways, and the happily running children in the village. There was no motorised vehicles in the Himalaya. Their cars? Yaks, Dropkyos and mules. Life was truly basic. You woke up, you pee-ed, your shit, you had your simple breakfast, the children would walk 1 hour to the next village for school from 10am to 4pm, from Sundays to Fridays, then the family will have dinner and then they just slept. Their only luxury was probably a bottle of orange Fanta.

Three weeks after coming back home, my heart and my mind was still living up there. I couldn't come back to earth....



Meanwhile, back in Debuche...

By now my Dal Bhat regime for my daily breakfast, lunch and dinner had changed to the crispy Tibetan bread with honey instead. Somehow I had gotten the loose stools from some food or utensils, and I thought I had better keep to something simpler food-wise.

Getting ready for set off, huddling around the central heater on a negative 11 degrees celsius morning. [Photo: Fann]

Adrian was kind. He allowed us a later set off time of 9am from Debuche, knowing that on this day it was uphill climb all the way. We all woke up in high spirit and had our fill of breakfast.

Breakfast at Paradise Lodge, Debuche. 8:15am.

It was an understatement to say that it was freezing early in the morning at Debuche as we prepared ourselves. I virtually had to stumble my way out of the freezing room outside to enter the main building's dining area, and after that stumble back, catching my breath as the cold air hit me full on, back to my room.

Nutritional requirement during trekking

The Tibetan bread I had for breakfast was delicious but never enough for a big and heavy man like me. Such a meal would accord me, even with copious amount of honey and a hot mango drink, at best 500-600 Cal. The boys were having a discussion during one of the meals about our energy replacement. An average day of trekking like this would burn an average man around 2000-3000 Cal. Add in our basal metabolic requirement of 2000 Cal daily, our daily expenditure would be in the range of 4000-5000 Cal.

The free flow unlimited refillable Dal Bhat I had on the previous days was my only way of delivering an amount closer to my personal caloric requirement. The daily bakkwa generously offered in turns by Darric, Khim and Kong Wan and Ai Lin added onto our energy replacement, not to mention boosting our morale. Kai Sing introduced me to a packet of trail snack made of nuts, dried coconuts while we were in Kathmandu and that was really an easy food while on the trek.

But in retrospect we needed more. At least most of us huge men. Khim was very cute.

"I was so hungry one night, I had to wake up in the middle of the night and started chewing on my muesli bars while lying in bed. Darric heard all the noises and asked me what I doing. And I told him I was hungry."

We looked back on the whole trek and identified one robot who slept well, ate well, trekked well and had no issues - Jeffrey the Robot. This man was amazing.

Jeffrey can eat anything, anytime, anywhere. [Photo: Darric]

Khim and Darric remembered his prowess:

"This Jeffrey was damn good. He would happy happy eat his instant noodles and keep his tummy full. No wonder he had sufficient energy and he was happy all the way during the trek."

In fact Jeffrey was so good that more than once, Adrian had opportunities to deploy him as forward messenger to run forward to either rendezvous with some of the boys and girls in front, or in another occasion to pass messages forward.

The other two persons who ate well and slept well were Alex and Lai Peng. They adapted well to the food offered and whatever the sleeping conditions, and they slept easily. I realised that these characteristics were important for doing reasonably well on treks like these.

On my side, all our young daughter's snack bars and nuts and such did come in handy as I found munching on these gave me the highly needed boost while on the trail. So did Darric, who was also one of the beneficiaries of Ah Li's generosity, snack-wise, along the trek, with offers of candies, snacks and such. In retrospect I would, in future, bring plenty of Snicker Bars for trekking.

Crossing the suspension bridge. [Photo: Kai Sing]

The trek to Dingboche was really uphill climb all the way. [Photo: Kc Tng]

Analysing our Garmin details, this day's trek from Debuche to Dingboche was simply just upwards, many parts with constant gradients, with some sections of steeper climbs. There were parts where rocky trails were scattered with huge slabs of rocks angled in such ways that required core muscle engagement.


4000m came. At this altitude the level of oxygen was 60%. Somehow the effect of this was quite obvious to our cardiopulmonary system. Serene, I and Ah Li were really taking our very own sweet pace walking. Fann, in her usual sleep-walking style, was taking the rear. We were happy to have Khim and Mimi accompany us. Ah Sing's gastro symptoms seemed to be worsening as she had some vomiting along the way. She was a tough girl. I urged her to just grit her teeth and carry on first until we arrived at Dingboche.

At the rear, Khim and we all also kept going.

[Photo: Patrick]

We were heading northwards and Ama Dablam and Lhotse kept coming in and out of sight, with the occasional view of Nuptse. Personally I found Ama Dablam to be a beautiful peak, grand and imposing in her very own way - Mother and Daughter. Such a meaningful name for a mountain like this.

The power of iPhone X. [Photo: Kai Sing]

[Photo: Lai Peng]

As we progressed, the trail started opening up into a broad piece of ground, almost like the bed of a valley, and we started enjoying the open space, the fresh crisp air, and the spectacular view that we would never ever be able to even behold back home where we came from. At this altitude, even with the sun brightly shining behind our backs, the temperature was sub-zero. Even the usually burning hot Serene was in all her layers on this day.

Lonely planet described this part of the trek as a much quieter part of the whole route as most trekker, even during trekking season, would make their return trek at Tengboche. The many other foreign trekkers who we trekked with and met along our paths up till Namche Bazaar and up to Tengboche, had somehow made their U-turn. And the trek was mostly ours now.

We were all so thrilled to see the sign pointing towards DINGBOCHE!

The terrain opening up as we walked towards Nuptse in the distant. [Photo: KC Tng]

Photo: Patrick

The nature of the terrain with the gentle gradient meant those who were physically able would be trekking at a relatively fast pace, like the way Matthew, Jason, Raymond, Ryan, KC Tng and Patrick were, and arriving at the small remote village of Dingboche quite quickly.

The Panorama of arriving at Dingboche. [Photo: Lai Peng]

Kong Wan did a calculation earlier that morning.

"Our climb today will be a total ascent of 700m leh," he declared. "Hey, that's quite a big amount of ascent leh."

"700m meh? Oh yah hor..." I replied.  That figure did not hit me in the first place.  

Dingboche stood at 4410m. It may only be a 700m ascent from where we were last evening. But boy, what I did not know was what a great difference this ascent made. A 4410m altitude was not something to be trifled with, which I would find out in due course later that evening.

Dingboche! [Photo: Kai Sing]

Meantime, we were all relieved to be seeing Dingboche in the valley. And walking clockwise around the stupa at the entrance to Dingboche, I uttered a little prayer, glad that we all made it thus far. So far so good.

The Dingboche Stupa greeting us. [Photo: Alex]

Was I tired after this relatively short 6 hours trek? That was the question that I asked myself. The truth was, I was feeling the fatigue. The effects of 6 hours at 4000m and higher, compounded by the past few days of continuous trekking, had taken a toll on me. My abdominal muscles were aching from rapid hyperventilation of deep breathing. And a gradual deficit in caloric replacement was also beginning to show. My food poisoning symptoms were starting to get worse, as was Ah Sing's. Our whole family had been taking probiotics for one whole months to strengthen our gastrointestinal system. But somehow, the E.coli bacteriae were pretty strong out here. Many of us even had tyhpoid vaccination done prior to this trip, thus I was quite confident that we should be immuned to salmonella infections.

Our hotel at Hotel Family Dingboche.  And what a beautiful sunset! [Photo: Kc Tng]

The good thing was, Serene and I had no pain nor aches of our thighs and legs. That was reassuring. I was half expecting ourselves to be experiencing these, like our last few treks. But the consistent slow pace really had helped. There was no lactic acid accumulation and we were both fine, muscularly.

Mimi was so overjoyed to arrive at Dingboche. [Photo: Kai Sing]

Alex very happy with his room at Dingboche. But that night was really cold. [Photo: Lai Peng]

That evening in the dining hall of Family Hotel Dingboche...

Dingboche was cold that night. The temperature registering a negative 11 degrees. We were lucky to have mobile phone signals on NCell SIM cards all the way up to even Debuche. But once we arrived at Dingboche there was no more signal. Some of the boys actually had to buy a 600NPR Everest trek WIFI package that allowed a maximum of 200Mb of usage at all the participating guesthouses from Dingboche upwards even to EBC. That was a smart move. That wifi package was quite useful. But at that point in time I was too preoccupied with other matters to think of buying that...

First thing we did was to head towards the central 'heater' [Photo: Alex]
Click on the image above to see another photo of more of us gathered here taken by Kai Sing.

The sunset that evening was very lovely, that was what I heard.  But I was too shagged to even go out.  But some of the guys did.  I remembered Patrick, Kc Tng and Ah Tan being one of the several brave souls who were out in the freezing weather to catch the sunset.

It was later Patrick recalled asking one of the boys: "I still remembered that I saw he setup tripod and taking sunset shot at Dingboche. I approached him and stand beside him, I see his camera screen and ask, sunset美吗？ he answered me, 一点都不美的.。(Not nice at all)"

Heng ah! Luckily I just kept warm in the dining hall instead of being outside.

More of our team members were falling sick, or starting to fall sick.
Cantona was really coughing and having sore throat. He was started on antibotic. So was LayK. Ah Sing's diarrhoea and nausea was bad. I had to give her an injection and start her on Ciprofloxacin. That night she would sleep with Serene and I while we keep an eye on her. Jeffrey's symptoms were still mild, this strong man, thus symptomatic treatment was administered.
Serene kept urging me to let her give me a shot for my food poisoning but I refused (I would regret that later). But like Ah Sing, I had started myself on Ciprofloxacin. KS, Alex, Lai Peng were all strong as yaks. So I was quite reassured with them. Cheng Cheng, Raymond, Zaid, KK, Ah Leong, DT, TJK all were in good shape.

At 4410m, many of our SaO2 were already starting to drop. Many of us were registering lower SaO2 than the evening before. This jump of 700m really made quite some difference. It was a landmark altitude, and I found many at 80% and late 70% that evenings. The usual ones who were well adapted were still reading 92-95% - Zaid was still way above 90%, Ai Lin and Ryan were at 96-97%, Fann, Ah Sing and Ah Li were also in the mid-90% ranges. Myself? Surprisingly I was reading am SaO2 of 92% with heart rate of only around 60+/min. Not having experience in managing altitude sickness, I was very intrigued by the data I had been gathering over the past few days.

Our AlpineMat was starting to develop symptoms of gastroenteritis (food poisoning) and was having a diarrhoea. As I was checking someone's oxygen saturation, he suddenly managed to do a somersault and a vasovagal syncope (meaning, blacked out) right there and then at the Hotel Family Dingboche dining hall, that really gave me one helluva shock. But youth was a great resource in itself, for after elevating his legs and lying him down, and after some intramuscular injections of Copan, the recovery was miraculous.

"What happened ah? I didn't black out, did I?" asked him, pale-faced after he came to. Yah, you didn't black out, what-the-fertiliser. He was the last person I expected to faint on me. Hahaha...

There was an Ang Moh man sitting on the next table. He later offered some kind help and spoke to Darric. Apparently he was also a medical doctor and he offered us medical equipment and medication should we be in need. Such a generous fellow trekker so remote up here in the Himalaya.

Among us, Ashley was really the poor one because not only was she having gastroenteritis, she was also having some upper respiratory infection, in addition to her AMS. Her fatigue had set in. Checking on her, her SaO2 was in the mid 70%. Hmmm.. still not good. Serene was chaperoning me. I held her hand and looked at her.

"Ashley, your are really not that well now. I am going to help you. And I am going to give you two injections and some more medicine. But please, you must trust me. I am going to get you out of this AMS thing." She nodded her head and grit her teeth. My admiration. She was a real tough girl.

With Serene's help, we administered all the necessary jabs and medications. And with just garlic soup for dinner, suggested by Babu, she retired early that night.
Adrian surveyed the group and the decision was made for AlpineMat to rest from the acclimatisation climb the next day as he was dehydrated and tired from the food poisoning. That was, in my opinion, a good decision. I was grateful that Adrian was there. As a Team leader, any final decision was his. My presence merely was to assist in whatever treatment I could offer and my opinion.





EBC TREK Day 7: A really happy day of acclimatisation at Dingboche!
24 Nov 2017


Here is the Relive video of our acclimatisation trek on this day  at Dingboche on Day 7, the 24th Nov 2017:

Relive 'Acclimatisation climb at Dingboche'

Here is the Strava Flyby for this trek. Just click on the image below, Play and zoom in.  On this day everyone seemed to guai guai trekked in a pack closely together as we breathlessly ascended the trek.  Everyone trekked at almost the same pace. It was an relaxing trek. Shorter than we expected, but still quite a climb. A short but sharp trek. Nice.

Here is my Garmin record of the acclimatisation trek in Dingboche.


The VIDEO: A lovely acclimatisation climb at Dingboche and a Special Guest appearance!



Last night the mercury really plunged in Dingboche. Ah Li's bottle of mineral water became frozen ice in the room early in the morning. And Fann had difficulty flushing the toilet after she pooped because the water in the toilet bowl had all became frozen. The nice lodge lady gave her a big tub of hot water to melt the toilet bowl ice and allow her to finally flush it.
That was how cold it was. It had always amazed me, how simply the mountain peoples of the Himalaya lived their lives. With no heaters and totally at the mercy of the elements.

Fann was chit-chatting with the lady boss of the guesthouse in the morning.  The nice lady revealed that Dingboche was too cold a place for her.  Thus during winter from December to March, she would go down and spend three to four months in Kathmandu before coming back to Dingboche again.  That was unexpected to me.  I would have thought she would be so used to the bitter coldness in this little village by now.  So it seemed that even the locals do take winter holidays to warmer parts.

Early morning panorama of Hotel Family Dingboche [Photo: Patrick]

By now, even Ai Lin accepted the fact that acclimatisation day meant trekking still. But this lady was really something. Her SaO2 remained in the high 90% ranges every time I checked hers, and on the trek she would be so fast and far ahead that Kong Wan had to chase after her often.

"How do you manage to trek so fast?" we asked Ai Lin.

"I don't know leh. I just walked lor. But I cannot walk slow. My natural pace is fast, because if I walk slower I will start to feel cold." was her honest answer.

"You do a lot of running?" she was asked.

"No leh.. I run lah.. But I can do endurance sports lor," that was her answer. And by now we could see why. Her VO2Max must be very high.

 So poor Kong Wan, despite him trying to control his heart rate within zone 2 by falling back and trekking with the rear group, he often found himself hurrying to chase after his wife and son, both who probably had some genetic ancestry with some mountain folks.

Everyone taking photo of sunrise over the peak/ [Photo: Fann]

To be frank, we didn't know what to expect for this days' acclimatisation trek. We kind of believed that we would be required to trek up to somewhere near the altitude of around 4900m or 5100m to get our bodies ready for the last push over the next few days. We had become rather blase about it after one week of trekking.
The morning started off cold. At 4400m and higher, we knew the whole day we would be trekking in sub-zero weather. It was only how much sub-zero it would be. The nights were absolutely frigid. I was sure in Dingboche, Lobuche and Gorak Shep the average nightly temperature would have been around negative 15-20 degrees celsius, just that my mobile signals weren't working and I didn't have the information. One of the guys who was holding a Garmin Oregon did show a negative 20 degrees on one of the early mornings.

Thus from this point onwards, I could see most of us trekking in all our layers throughout the day. The most one would do would be just to remove one outer layer when the sun shone during midday, but the rest of the layers stayed on. The only exception was still Jeffrey the robot. He was still trekking in his base layers and a couple of office T-shirts!

[Photo: Fann]

The morning trek started off sharply steep, giving us no chance to rest. I was surprised to find that quite a few of the cheongsters were willingly trekking slowly behind Serene on the way up.

"Let Mama lead the way, we follow Mama's pace," declared Darric, who was guai guai following behind Serene.

"Yah, I am happy walking behind Serene," said Kai Sing even.

These guys were clever. Acclimatisation climbs were meant to be enjoyed. I was still, however, hyperventilating all the way as I walked up. I gradient was steep all the way. And the zig-zagging was unrelenting.

We looked upwards and there was nothing but the top of a small hill. We looked downwards, and Dingboche had become smaller and smaller. We were all in the middle of nowhere.

[Photo: KC Tng]

Today all very guai. All followed slowly behind Serene! Funny lah!

[Photo: Fann]

[Photo: Fann]

The steep slope finally gradually even out to some kind of view point with many mani stones and longdas scattered over a plain, and prayer flags strewn high over them. This was a rest point. I was personally grateful to have a chance to slow down my hyperventilation a little.

[Photo: Alex]

The view was magnificent. The mountains struck a grand pose with their snow peaks at an angle and the dark rocky base. The tundra shrubs lined the plain. Rocks and fine dust covered all the grounds. this was, according to our Garmin, at an altitude of 4500+m. A few of the boys who were wearing the Garmin watches were also puzzled that the altitude was around that level. It wasn't as high as we expected ourselves to be.

"What altitude does your watch say?" asked Babu. And when I showed him, he said, "Well, it's actually around 4700m here. Sometimes the GPS will show slightly differently."

Adrian and Babu made a decision to cut the exercise right here. I was personally hoping to climb higher actually. But in hindsight I thought their decision was correct because they needed to strike a balance between ascending sufficiently high, and not to tire us out, understanding that many of us were already fatigued from our days of trekking.

Panorama by yours truly

As we were wandering taking in the sight, another group of Singaporean trekkers came up, led by none other than Khoo Swee Chiow himself. This was the group that was going to EBC like us, but after that they were going to summit Island Peak at 6189m. The summit was a really technical summit and looking around their small 10 person group, some of our members were muttering among ourselves that they were not young, but they were much fitter than us, and trekking at a faster pace. Apparently Khoo Swee Chiow trained his group members very strictly to ensure that they attain certain levels of physical fitness as the Island peak summit was going to challenging.

[Photo: Kai Sing]

Adrian was surveying the background and finally found a spot that he wanted to take a few group photos.

Group 1 photo at Dingboche acclimatisation point. [Photo: Adrian]

Group 2 photo at Dingboche acclimatisation point. [Photo: Adrian]

I really liked the vantage point as the mountain texture and lines in the distant were really unique, and made for a beautiful backdrop. For good measures, Adrian also took a group photo for our family. I think he was worried he might have missed some of us as we were so slow walking behind. Hahaha!

Many of us started taking selfies, and wefies and shooting for each other. Here was a beautiful wefie shot by Cheng Cheng.
Serene and I couldn't help but strike a Korean pose. And Ah Li quickly grabbed a shot of us.

And then someone started shouting out..

"Hey, guys! Let's take a shot with Mr Khoo Swee Chiow!" and this pleasant gentleman obliged. Despite his group starting to move off, he took his time and let us take group photos after group photos with him. Such a nice man!

Photo: KC Tng

[Photo: Patrick]

Photo: Lai Peng

OK, finally it was time to descend. And we were glad to be heading back towards the warmth of Hotel Family Dingboche.

[Photo: Kai Sing]

It was half past twelve when we arrived back at Hotel Family Dingboche. And the sun was nice and warm. Some smart fellow started sunning his solar panel and shoes and underwear and base layers and wet clothes on the zinc roof just beside the front porch and soon everyone followed suite.

I was still fully clothed in my layers, except for the thick outer down layers. The sun was warm, but I could still feel that the air was cold.

Darric, Jeffrey and DT realised that their trekking boots had decided to call it half a day, and had started yawning in the front and at the side. Luck was on their side. Babu magically appeared with a can of super glue from the guesthouse boss and Dilip started working on their shoes. It actually did the job, and the boots all held. But just to be on the safe side, Jeffrey still went ahead and buy another new pair of trekking shoes somewhere nearby.

Talking about somewhere nearby, after lunch, Alex, Kai Sing, Lai Peng, Ka Lin, Kong Wan and family all went gai gai-ing around Dingboche and they found a French bakery and had a nice tea there. I really salute these good people. They would forever be on the lookout for luxuries, even during the most hardship trip.




That evening...

We were all tired. More were starting to have respiratory infection. Serene and I were making our rounds and started a few more on antibiotics and cough and nose medicine. So far no new cases of food poisoning. The fine dust and the mountain air really had been the triggers for all these respiratory symptoms.

The next day would be another landmark day - the trek to Lobuche at 4900m. That would present with another hurdle as I believed 4900m would tax our bodies even more.

Meanwhile we could do nothing but rest and sleep.

Steaming our buffs. [Photo: Kai Sing]

Click here to go to the next part:
EBC Trek Part 3 ~ The Final Push. Dingboche to Lobuche. Lobuche to Gorak Shep and to EBC and back to Gorak Shep.