Day four of our trek has brought us to Tengboche. We left Namche Bazaar this morning around 8:00 am after another great breakfast. The hotel we stayed at in Namche was wonderful. Beautiful views, spacious rooms, hot showers, and flush toilets. While we were sad to leave the conveniences, we were excited to proceed with the trek.
Today’s hike was sharply uphill at the beginning, followed by a fairly steep downhill to a river which runs through the valley. We ate lunch at the low point of the hike right by the river. Once again, the meal was great. The quality of the meals has been one of the surprises of the trip for most of us. We don’t know if that will continue throughout the trip, but it has been a pleasant surprise.
Yak caring loads
We started hiking again around 12:30. The trail was quite steep all the way to Tengboche. Unfortunately, about halfway up the trail, we got behind a caravan of about 10 yaks loaded down with bags and supplies. In addition to slowing we down quite a bit, them kicked up a lot of dust. We couldn’t get around them until just before we arrived at Tengboche.
Tengboche sits at an altitude of 12,600 feet. It is a small village of mostly hotels for trekkers. There is a Buddhist monastery at the top of the hill when you first arrive in town. We were told that roughly 100 monks live at the monastery. We were given a tour of the monastery by our faithful lead guide, Tendi. We saw the main worship room which consists of one large statue of Buddha in the front center of the room. There are 3 benches that the monks sit on in the middle of the floor. The walls are painted with scenes from the life of Buddha.
At Tengboche Monastery
The Nepalese staff assigned to our group has been great. We have four porters who carry our bags. These are young men who are quite small, but have amazing strength. Both of them are carrying two bags which combined must weigh 80-100 pounds. In addition to Tendi, there are four other Nepalese who walk the trails with us. Their names are Rinji, Mingmar Dendi, Mingmar, and Jeevan. They rotate being the lead hiker and hanging toward the back to make sure no one falls behind. So far, all of us are hiking strong and feeling pretty good. No significant altitude problems or sicknesses to report. Tomorrow, we head to Dingboche at roughly 14,800 feet where we will file our next report.
