Everest 2006: Fi and Paul: Trekked to Dingboche

Location: Dingboche
Altitude: 4300m
Local Time: 4:50pm, 29 March, 05
Weather: Sunny, 10C

Hi its Paul here, coming to you from sunny Dingboche. Today we got up at 6am had breakfast of French toast, eggs and porridge (we are doing it tough!) and by 7:30 we were on our way to Dingboche.

The walk to Dingboche
It was pretty cold last night; I had to pull my sleeping bag tight around my head to keep warm. Its still a light bag, and we have warmer ones for base camp. In the morning there was ice in our water bottles and our toothpaste was firm, but still usable. The trail was icy so we had to be very careful with our footing. Its a wide well made path to Dingboche, although there were a lot of yaks along the way, which can make life interesting. Yaks walk a bit slower than we do, so we are often passing them. With their loads strapped to each side and trains of up to 10 yaks in a row, its a bit like trying to pass several semi trailers in a car!

After an hour we took off our polar fleeces, and hiked in travel pants and t-shirts. Yes, it does get warm here during the day.

Passing through Pangboche
Along the way we passed through the town of Pangboche, which seemed to be quite a large town, with many fields, all with 1m high stone walls around them. After Pangboche we ascended through the tree line, so the landscape is much more sparse. Lunch was had in a small village called Orsho about an hour after Pangboche. Afterwards we dropped down to a small river and crossed it on a very rickety bridge. Chris wanted to get a photo of Bridget on the bridge and he made her stand right in the middle for the photo! She wasn't too happy about this. We then climbed a short distance uphill to Dingboche, arriving at about 1pm.

Dingboche
We are camped in the grounds of the house of our trek Sirdar, who is a Sherpa called Phu Tashi. He is a really friendly, helpful guy and no request seems too much for him.

Dingboche is a nice place, nestled between two ridges, so it seems to be somewhat sheltered. That said, the wind has been picking up, so I hope we are not in for a rough night.

The four of us are feeling fine at the new altitude, however Bridget has a sore stomach, but hopefully its nothing serious. I had a bit of a stomach upset the other day, but I took a couple of Ciprofloxacins at night and I was feeling better in the morning. Ciprofloxacin is a new type of antibiotic and you don't need to take a full course. I took one more in the morning for good measure and have been fine since.

Tomorrow is a rest day to get us acclimatised to this new altitude, and we might take the opportunity to walk to the nearby town of Pheriche and visit the high altitude medical clinic. Apparently they run talks at midday about high altitude medicine, which should be really interesting.

Bye for now,
Paul.

Updates

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