Everest Region December 2003 - Day 4

Namche to Tengboche

You can see a slideshow of my best pics from Everest on flickr.
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We set off for Tengboche along the "highway" that leads north east out of Namche. Avoid it on the day after Namche Bazaar (which is on Saturdays), because the yak trains on it kick up a lot of dust. We really enjoyed their company, though, as their bells jangled melodiously, accompanied often by herders whistling some rustic Nepali tune. You rarely see yaks below Namche's altitude, as it is simply too hot for them, and you rarely see cattle above Namche; too cold, I suppose.

Buddhist prayer wheels abound in the Everest region, each rotation sending good karma floating off into the universe. The folks at Phunki Tenga - 200m below Namche, on the Dudh Koshi river - had the idea that using falling water to spin a prayer wheel would mean a more constant flow of good karma. Hence these water-powered prayer wheels.

It is a 600m climb from Phunki Tenga up to Tengboche. The sort of thing you really should give lunch a bit more time to digest before attempting. However, Glen by now had pepped up, and we made our way sedately up the south face of the ridge line, stopping to spot damphe (Himalayan pheasant) and hopefully deer. We didn't get good photos of the damphe, and didn't see any deer, but we had a good rest, anyway.



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As seen on Andrew Purdam's Bushwalking Treasure Box blog.