It was another early morning, a breakfast of hot porridge,
eggs, and hot dogs (you know, the usual climbers breakfast) and then we set off
for the next set of huts. Day 2 took us
out of the rain forest and into the alpine tundra. The hike was a bit more challenging than day
1 and quite a bit longer (11 km) and by the end of it some in our group were
beginning to feel the effects of the altitude.
Fortunately none of us were as bad off as the Korean climber next to us
at dinner who was told in no uncertain terms by his guide that he needed to
head back down because he would die if he continued any further up the
mountain.
But our porters again beat us to camp and had food and warm
water awaiting us. Those porters were
truly amazing. They would climb past us,
as if we were standing still, with a heavy pack on their backs, an equally
large one balanced on their heads, in conversation or whistling a tune which we
could occasionally hear over the sounds of our own heavy breathing. After a short break we climbed another 300m
(for acclimatization) to a place called Zebra Rock and then descended back to
camp for the night. The 5 of us climbed
into out bunks in our shared 10’x10’ hut and slept until about 6:00am.
No comments:
Post a Comment