Friends in the High Places

Our flight into Kathmandu today went just about as smoothly as possible. All our bags arrived, no issues getting our visas, and I was able to pick up a SIM card for the cell phone and data card for the laptop on the way to the hotel.  I did learn one important lesson here – cash is king!  Nobody takes credit cards in Kathmandu.  And if you don’t have enough cash to exchange when you get here, it’s really hard to get more.

Toward the end of the flight in, we saw some mountains sticking up above the clouds, with huge snow plumes coming off their southern sides as the jet stream was blowing the snow off of their northern flanks.  A little later, the captain announced that one of them was Everest (and Lhotse and Nuptse just to their South), so we’re pretty sure the others were Cho Oyu and Ama Dablam.  What we want to be in position and ready for is the window during which the jet stream moves off of the mountain, allowing us to try to summit.

We met the rest of the team we are going in with today, several base camp trekkers, a Lobuche climber, a Camp III climber, and another going to the South Col.  Mark and I were the only Lhotse climbers there today, the third on our team is already trekking in the Khumbu valley.

Tomorrow morning we have a 5 AM flight that will take us up to Lukla, the start of the trekking route, and then it’s on…  We’re pretty happy that the international travel part of the trip is over, and that it went smoothly.  From here on we’ll have more direct control over our progress.