The Complete Guide to a Successful EBC Trek – Post-Trek Debrief: What I Needed (and What I Didn’t)

Hi everyone, Chris Stout here. Welcome back to the series on Everest Base Camp Trek. I'm going to go through in this list, kind of a, or this episode, a list of the equipment that they've talked about. I talked about this in one of the other companion videos. It's in the show notes below, but I'm going to go through it this time after now coming back. I've been back just a few days and kind of go through what, what they suggested needed— was needed, what I had as my list, and then also what I wound up not using. I don't know that I— there is anything in particular that I wish that I did have that I didn't bring. I'm just going to go through it that way. So this is a PDF, it's available also from their website, uh, Rugged Luxury Climbing the Seven Summits. Great folks, great outfitter. I also have it— all the documents in this entire series are also listed in Issuu, and the links for that are in the notes as well too. So basically, uh, this is the gear list. They give you a couple of them. One is sort of laid out in landscape this way, another one is inside the general package. They're pretty similar to one another, just laid out a little bit differently. This one doesn't have illustrations. You'll see the one I'm going to go through does. And then they basically, in this one, you know, like show you by body size, and you can just make your own notes and checklists and stuff. So it's just a different format, pretty much the same content, but a different handy way to use it. So that does exist. It's also in my issue. It's also available on their website. But, um, I'm not going to go through it. I'm going to go through this and through my personal list. So again, I should also preface this: a lot of it is up to your own tastes. In our group, I found that there's a lot of us, you know, it varied. A lot of us had already had some of this equipment depending upon how other adventure travel some we have been. Um, some had just recently been on a Kilimanjaro trip, so they had a lot of that equipment. Some of my equipment was getting kind of old. I that a Columbia raincoat that I had was really pretty much no longer waterproof and actually bought another one while I was on the trail in Namche at the Namche Bazaar. Got a La Sportiva there that I'm kind of looking forward to trying out. But a lot of other equipment really just wound up not being necessary. We'll go through that again too. So I am not a big fan of these. I think they're easy to kind of, you know, pull off. I get like this with passports and money, maybe underneath a shirt, but then it's cumbersome to get out if you actually need to do a transaction. So really kind of personal preference, personal taste as to how you manage your valuables and passports and things like that. Cash— I always try to bring a little too much cash, and I certainly did that. I brought literally twice as much of what I needed, but you never know if there's some kind of emergency. I was in Baku, Azerbaijan, and one of my credit cards decided to not work, so I really did need backup cash and backup credit cards. So again, take a look at that. I'm also a big fan of digital pictures of my passport on my phone. If my phone breaks, then I also have printouts of it as well too. So the old adage of two is one and one is none is kind of a delicate balance. You want to not be stuck in a bad situation and not have something if your phone dies or gets snapped, if you have credit card problems or whatever. But then also the balance with this kind of a trip is that you don't want extra stuff that's going to, you know, weigh down you or weigh down your porters or risk getting broken or just you know, being kind of a waste of weight and size and volume. We were originally told, and I thought it was because of the flying into Lukla on the plane, that we had a weight limit of 50 pounds for our duffels. I'm pretty sure that some of the folks had much over the 50 pounds. So again, just be conservative, be as light as possible. I shot for that 50 pounds and was under, so I was happy with that, just in case there was something else that that I needed to get that I had neglected. So just kind of a rule of thumb, but, but up to you. Sometimes that's not a super hard and fast rule. One of the nice things with working with Climbing the Seven Summits and Rugged Luxury is that the clothes that you travel in, or the clothes that you want to be a tourist in, can stay clean and nice in your hotel while you're away. So one of the key things with that is that you need to have an extra duffel to be able to do that. I had a small North Face duffel that I planned to do that with, but then they were very generous and gave us a brand new, pretty good-sized duffel. So that's the duffel that I wound up taking, um, having the porters take on the trek. But the big duffel that I brought everything over from the United States in then stayed in Kathmandu. So then I actually had kind of one more duffel than what I needed. I was lucky that I could fit their nice big duffel into my nice old duffel and be able to then get them both back home and didn't go overweight with that with the airlines. But maybe just double-check if you go with them or with an outfitter, you know, am I getting a bag? What size is that bag? Is that bag going to be enough for what I need? How am I going to manage my luggage? Just so you don't have those kinds of naggy issues. I— lightweight sneakers, big fan. First part of the trek, um, I used an Alta. Big fan of those. Wide toe box, which is what I like for my feet. Solid sole, Vibram sole, and I keep pointing to the Hoka. This is not— this one. And they were Gore-Tex waterproof. So big, big fan of those. Those really kind of got the job done. Shower sandals. I never took a shower outside or anything like that. It's probably even a good, good idea in some of the inside showers, but I either just went barefoot. I did bring— buy a pair of Ophos for after trail walking around. Oh, my feet really appreciated that. I also brought a pair of socks that were kind of new and cushy, Merino wool from REI. Big shout out. And those socks never were in a boot. Those were only my be around camp, be in a tea house, be in, uh, Ophos, uh, socks. So always had kind of a nice little pleasure at the end of the day to be able to get out of those socks. They say 2 pairs of light socks. I brought 2 pair of light to wear, 1 medium pair, 1 heavy pair, and then 1 pair— I was talking about a light pair to just give my feet relief. Socks don't take up a whole lot of room, they don't weigh a whole lot, and they're really kind of a pleasure. I am very blister prone. I am happy to tell you that my merino wool sock combination with my Trail Runners and with my Oboz boots, mid-to-ankle boots. Never had a hot spot, never had a blister after 40+ miles, and very, very, very happy with that. Everything was pretty well broken in. The Trail Runners were probably the least broken in, but again, no, no issues with, with any of those. So big fan. I was hoping that I might be able to keep the Trail Runners on most of the time, but I tell you, I have bad ankles and The further you go on the trail, for me at least, the more rugged it becomes and the more moraine and scree and stuff like that. So a lot of potential ankle twisters and had a really good benefit from that. I'm not a super fan of trekking poles. Everybody else on the team did, either using one or two almost the entire time. I didn't use mine literally until I— one kind of fairly steep acclimatization hike I did on the way back down, but really right around base camp. From— if you go from the Instagram rock, so to speak, of base camp to actually where we were, which was in base camp proper, it's almost another mile. And it's a very loose mile with, you know, freeze-thaw cycle with rocks, so they're all kind of loose and gravelly and quicksandy. And really, really, really needed the poles there. And even in spite of that, myself and my other teammates really found it slippery and ankle twisty and and fall downy. So again, socks— I probably talked enough about socks. I had two base liners, Long Johnnies, the kinds of things. I had a heavy duty and a light duty. I never wore the heavy duty even though it got cold as could be. I was very happy with my light liners and regular trekking pants and my light liners and my insulated pants. So that worked for me. Um, I only brought one pair of overpants. That worked out fine. They're an old pair of Kuhl pants that did have the zip-offs. Never zipped them off, I never needed to. That wasn't necessarily a feature, but it's just I like the ruggedness of that material. I like the way they fit. I could get them over either one of my long johns very easily. I really didn't need the, the two pair and didn't take them. Shell pants I had for I had one pair of rain pants. Again, they were probably a little too old, did not do a great job of keeping me dry. I would also say that I was lucky that when we needed the rain pants, we were in a tea house, so I was able to stay inside, be dry, take my boots off and put my pants on. They recommend, you know, zipper long sides, long along the sides, which makes sense so that you can put it on with your boot without taking your boot off. I wasn't going to buy a new pair of rain pants just for that feature. Worked out okay for me. If I were to do this again in the future, I'd probably throw away the pants that are— donate the pants that I have now and get a full zip side for those. You certainly don't need two pair of those, one pair is enough. And insulated pants, big fan of those. Um, oh, what to say about those. I don't think I ever actually was outside climbing in them, but I oftentimes slept in them, even in a sleeping bag, because it was super cold. -27 was, I think, as cold as it got at base camp for the time that we were there. But it's just kind of also nice psychologically to know that I had them. So a lot of times, you know, I'd show up in, uh, in the mornings or in the evenings or whatever after changing with these on over a pair of thin long johns that did the job. I got a sun hoodie, maybe just because of the weather that we had. I never used it. Which was kind of too bad. I tend to heat up pretty quick when I get going, so I basically every day I had two different t-shirts, both technical material. They were just regular t-shirts but technical material from past races. I wore those as a base. Then I had a kind of a— I don't know, it wasn't really fleece, but it's kind of like a thick material, a full zip jacket that was black. So a couple things with that With the full zip jacket, I had pockets. I had 2 down here and I had 1 here so I could keep tissues to blow my nose and ChapStick to have handy. With the full zip, I could open up and air out if I needed to. I could zip halfway up when I would stop if I needed to start to get warm. I could zip all the way up when I first started in the morning. Worked out really, really well. I should also say too that that was not my— I had 4 layers generally, sometimes 5. So I had a base layer of a technical t-shirt I then actually had an old cool button-up shirt. So again, same kind of thing, I could unbutton it as much as I wanted, I could open it up all the way if I wanted. It was white, so once this thing started getting toasty, I could take off all my black over jackets and just have the white and have it be more reflective. I could easily roll up the sleeves if I needed to, etc. So just that, that worked out really well. When I needed greater layers, I had this other, this black full zip that I was talking about. That's kind of like a, kind of like a light fleece on top of that. Then I got a puffy jacket that's down, a 70 fill for that, with a hood. Like that a lot and pretty much covered up my butt too. So good coverage, good wind protection, great to have the hood. Had it up probably half the time that I had it on. So that combo worked generally well up until base camp. Everest Base Camp, I can't remember if I think it was, I can't remember if I wore my big puffy, I've got a Mountain Hardwear big super puffy jacket. I can't remember if I wore that at Lobuche Base Camp as well too. I might have, but I know for sure I was working wearing that very much at Everest all the time. So this is kind of like the puffy, and I should also say this was a hamali that we were gifted. From, uh, um, climbing Seven Summits, CTSS Rugged Luggage. Thank you very much for that. So, and also it's good to know because I have a different puffy jacket that didn't have a hood, and it would have been kind of stupid to have brought it all the way to then not use it or leave it in Kathmandu. So if you have one, just double-check with your outfitter, you know. Yeah, I know it's probably, um, uh, not nice, but, you know, hey, say, hey, are you going to gift me this? Because if you are, then I won't bring mine. If you aren't, then I will bring mine. So that's very nice of them to surprise you with those things, but it can also just be kind of a little awkward. And sometimes you don't want all this extra stuff to leave in Kathmandu when you can leave it at home. This is similar to the shell that I had that was not waterproof. Donated it, got a shell in, in Namche Bazaar, like I mentioned, from Laspartiva. It pretty much looks kind of like this, just different colors, different zippers. But good to have that. You could also use it as not just as a windbreaker but also as a rain jacket and also with layers and keep it pretty, pretty warm. The one I got too also had like zippable armpits, which I'm a big fan of. Like I said, I— once I get going and the sun's out, I really start to cook, so I'm much more uncomfortable hot than I am cold. So it's— for me, it's nice to be able to have those options of ventilation and whatnot without having to totally take jacket off. And then big puffy, like I said, I have a Mountain Hardwear that I've had forever. It is bulletproof and just really like it. It also packs up very nicely, small size. Um, I kind of went too far on the gaiters. I had a windproof Buff gaiter, neck gaiter. I had a merino wool neck gaiter from Buff that I liked a lot, got that at REI. Got the other one, the windproof one, also at REI. And then they gifted us one. So I had a thin one that I used a lot in training, and then once they gifted this one, I— that's the one I used. And man, I wore it almost all the time, even just around my neck. I found that that little phenomenon of that around my neck really kind of kept me warm a lot, surprisingly so. I had a scarf on some other trips, like in Saudi Arabia and stuff, and found that that also helped me regulate temperature quite well. So I maybe just kind of keep a buff in any of my packing gear regardless of of weather. Um, I have a nice little beanie that I got from Jesse Itzler doing 29029. It works super, super well, so I'm a big fan of that. Wore that a lot. Wore my buff over the back part of it to cover my ears and oftentimes the hood, and I was totally comfortable, uh, head temperature-wise. Uh, the Outdoor Research weatherproof liners— these really are gloves, so I like those a lot. I had a pair of glove liners, cotton ones, that were just almost super worn out. I wound up losing one, and it was kind of no big loss because I was going to donate them or recycle them, either which way. But I had a pair of glove liners. I had, uh, Outdoor Research gloves like this that are waterproof, not great dexterity but okay, and good warmth. And then oftentimes I would put one of those little heated chemical pads inside this and pull my fingers out for from the fingertips and just kind of have a fist inside the glove to warm up my fingers. Uh, got these heavyweight gloves. I think mine are REI brand. I don't know what these are, North Face or something— Black Diamond, sorry. Um, they look just like this. They were great. Um, this is really crappy dexterity, obviously, but the point with these is to stay warm. So I wore these a lot. Also, once I was in base camp, maybe in Lover J as well too. Hot Hands, very helpful. Takes a little while for them to get warmed up, but once they do, that's pretty good. I keep them in my pockets all day, the rest of the day, or put them— swap them into my gloves, what have you. Glasses, I wound up with, um, Jillbo. I think I have kind of a crappy prescription, so I couldn't really get these kind of cool ones, but I had to get lens inserts that then went into kind of the, um, the kind that they're just like look like triathletes. They're a solid lens. Those lenses, uh, tint— they're sort of light sensitive, which was nice. So on a lighter day, I didn't have to like swap out glasses. I did bring a pair of prescription sunglasses that I had, an old pair of Varney Sides that I could put on. But once we got into the snow, I wanted to wear the glacier glasses. Plus my nose sunburned even in spite of 50 SPF sunscreen, so I needed the nose protection, which really helped as well. Too. I was pretty bundled, like, so I had a buff covering up to underneath my nose, I had the goggles covering across my face and my nose, and I had a knit cap and a hood, uh, with the buff pulled over the back part of the cap. So I just— I could have robbed a bank, you wouldn't have recognized me. I was very, very nice, very lightly, which was nice, and comfortably insulated with that against the wind and the sun and the brightness and whatnot. Um, I had a, um, Osprey 40-liter backpack, actually kind of borrowed from my son. I could have used a couple more liters in it, but it worked. It worked out fine. It got the job done. It had a Camelbak in it. I brought the Camelbak and never used it. They recommended not to do that because of the mouthpiece that some people said it might freeze. I've been in cold temperatures with those and not had it freeze. I just blow air back in the tube once I've stopped drinking. They also were concerned, like, you know, if you don't have good bag management, if you take your bag off and the little water thing touches the ground and now it's in yak, ick, and then you take a sip of that, you've got problems. So anyway, decent 40-pound, make sure it's got at least, you know, easy accessible sides for water and whatnot. And again, the bag designs are all over the place, so get a bag that you find functional for you, good capacity. Rainfly is important. Got drenched that first day with those crappy rain pants, my crappy raincoat. But my bag was fine because I had a really good rainfly that came with it. And I think maybe we're going to come up to some of those here in just a second. Again, the backpack, trekking poles. I had an old pair of crappy ones but didn't use them really until, like I said, that one steep climb and then once we're in base camp. We rented sleeping bags. I had, I think it was a North Face rated to -20, something like that, kind of mummy style and stuff. Very comfortable, very warm. Even in spite of that, I still had a lot of clothes on in base camp. I, every night, all of us would take— I had two 1.5-liter bottles. One had an insulating thing around it. I would fill both of those up with boiling water for the night and then have some water in the morning. If you put water out or had another bottle, you know, by your bag side, it would inevitably freeze. We just— it was so freaking cold. So people's toothpaste froze, their wet wipes froze, they were like parchment, they would crack. Your anything that kind of wasn't hot water— people's pee bottles froze. I mean, it's just really kind of, kind of crazy how cold it was. But if you had a hot water bottle inside your bag with you, chances are it would still stay liquid by morning. Um, I got a silk liner. People highly recommended that. I thought that would be nice too with the fact that I was using a rented sleeping bag and that might be kind of icky. Sleeping bag was not icky. This inside the sleeping bag was okay, but I was still fully dressed and stuff, so I kind of never felt it. And it just wound up kind of being a mess of trying to manage being inside that. So I used it once and then never used it again, so probably would not use it. I got an old ancient— I don't even know, I think Black Diamond probably— headlamp that I love. It's super light, holds— takes 2 AAA batteries. I'm old school. I like batteries versus the USB chargers because I find, especially on a trip like this, you don't have any place to charge them. You're too busy charging your phone or charging something else to charge up your headlamp. But, you know, if you've got a headlamp and it goes kaput, you're kind of screwed. If you got battery— if it's USB— if you got batteries, then you can always swap the batteries in and immediately you've got fresh batteries and fresh light. So I would just have sort of range anxiety. If I had a USB one. I'm sure there's other situations where they're great, nice to not have to consume and waste batteries and all that. I totally get it. But for my situation, this situation, I was a big fan of the old school Nalgene bottles, you know, kind of the classic. I got two of these from REI, liter and a half, that was plenty. Downside is they weigh a freaking ton when they're full, so that's kind of a drag. So you really, you want to drink— they wanted us to drink about 4 liters of water a day, which is what we tried to do. I was never super successful at it. Others were better at it than I, but between all that water and Diamox and altitude and everything else, you really kind of, you know, can have dehydration. I didn't have really much cramping. I took Hammer Nutrition Fizzes when I could in the evening and in the morning to get a little electrolyte boost. That was nice and helpful. SteriPen— I've had a SteriPen forever. I've got rechargeable batteries for that because it tends to use a lot of juice. Um, didn't even take it with me once I got to Kathmandu because, uh, Big Tindy, who went through my gear list with me, said basically every place is going to have boiled water or they're going to have bottled water. So you will, chances are, never have to need to do the SteriPen kind of cleaning. And I was happy with that, and I did not need it. I did not miss it. Some people brought thermoses, and believe it or not, it was so freaking cold that people's liquids inside their thermoses would freeze, which I'd never seen before. And then the tops would freeze. They couldn't unscrew. Oh, it's just really crazy cold for long periods of time. So I did not have a thermos. My Nalgene with hot water worked out fine for me. Thank you. That day that I got drenched, our guide said, you know, he's a big fan of umbrellas. So for $15 in Namche, I bought an umbrella. Never used it after that. Never got rained on after that. So I figured it was $15 of karma to keep us all dry. Left it at the hotel with, um, one of the concierge and donated it there. Some people had these, uh, ponchos, which I get it, you know, they're huge. You can get a lot of coverage with it. Uh, my problem with me, even with my rain pants, was that, you know, basically from the knees down I was still soaked in rain pants. So I think a parka would do the same thing, maybe even increase dripping. Other people didn't have parkas that, you know, fit them very well. So if you caught wind, it just like would blow up underneath you and then blow up all around your head. It would blow around because we were in very windy conditions, and big no surprise. So the hoods would blow back and you couldn't get the hood tight enough even if you had a cap on below it. You just, you had hood management problems. You had water coming in from around the hood. It was just kind of a mess. So generally the, the, and I know that they vary, I know that they're, you know, they, they're cut different, there's different designs, different materials, but people also found them just hot as could be too, just like little, you know, mini sweatsuits. So, um, your call, you know, if you like that, but What I saw was kind of more hassle than benefit with it. Nice thing is they do cover a lot of surface area. You don't need a separate rainfly for your bag. Uh, Sheer Zinc. A friend of mine on the trail got this, let me borrow it, really liked it, liked it a lot. We had been donated a stick of 50 SPF as the zinc, slathered it all over my face the first time that we started to get sunny, and I nevertheless got sunburned anyway. I don't know if it's a bad batch or what, but the little you're supposed to unscrew like a ChapStick. That didn't work right. So I'm not going to name who it is, I can't remember to be honest. But this was— I don't know what it cost because a friend let me borrow it, but it was certainly very much worth it. So do get a very good sunscreen. The higher you go, the more UVs you're going to be getting. I wore my, my glove liners on my hands primarily not for temperature but for sun protection. So a lot. And then I would wear a cap, and I had the goggles, I had the buff, I the hood. So I was doing really a lot of stuff to try and get sun protection that way. Earplugs, I didn't— I think I might have had some. I probably buried in a dop kit that I always carry, but I never did use them. Cameras, your phone, because you're going to use that like crazy. I brought a little thin Stoic philosophy book by Seneca because it was light and I've always been wanting to read it and just gone to it here and there. Other people brought, you know, iPads and whatevers and read on their phone. I just kind of want to disconnect, so I really didn't do— I don't think I ever touched the Seneca book. I certainly did not download movies or anything on my phone, just kind of wanted to chill, conserve electricity on my phone, not worry about charging and having anxiety that way. But that's, you know, really kind of up to you. A lot of other people did bring books, even hardbacks and stuff, and left them and donated. Hand sanitizer, big, big, big deal. I had that in a couple of places and just, you know, used it all the time. So really important. I had a little small soap and kind of coarse washcloth and travel towel and shampoo. I just, I could not bring myself to shower. It's so freaking cold. So, and honestly, I didn't, not to be crass, but did not stink that much either. So, which is just kind of weird, maybe just because it was so dry and evaporates so quick, but did feel grungy, did feel grimy. When I got back to Kathmandu, I told everyone, we became very close with one another about our hygiene, that I'd actually washed my hair 5 times to kind of get the dust and ick and whatever oil. I tend to run kind of oily in my skin and hair, so that was just a godsend to be able to do that. The pro side of having dry skin or oily skin is that in these dry climates, everybody else is really complaining about cracking skin and dry skin and flaking skin. I did not have that problem. So again, if you tend to be more oily, chances are you're going to be less washy and not miss it that much. I did bring wipes Used those a few times just to kind of clean up and stuff like that. That was nice and beneficial, but like I said, one day they— colleagues had frozen. I did bring a pillowcase. I actually only used that once. A trekking towel, of course, toothbrush, toothpaste. They've got it down here twice. I always carry a nail trimmer. I also brought a toenail trimmer just in case if there were some issues with my feet. A pee bottle was just a lifesaver too, to not have to get out of that tent when it was so freaking cold. But then you also have the anxieties of maybe like 2 pees a night and, oh, am I going to overflow it or whatever. One person actually did have that problem. The trash bags are basically to use as waterproofing for our duffels. Um, some people put all their stuff in the trash bag and then the trash bag in the duffel. I used it just as a liner around the zipper. I never really had any problems with that. Uh, medical kit I've gone over in my other video. Take a look at that. It's also listed out in the issue. They recommended 4 pounds of snack food. I probably came back with 3 pounds of snack food. So I just, I didn't have a whole lot of appetite even for the stuff that I wanted to bring. I would also tell you bring money rather than snack food because you can, if you want stuff like Snickers and Kit Kats and stuff, they are ubiquitous. They are everywhere. They're not expensive. If you want some more esoteric stuff, you can probably find it. If you got something special, super specialty, maybe you want to bring that. But otherwise, there's always, you know, I never, never went hungry, so to speak. So this again, just kind of a summarization of their checklist, etc., and kind of, you know, what's what in trekking gear, and just kind of a reiteration in a different format as a literal checklist to this. So let's shift over from theirs into what I used. Okay, these are kind of what I call my yellow sheets. So this is kind of how I categorize being a little bit obsessive-compulsive with things. So these are the foodstuffs that I brought, and this kind of overlaps within like gels that I brought and some of the stuff. I'm sponsored by Hammer Nutrition, so I have like their Tissue Rejuvenator, which is, you know, good for your knees and whatnot. And I'm a big fan of inulin in the evening for as a probiotic. I didn't bring protein powder, I had protein bars. So ginger chews just for fun, fizz, etc. So just pretty straightforward with that. I probably used certain things like Fizz very frequently, their greens, I took that every day, but you know other stuff if I had some aches and pains I would take, but really didn't have a whole lot of that, thank goodness. Never took any ibuprofen, didn't have problems with altitude. I took Diamox, so that might have helped with that, plus we had a good acclimatization schedule, and again just didn't have super appetite. I am vegan when I'm normally at home, I was vegetarian vegetarian while I was on this trip. And I think sometimes just kind of dealing with a lot of fatty stuff like french fries, which tastes great, but after a few times really kind of get to your stomach, or some of the soups that might be a little more cream-based, um, did not play well with my stomach. I had one day where I just really had a— I was not well. I took Imodium so that I wouldn't get dehydrated with diarrhea and just had a lot of vomiting. Sorry about that. After strenuous hike up to high camp at, um, Loboche. But then after that, within about 24 hours, I was okay. So that was good. Uh, tech— this is all really kind of up to you. I brought 2 battery banks because I had electricity anxiety, power anxiety. Never used either one of those. Um, I brought like a 3-in-1 adapter thinking that I'm gonna have to like borrow from other people's chargers and stuff. Never had to use that. Um, straight pin and stuff never even made it out of Kathmandu. I had a plug that I used actually in Istanbul in the airport. I went Chicago, Istanbul, Kathmandu to be able to charge things there in the airport. There's supposed to be a unique weirdo 3-prong plug that I happen to have that's supposed to only be in India and Kathmandu, Nepal. Never had a socket that had to deal with that. So any of the power bank, any of the power cords and stuff, I'll solar at any of the base camps. Regular US, United States plug fit into that, North American plug fit into that. At my hotel in Kathmandu at the Yak and Yeti, regular plug, no— pardon me— no adapters or anything like that necessary. So again, this is just the socks and tees and whatnots that I talked about. I did bring a pair of trunks because there was a hot hot tub at the hotel. There's a pool. I didn't go into that. I did do the hot tub. Um, a little tip I heard from someone on the internet was rather than put— like, I didn't have a big— I have a big lock for my duffel, but it's not a TSA lock. So I put a Ziploc, a zip tie on it. So if someone needed— is secure— and if someone needed to get into it, they could just cut the zip tie. And security, like their version of TSA or whatever, so that worked out pretty well. Um, let's see, I mock-packed my Osprey bag, zip ties with the duffels. Toiletries, pretty straightforward. I brought 2 big rolls of toilet paper because again I was paranoid about that. Left one in Kathmandu and used a tenth of the one that I brought with me on the trails. Just about most of the time, you know, being a male, I didn't need it after urinating, but most the hotels or tea rooms, tea houses, did have toilet paper. A lot of times you couldn't flush it, you had to put it in an adjacent trash can, but there was typically enough of it. But I always had a little, little bit with me just in case, so that little peace of mind. First aid kit, I'm very happy to say, other than using Imodium, I did get a little bit of a sore throat and felt like cold symptoms at the beginning, so I took bolus of vitamin C and zinc um, but, um, I did not have blisters or issues with that. I had tape and paper and tincture of benzoin and scissors and tweezers and all this stuff, cotton balls and alcohol and whatnot. Never did need to use that. Clothes and boots and shoes and socks, pretty much already covered. My cap, I didn't say, but it's just an Outdoor Research Gore-Tex cap. That was good. Medz, I did take the anti-diarrheal. I took Diamox. I had eye drops. Uh, let's see, anti-nausea, bronchodilator I did not have, azithromycin I did have for GI or lung stuff, didn't need it. Took vitamins every day, had aloe in case of sunburn, didn't need that. Took an oral vaccine for typhoid. I was going to take nuts but wound up not doing that and actually didn't miss them. Gear, you know, talked about all that pretty much, I think, before— EpiPens and water bottles and trekking poles and whatnot. And then this was just kind of my countdown of all the stuff I needed to do just the week before. So that's kind of it in a very large nutshell. You'll see lots of packing lists in a variety of YouTube videos of other people's. I also have like a separate whitepacking list that I just kind of use with every kind of trip. Again, check the show notes below because you can get that and read that and issue any of these materials as well too. So I hope this is helpful so that you don't necessarily bring anything extra that you don't need to take from the United States at all. Maybe there's some stuff with— now that you know that you don't need, that will allow you to bring something else that might be a treat or something for you to bring with you. Keeping it— again, I think the ethic of trying to stay under 50 pounds is a a good thing to do for a variety of reasons, but it also gives you a little bit more space if you're the kind of person that needs to bring back some, some goodies and knickknacks and stuff as gifts for others. So again, I hope this has been helpful. If there's anything, reach out in the show notes or reach out in the comments below if there's anything I can do to be of help or any questions I might be able to ask. So I hope you will have a wonderful Base Camp trek and event. Hope it'll go as well as ours did, and maybe just be a little bit warmer. Thanks so much. I hope you enjoy the series. Please do like and subscribe and tell your friends. Take care, drive safe, be safe, climb safe.