High Alti-food

Woke up quite easily in our little wooden room. Having the extra duve had been really nice. The view of mountains of pine trees blanketing our window was incredible. We had omelette, toast, more omelette and toast, and hot chocolate, and set off.

It was very Pocohontas. All towering tree covered mountains, rushing milky rivers, and rickety suspension bridges.

It was a very hard uphill walk. Was drenched in sweat and so hot under the sun.

The paths veered between sandy slopes, and tumbling rocks, as quickly as my mood veered between calm, stoic, and I cannot listen to Blind Spice comment on another waterfall. Yes, there are a lot of waterfalls. There's also a lot of trees, rocks, clouds, and problems I have with you.

Took about four hours but eventually the steep path climbed round to Namache Bazaar clinging to the side of the mountain. We were very surprised as it is massive. About 100 largeish stone buildings with coloured tin roofs perched on a tiered grassy town. It falls away into a deep bowl of gully with, yes that's right Blind Spice, a waterfall.

In our bedroom we're the same height as the thick swathes of cloud misted the gully so it looks like the town falls away to nothing, to the bottom of the world.

Himalayer up

It was very cold in the evenings but most guesthouses were nice. Wooden inside from floor to ceiling, like in Twin Peaks, but less jazz music following my every sultry move.

Very cold and damp. We felt like we'd never get warm, however, a hot shower for £5 and all my red fleecy downy layers made me feel less chilled to the bone.

Ash, El and I went to get internet. The kids in the group followed us but a long queue combined with their short attention spans meant they soon peeled off to swap stories about PPE 101.

Afterwards in the room we made a sofa out of a duvet and cuddled together reading. It was so cold and misty outside that my tee shirts drying on the windowsill outside got icier. But we got cosier and fell asleep together on our sofa before dinner.

We entertained the kids over dinner (garlic soup, garlic potatoes, and vegetablely pasta) with word games and had loads of fun amid the popcorn debris. Laughed a lot.

Hasidic Spice was very annoying though. Her hair is probably so heavy on her head that her brain is slowed. She must have had it cut off when she got her first in Econboringnomics.

Anyway, it took Pemba about 15 mins to explain the next days plan to her and Blind Spice. Who by the way can't take a joke. Especially not about dying in her sleep due to being fussy and taking Altitude Sickness tablets unnecessarily.

Want to go to bed but it's just so cosy on our carpetted benches around the stove, and I don't want to miss Josh asking Usama and Daneel more probing questions about Ramadan, plane bombing, and generally being evil Muslims

The blind leading the blind

Walking was mostly very hot and sweaty. The tree covered mountains, rushing waterfalls, and clouds were very beautiful but it was a bit overwhelming so I preferred to look at my feet.

Eurgh, how can Hasidic Spice bear to live with her vision being blinded by those frightful ringlets.

Oh the title of this chapter comes from her best friend Shrew Face. She's wearing black prescription sunglasses and waving her walking poles about in front of her so I've nicknamed her Blind Spice. El and I keep getting stuck walking by her and have to swiftly move back.

We passed lots of cute Nepali children playing outside in the dirt. Everything here gets covered in dirt. We passed a landslide which had destroyed two houses and killed six people. Daneel took a photo. He snaps everything.

We stopped for lunch gratefully at one of the many guesthouses. Ah a familiar meal. Carb on carb.

Trekfast

Hasidic Spice (our leader dresses like she's from the 90s with hair like a Hasidic Jew), is wearing a tee shirt which says 'Anything unrelated to elephants is irrelephant.' I'll get it for Chaz as a joke. She loves elephants but will hate this.

Everything feels a bit damp like we're at a festival, but obvs better as no music, and it's an adventure.

We were woken at 7 am with knocks on the wooden doors of our little rooms. I found it very hard to get up. Felt a little cheated as I'd woken in the night and not been able to sleep again until I'd 'Quelled.' Yes, a side effect is feeling sleepy..

Was cold and damp but after I'd drenched my face with ice cold water from the tap I perked right up.

We had porridge and toast with a boiled egg for breakfast. My solid egg yolk fell out my egg and rolled across the room. We had yak butter.

We had our big bags loaded on to the yaks and we began our walk.

Our Lukla is in

Nestled in Lukla (2850m) in my guesthouse bed at 7.30am. It's up the first bit of mountain after the most dangerous airport in the world.

Last night in Katmandu we had a traditional Nepali meal. Here's a picture but the most important thing to know is that they start every meal with a starter of popcorn. Pemba our guide says school children take it to school for lunch too.

Anyway, I'm in my sleeping bag trying to rest whilst there is a lot of banging and screeching outside. Main yellow boy keeps yelling about 'going into town'. Where does he think he is? Sheffield? They're probably going to take emo photos of their walking boots in a circle from above, or every puddle and piece of yak poo they stumble on.

Katman(can I)do this?

Dear Everest Diary,

I'm at the airport trying to ignore the rest of the group until my actual friends arrive. Our leader person has made us put on our yellow charity tee shirts and have a photo. Hope my grimace doesn't break the camera...

Oh, El and Ash have arrived now which is nice. They're trying to make me mingle with the yellow monsters though. As a compromise I let the only other two Asian girls make a beeline for me. We can make a glossy black haired clique.

MMMm plane food. Looks like a serving of sick with an egg on top. Just WYDUAS's style.

What a scramble!

Before I climbed Everest I did a practise run in the lakes with my darlings. Had been told I needed to wear my walking boots in a bit and odd trips to the supermarket in them just wasn't cutting it.

We arrived on the Saturday and after much red wine, merriment and, 'Are you there Moriarty?' we tucked ourselves up to dream of sunny walks and sunny side ups. I was happily snuggled up with Roast and slept very well.

We bounced out of bed the next morning and set about our egg factory. If we were going to be scrambling up mountains we needed some

sustenance! I set Sashy to the task of toast butterer. She had almost as good a good handle on the butter knife as old Peaches used to. But lets not talk about that before breakfast...

Then we shimmed up loads of mountains only stopping when the Dad's announced it was tea break and Twix time. We were on top of the world!