Day 11 21st February 2011

Dingboche to Lobuje ( 4928m)

A gradual climb above the Pheriche Valley then descend to cross the Khumba Dughla.  From here we witness the huge terminal moraines of the Khumbu Glacier flowing off Mt Everest.

Onwards to a tea house at Lobuje.

The scale of the mountains and the distances are incredible

A 6.30 am wake up call, revealed an overcast day.  We set off just after 8, from or Dingboche lodge.  We took the track, we had climbed the day before, then veered off to the left, for a hard pull for an hour.

What was that Who song - I can see for miles and miles and miles...............

As you can see we are well above the tree line now

The day was still generally cloudy, interspersed with some clear patches.  The route followed the Kongma La Trek, which took us up to a height of 4800m. We stopped for lunch at the bottom of the valley - lots of carbs again, chips , toasted cheese sandwich and tuna, of course all washed down with a few more cups of tea.


This is the lodge of our lunchtime stop

The trek after lunch was tough, quite rocky terrain.  In England you would do this distance in 30 minutes, here it took 3 times that.

A rather icy cold river

The last half hour was flatter and finally down to Th Eco Lodge at Lobuche - which was originally a summer village for yak herders. We probably trekked for 6 1/2 hours today.

Still plenty of snow to contend with!

The Eco Lodge is named because it is constructed from stone and aluminium rather than the more traditional timber.  This lodge and the previous one are solar powered, the ones prior to that being run from hydro-electric power.  The little led lights will only keep going until about 10pm - if you can stay awake that long!!