3:30 in the morning is when we woke up. You'd better believe we had a darn good reason too! With no one else awake to cook us breakfast, we donned our poofy down jackets, headlamps and packs before setting off into the cold morning to the top of Kala Pathar, 400m above us.
Despite being almost pitch black, the view was incredible! Behind us the giant ridges of mountains were silhouetted against the night sky by the almost nonexistent glow of the soon to be rising sun. The stars were above us and (remembering that the only settlements within 100km of us relied mostly on solar power) shining brilliantly in the blackened sky. Looking back down the slope towards Gorek Shep there was a distant row of bobbing headlamps, slowly making their way towards us.
As the glowing mountains began to brighten we were able to gaze upward at the seemingly never ending path which we were following. I tried taking a few pictures, but the light was so dim I had to hold my breath to keep the camera from shaking. By the time my brain was finally able to scream loud enough, I was left bent over a boulder panting in the 50% trying to regain my breath for almost a minute. I turned my concentration back to walking and eventually locked into a decent stride; exhaling on my left foot and inhaling on my right at a rate of around 40 breaths per minute.
We arrived at the summit of Kala Pathar (5550m above sea level) in time to take about 2 pictures each of Everest and the incredible surrounding view before the sun rose over the ridge, completely blinding us all. We found a good seat out of the way of traffic (oh was there traffic!) and hunkered down for the morning. I sure as hell didn't come this far just to turn around and go home! While waiting for the sun to move to a more favorable position, I drank some fluids, ate some Craisins, and worked on my sunburns. We were eventually able to convince our guide that we would be alright on our own and could find our way back to the lodge without him having to wait with us for hours.
We sat on the top for almost three hours taking pictures and walking (carefully!) around. The weather was absolutely perfect, not a cloud in the sky and no wind to speak of. Once we had sufficiently photographically documented the existence of Mount Everest, we headed back down to Gorek Shep and lunch. We managed to stay awake long enough to finish eating and to make the trek back to Lobuche for the the night. At 3:00 tea we decided to try our luck with the hot lemon, but it tasted just a little to much like Neocitran to really enjoy it. We were planning on heading straight to bed after dinner, but our guide came up to us and asked "Uno time?" How could we say no?
Too much for an article. A series, perhaps. A Kindle Single? Or just a book! It's great. Don't stop. If you're between writing more and, say, Uno, write!
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