Nate Buchanan climbs from Dingbuche to Lobuche, a 600-meter ascent to 4700 meters. Wind, cold, and brief snow make the five-hour hike brutal. That night in the tea house, altitude sickness looms before the final push to base camp.
Nate Buchanan (uploaded May 25, 2016).
Dingbuche to Lobuche.
About 600 meters.
About five hours.
About 4700 meters.
Sarts is it day seven? Yeah. This morning we're heading from Dingbuche to La Buche, which is about 600 meters in elevation. It should take about five hours. And the craziest part is it's our last hike before we go to base camp.
Sam.
It's about 10:15. We're stopping for lunch. False alarm. It was too early for lunch, so we're getting tea instead. Tee time is up, and now we're going straight up this mountain to Labouche. It's the coldest I've been. The wind has picked up dramatically. Thankfully, we're about to climb a mountain to warm up. We're about to climb straight up this little ditch right here.
How you feeling, Kara? I'm already getting warmer. Good. Fingertips are a little cold, but my legs are feeling good. My legs and my lungs are feeling good. It's important. Yeah. Been hearing stories about people who've dropped out due to altitude sickness. Yeah. People are going cuckoo up here. Throwing up.
It's getting real.
This has definitely been the hardest part of the entire trek. We're at about 4700 meters. We can definitely tell we're at altitude and we are hiking straight up this mountain.
With that said, I think we're both feeling pretty good. And the views today have been the best of the entire trek.
We'll make it to base camp tomorrow, no problem. It's getting super windy up here. Here, you can tell by the solar panel on my back. Absolutely freezing. Right down there is the village we came from less than an hour ago. Quite the hike.
What's that? Oh, co.
It's snowing for the first time.
Just a little bit, but it's snowing. Hopefully we'll get some more. Now we're taking this trail all the way down through the valley, as close to the mountain as you can see. One of the hard things about trekking is you want to look up at all the scenery because it's gorgeous, but then you drip over a rock every few steps. So I'm trying to find a balance of looking up and seeing the scenery and looking down and making sure I don't base plant like.
Well, this is where we're staying for tonight. Tea house in the middle of the mountains. We can actually see them all right now.
Time to get some lunch. Thank you.
Thank you very much. After we got some tea house this afternoon, I started feeling, like, dizzy and probably like I was getting altitude sickness. Really freaked me out. Took it easy this afternoon. Played some cards with friends. Now we're having doll bot for dinner before I go to sleep. Hope I feel better in the morning to go to basic.
Down.
