‘Tengboche, Pangboche and finally Dingboche – the end of our ascent. 4,410 metres at Dingboche, but we climbed higher to look down the valley to Everest Base Camp, 2 more days ahead. These 2 days of cold and hardship were not on our agenda. A medley of pics following, some with explanatory notes.’ (Della Again) […]
‘I confess to having bored countless Eng Lit students of mine with my passion for Coleridge’s poem “Kubla Khan”. Little did I suspect that I would one day discover Coleridge’s Xanadu in the Sherpa capital of Namche Bazar. I saw so many parallels to the poem, but perhaps the most relevant is the fact that
with overnight stop at Benkar’. (Della) ‘Main street of Lukla The road out of town Other trekkers: The person in front is carrying a largish day pack whilst the hired porter behind is carrying the rest of his/her gear. This was normal procedure for almost all trekkers. We, in contrast, proudly carried our own packs
An updated version of this iconic pack is now available in 70D & 100D (as in the Gorilla) DWR coated Robic Nylon in three sizes from 578 grams & US$153 (Nov 2019), the G4-20 Ultralight 42 Backpack Quite a good price and weight. This would be very suitable for a lightweight hiking/hunting pack. Features include:
‘Flying to Lukla is the adrenaline-filled beginning to the Everest Base Camp Trek. Reputedly the most dangerous airport in the world, Lukla Airport has a landing strip just 500 metres long, with a sheer cliff on one end and a brick wall on the other. We took videos of both our landing and takeoff to
A complete topographical map of Australia is available free in 1:250,000 scale. This is quite adequate to find your way and prevent your getting lost. You can download the maps, copy them to a storage file on your phone and then open them with PDF Maps Or Avenza – if you want to be restricted
So long as you have a smart phone (with GPS and Compass – be sure it does before you buy it!) you don’t need a Garmin or any other GPS device, and you don’t need to pay for any maps or Apps. You can organise your phone so that you need never get lost. However
Obviously you can light a fire on the snow but it will quickly melt the snow, sink into it and go out. And this is just when you most need a fire, so what to do? Find somewhere clear of snow is the easiest choice: often there is little or no snow under trees. It
My wife, Della and I used to carry two complete cook sets but we have shrunk that down a bit. Mostly we carried two pots because it simplified heating water for a shower, but as Della almost always takes a sponge bath and as all the food we cook will fit in the one pot
Although they are not (at present) ultralight, I really like the concepts behind these wonderful lamps. Lumir-k: Cooking oil fueled LED lamp: & Lumir-C Candle Powered Led lamp: Lumir C: Lumir K: This is a similar concept, power from heat: https://drop.com/buy/biolite-campstove-bundle#overview & this: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2015/07/20/power-from-heat/ PS: You should be able to make this system work with
