Nepal #6: Questionable Decisions in a Blizzard

Kala Patthar is a mountain next to Gorakshep which is known to be one of the best viewpoints to see the Everest summit. Eric and I attempted to climb it the day after for sunrise but as I woke up to my alarm, I peered out the window, only to see and hear snow pattering down on the tin roof. So we went back to sleep and woke up later in the morning. We waited until it was relatively clear and started the long hike up the dirt path. We made it not even halfway when I saw some dark ominous clouds making their way down the valley towards us. 

We waited for about thirty minutes and watched the valley clouds as well as the clouds that were already covering Mt. Everest. With no chances of clearing up and the possibility we get stuck in a blizzard, we had to make the tough decision to turn around – though it was a clear decision to many, those who hike mountains understand how tough it is to turn around before making it to the summit. 

The weather worsened as the day went on and we watched the outside become a white canvas of nothing as the blizzard raged. We had made it back just in time and stayed cozy by the fire playing card games, mostly a game called golf, that we learned to play from two women one night in Lobuche.

The next morning, as I woke to my alarm, I didn’t even bother checking the window as the resounding “pat pat” of snow hitting the tin roof was ringing in my ears. A few hours later, around 6:00am the snow stopped and Eric and I rushed out of the teahouse without breakfast to hike up the mountain. This time we made it to the top and were rewarded with amazing views of Mt. Everest. We stayed most of the morning just enjoying the movement of the clouds, as they flowed, appearing and disappearing quickly around the tallest mountain in the world. 

The sun felt amazing as it beamed on my uncovered face and I soaked in all the warmth I could, laying flat against the rock at the summit. At some point the bliss of the warmth and view had to be broken as we had to start returning that day. We had been at that altitude for two days and I was lucky to have slept well. Strange and vivid dreams had plagued me all night but I felt very rested. Eric on the other hand admitted he was struggling getting any sleep at these high altitudes.

We got back to Gorakshep later in the morning for some quick breakfast and to grab our stuff. Once again there were some little spits of snow but nothing like the blizzard from the day before so we decided we needed to get moving. 

Only an hour into the hike we were once again covered in a pretty heavy blizzard. I always thought the trail was pretty easy to follow but the snow covered up any tracks and it suddenly became very unclear where to go. I was lucky that at the point we were super off track, I spotted a man on the other side of the valley and we were able to follow that to get back onto the correct trail. 

Through the snow, we got back to Dughla where we sat for lunch to let the snow die down and try to warm up and dry off a bit. It was here we were faced with a difficult decision to make. The hike to dingboche would bring us across a plateau that had a very sudden and deadly drop off if you stray too far to the edge. I was quite concerned considering we had gotten completely off track just thirty minutes before trying to navigate in this weather. Some people coming from Pheriche, which would bring us into a valley below the plateau mentioned that the trail was super snowed in. 

That is when we started to debate going to Gokyo lakes instead. Though higher in altitude it wasn’t snowed in and it was a major adventure neither of us really wanted to miss out on. Finally after some serious debate we decided to go that way and as soon as the snow stopped we plowed ahead. 

The owner of the teahouse pointed behind them and said to follow the trail that way. Once we had gotten pretty far from the teahouse we realized the trail breaks into many goat paths all leading in different directions. Staring at the mountain in front of us, we decided there was no way we wanted to go over that and figured even if the path did go that way, it would meet back up with us if we went around it.

As we balanced one foot in front of the other on this very thin, barely there trail, having these little bushes scratch at our pants, we passed this amazing half frozen lake in a valley below us. The views felt a lot more wild here as we hiked on barely-there trails and passed these little stone walls, I’m assuming built to protect the people herding animals. 

Eric was moving a lot more slowly at this point, his lack of sleep and the altitude seemed to be getting to him a bit more than me so we took it slow. I often walked a bit ahead for signs of the trail and would wait for him to catch up. It wasn’t until it started snowing again I could feel my heart start to skip with anxiety.

We had been hiking for hours on a trail we weren’t even sure was a real trail and it began to snow quite a bit. I felt like everywhere I looked my eyes were playing tricks and I could just see a house or town. Eric was not doing well at all so I felt it was up to me to get us to safety, though as the sun went down and it really began to darken, I was terrified we would be making camp out here.

I kept watch for places we could set up that would protect us from the elements as we went but I definitely prayed to find the town of Dzongla soon. It really was this moment as we walked along a stream and it was super foggy and cold and getting dark when it truly hit me. We were in the Himalayas, people die out here doing the things we were doing, this was extremely serious being lost and wet. I knew Eric was tired but I kept pushing and pushing, saying its just a bit more, we have to get there. I was given the chance to repay the kindness and support he had shown me when we hiked into Lukla so late at night. 

I kept wiggling each finger in my gloves to ensure they weren’t getting too cold or too numb as we walked. I was keeping the panic at bay with sheer determination that we were going to get to the town. 

When I was at the point of truly considering camping, I smelt smoke. Maybe it was all in my head but I started staring into the fog just to my left on top of a hill and across the stream and I could just barely make out the outline of a house. It wasn’t much and I was worried the altitude, lack of oxygen, exhaustion, and fear was making me imagine things but as we kept on the path there was a small wooden bridge crossing the river. Then just past the shores, there was a true path leading up that hill. It was comprised of light brown dirt but wide enough for my two feet and clearly carved out of the landscape. 

We walked into Dzongla at 10:00pm at night soaking wet but extremely relieved. They didn’t have any food and the fires were out at the teahouse due to the time but neither of us cared. We were down to the bone exhausted. There were still people in the common area, enjoying the last of the dying fire as Eric and I sat as close to it as possible with our boots, socks, and gloves pushed close in hopes they would dry.

As we sat, I listened to a group behind us discussing the plan for the next day .They were leaving at 4:00am to get over Cho La Pass. Due to the weather dangers you don’t want to be in that pass if any hail or snow comes in, it was very dangerous. Finally, Eric and I stumbled into the shared room with two beds and stripped out of the soaking wet socks and gloves and jackets before wrapping up in the sleeping bags in hopes of getting warm.

That was the first night I got very little sleep, I was violently shivering all night in my damp clothing. My teeth were either clenched together or chattering as I tried to just go to sleep. It was impossible for me to relax as my muscles clenched tight with the violent shaking and I wrapped myself tightly in a ball trying to conserve the little heat I was producing.

After a long night of violent shivering and constant movement to keep warm, I woke up to my 4:00am alarm. My jaw ached from clenching my teeth and my muscles felt stiff from the long night of moving around trying to get warm. I hoped for the day to provide warm sunlight and no snow but I worried that might not be possible.

Eric wasn’t feeling great and complained about getting up that early and said we should sleep some more. I decided it wouldn’t hurt too much to sleep a little longer to let the group get ahead of us to pave the way across the pass. We slept a bit longer until the sun rose over the small Himalayan town and around 6:30am we were packed and eating some breakfast. 

I was incredibly anxious, I kept fiddling with my backpack straps and checking the time every five minutes. We had been warned by several people not to try to cross in the afternoon as the snow showers were likely to white out the pass and it was already dangerous enough that we were crossing without a proper guide. Eric was relaxed though, that is one thing I envied, how relaxed he stayed, but the night before for me was a major wake-up call about the true dangers we were facing so I wanted to get moving quickly. 

Finally, around 7:30am, Eric agreed to get moving and we started, he was going slower than I would have liked and stopped often. I think he felt how rushed I was and told me to go ahead without him, that we would meet before the major glacier that we had to cross to get to the lakes. I didn’t want to leave him knowing how sick he had been the night before but he seemed fine just that he wanted to be alone to think. I could understand that he didn’t want me to bug him and after a long discussion and a bit of thought I decided he felt fine and just wanted to be alone. This wasn’t uncommon, there were times we agreed to meet at the next stop and be apart for several hours so I began moving quickly ahead of him. 

This was the most majestic part of my journey along the mountains. The town sat in a plateau of dried green grass with a few stone houses that had colorful green and red tin roofs. The mountains surrounded us on all sides, branching into the sky as the ones to our right had snow-capped peaks and the ones on the left were stark gray and brown from where the sun hits and melts the ice and snow. 

The whole hike towards the pass I struggled to keep myself from stopping every few minutes for another picture. I wanted to remember this view and moment forever, though at the time I wondered how I could ever forget. I kept following the winding trail with my eyes as I looked for the pass and where I would be hiking over. As I continued I just barely saw in the distance a small saddle between two towering rocks and believed I was heading that way.

The way up into the path was slow moving along loose dark gray gravel. At a certain point where the altitude got higher I had to stop for a moment to throw on my microspikes I had bought in Namche Bazaar, as the snow and ice were making me nervous. This is where a bit of climbing up and over large boulders had to happen. The ascent got steep and I was thankful for my hiking poles as they allowed me to dig into the ground and boost myself up.

After making it to the top of the pass I was utterly relieved. My focus was solely on getting across that pass, I kept saying to myself “get across the pass before the snow comes” as a mantra constantly repeating and pushing me to move faster.

I took a bunch of photos at the top as I saw a small lake of water and took in the last of the views of the beautiful valley resting below. I turned and began into the pass. 

I wasn’t sure what I was expecting at this point but the pass was massive and not at all what I expected. I could see where there was this massive glacier of ice, bigger than I ever could have imagined, resting directly across the path. I just barely saw a bright orange jacket moving steadily along the last stretch heading uphill. I looked directly in front of me and there was the smallest path I’ve seen while hiking, only the width of my foot. To get to the glacier you walk on, I had to walk along the side of the mountain, which was pure loose rock that has been worn into relatively fine particles. The drop into the bottom of the pass was very dangerous, if not deadly. 

I told myself just to focus on one foot in front of the other, I moved steadily along, making sure to stick one hiking pole below me and one into the side of the mountain in hopes to keep stable if the ground came out. Things were going well for a while and I got confident enough to start moving a bit faster. The moment I looked back, I could see some darkened clouds, that no doubt carried snow, coming from across the valley towards the pass. 

That momentary distraction is all it took to slip. My right foot had landed on a soft patch of rock that released as soon as my weight was on it. I started sliding as my back slammed onto the side wall of the mountain and I found myself going down. I kept trying to dig in my poles and then my hands into the loose rock on the side of the mountain, but I just kept sliding. I saw a stable looking large rock sticking out of the mountainside I was sliding down, so I stuck my right foot into the gravel as much as I could and launched myself to the left and smacked directly into the rock. The good news was that I wasn’t sliding anymore, the crappy news was that I slammed directly into my ribs and was completely winded. I laid there just wanting to go home. 

Luckily, I wasn’t too far from the path and when I caught my breath I found a way to meet back up by pushing quickly to a couple of stable looking rocks and using my shortened hiking poles to dig into the loose rock of the mountainside. I realized how dangerous that had been, a major fall like that and I could have either died at the bottom or fallen through the ice and drowned. 

I got away with some majorly bruised ribs that ached as I continued along the path breathing shallowly and gently. The clouds were still coming quickly and I had to get past the next hardest obstacle, the glacier itself. In this snow I decided not to put on the spikes as the snow was bunching up again and stuck to the spikes. That meant every few steps I would have to smack the ice off of them. Until it got too icy to walk I decided to keep moving with my taped up boots. 

I thought hiking across the glacier would be easy enough, until I heard the water rushing under me and the ghostly creaking of it on approach. I had the right idea to follow the group before me as there were very clear footprints along the snow all the way up the glacier. I thanked the man upstairs that the snow hadn’t yet covered the prints and I began to follow exactly in their footprints. 

I did wonder how such a large group like that only had one set of prints to follow but I figured they must have stayed in an exact straight line. I was about ten minutes into hiking when I realized it was because the guide had to show them across. I saw a step off to the right a bit that seemed out of line and when I got to it and looked down, I saw at least a twenty to thirty foot drop with rushing water beneath. I realized that the guide was picking his way carefully across and understood now why everyone told us a guide was the way to go. You could fall straight through the glacier to the water below if you didn’t know where to step. After that I pushed with my pole on each footprint before stepping in, worrying the rising sun had possibly melted the layer a bit more.

I’m not sure I can discuss the relief I felt when I got to the top of the glacier. Once again there was this beautiful line of prayer flags at the top, showing me the way and giving me the absolute faith and confidence that I could do this. I shed a few tears, maybe a few more, happy to have made it across before any snow and to have the utter luck of just a few bruised ribs instead of anything much worse.

From that moment on, I was a full believer in debunking the idea of “conquering” a mountain, you make it to a summit,you cross a mountain, you even visit a mountain and I believe it is the faith of the mountain that allows it. So I said thank you, thank you for allowing me access and allowing me safe passage. 

I have no idea how long I rested, laying flat on my back. I can’t even remember if I ate a snack or just laid there staring at a progressively darkening sky but it was those clouds that got me back on my feet. You think I would’ve learned at that point not to let my guard down but it only took a few moments of laziness for my next incident. 

On the descent of the pass, there were these thin wires that were connecting the stakes into rock. It was quite steep for a while going down the other side of the pass so I clung to the wires, lowering myself down each drop. I was too lazy to stop and put on my spikes even though it was icy as I was riding the high of getting across the glacier and it felt like the danger had passed.

At one point, I was using a wire to essentially rappel down to a certain spot, my taped boot soles couldn’t find any traction and slipped right out from underneath me. I had no gloves on and the wire quickly burned my hand as I started to slide down with my whole body weight. I had to let go and was once again sliding on some ice and snow, though this time there were quite a few boulders in the way. I slammed my hiking pole into one and all I heard was a large snap as my hiking pole bent right in half. But the movement was enough to change my trajectory of falling and guess what – I fell directly on my ribs again. 

I have to admit that I was angry, so angry at myself and the mountain. Flames of pain were shooting up my ribs as I pushed myself gently up and started to push on them. I’ve never had broken ribs but I was pretty sure they should hurt a bit more than mine did and the bones felt intact so I knew they must just be majorly bruised at this point. I grabbed my pole that was barely held together by a thread of metal and just snapped it in two to stick in my bag.

I got out my spikes after that and pulled myself together to begin the descent once again as hail started to rain down and I wanted off the side of the pass as soon as possible. I gently rappelled the rest of the way down, now only using my left hand. I made it to the bottom of the pass shuffling and scooching on my butt trying to immobilize my right side as much as possible. Surprisingly with all the adrenaline of surviving the pass I wasn’t feeling as bad as I thought and I was able to ignore the dull throbbing coming from my ribs. 

I walked along these valleys of dried and dead yellow grass, though once in a while I saw this almost neon green squishy moss hidden between rocks. The trail was long and winding and hail rained down at varying strengths along the walk. The sole of my one good boot finally gave way and fell off so I had to take a long break to tape that back up.

I walked for hours after this, seeing nothing, and with no map to know, all I had to rely on in these deserted valleys were these bare black poles that stuck up from the ground in varying distances. Every turn or hill I got past I hoped to see the town before the Khumbu Glacier. 

At long last, in the late afternoon I saw the bright blue tin roofs standing starkly against the dull browns and blues and felt immense relief. Originally I had been hoping to get to the Gokyo Lakes that same day but I sat to wait at the only teahouse open, hoping Eric would come along. It was a very tough decision to make because if I went across I wasn’t sure Eric would know. It may cause a serious situation if Eric thinks I didn’t make it so I decided to stay and wait.

I wandered around the town and sat inside a teahouse for a bit resting. It had been a few hours and I was getting scared something had happened to Eric. I worried he got caught in the snowstorm or fell through the glacier. I wondered if I should have waited for him or followed his wishes to go ahead without him.

I started to talk to the only other person in the common area, a man with dark brown hair and thin face with these square glasses as he looked at a book. I said I was waiting for someone and described Eric to him, the guy said, “Oh that guy? I think I just saw him a bit ago walk by the window over there.”

He pointed across the room, I grabbed my bag yelling a quick thanks as I ran out the door to find Eric. Sure enough I ran square into him as I rounded the tight corner of the teahouse. He laughed at my concern and said it had hailed and snowed a bit but he moved fast enough not to be completely caught in it. 

It was late that day and we were pretty exhausted as he questioned my broken pole sticking out of the side of my bag. We decided to stay that night in the teahouse, which happened to be their last night open. The lady said she rarely meets people crazy enough to do that hike alone at this time of year, the beginning of the monsoon season. They gave us a big batch of fried noodles, that had all mismatching types of pasta as they were all packed out and leaving the next day themselves. 

We were nothing but grateful they even let us stay since they were leaving so soon and thanked them profusely as we talked to them about the towns they head to during this time of year and how long they had been running the place. I will forever be thankful to the kindness of the Nepalese people and how incredible they themselves are for living in such harsh environments.

That night I fell asleep quickly as I was finally dry and warm with a belly full of noodles.