Dushdeley! (Tibetan for hello, spelled how I think it sounds)
Stunning beauty throughout the 2 day car ride to Everest. Lots of high mountain passes and being short of breath.
Tibetan prayer flags at one of the high passes. I don't remember which, they were 4500m to 5200m. The 5 colours of flags represent the 5 elements:
yellow - water
Blue - sky
White - clouds
Red - fire
Green - earth
Staring out the window was enough for the ride. Beautiful mountains, rivers, lakes. Often there was nothing but the road and power lines. We passed through lots of small villages too. It was like going back in time to an agricultural society. Small plots of land were often being plowed by yaks, and our van was frequently delayed by herds of small goats or sheep on the road, or the occasional donkey.
The last 100km to Everest base camp was on a very bumpy road, it took 4 hours and lots of switchbacks but we made it in the evening. In this photo you can see Everest surrounded by light clouds. 8844.43m which is about 3900m higher than where this picture was taken. We stayed in a surprisingly comfortable tent, in a small 'tent city' where tents claimed to be hotels. Each tent had a stove powered by yak dung which warmed it up pretty good. Except they stopped fueling at night, so it was around -10 at 4 am and the provided blankets kept slipping off. I also had an issue where just before I dozed off to sleep I was woken up really short of breath, like I was drowning, so I hyperventilate for a minute and am fully awake. I guess 4900m is too high for me, it was a somewhat sleepless night.
A number of yak at EBC. They are often used to carry people's gear. There was a lot of serious climbers there that had been there for a while acclimatizing.
Qomolangma is the Tibetan name for Everest. It was pretty cold that day, and unfortunately it was cloudy, otherwise a nice view of Everest would be behind me. You can see the stairway on the small hill behind me, we climbed that after. At my normal pace I was completely out of breath, like I had just ran 100m at full speed. I got a lot more respect for the difficulty of climbing Everest now.
Other things: Tibet has a strong military presence with lots of checkpoints. A few serious military ones where we had to get out of the van and present our passports. And our guide printed off about 20 copies of our permit to hand out to the checkpoints. It really feels like an occupied country, maybe because it is.
Tibet was a land of contrasts, there are monasteries full of gold and precious stones, but they are surrounded by poor villages (at least they appear poor). There are these stunning landscapes and view but a gutter full of garbage next to the highway. I also found out the life expectancy in Tibet is 80. 80! It's surprising after the first glance of their society but it actually makes sense. Lots of natural food like vegetables, physical work everyday outdoors, lots of walking. Almost every day the elderly will walk counterclockwise around a religious site 1 or 3 times, so sometimes 3-4 hours of walking with their beads and prayer wheels. Our guide's grandmother is 108 years old right now!
It seems like china is pushing a lot of development on Tibet, but I think they are happy with their primitive way of life, maybe happier than people in the west. But no, I will not be moving to Tibet.
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