Everest Base Camp Days 1-3
| November 12th, 2011 | by Matt Brereton-Patel |
A very smart guy once noted that the best laid plans of mice and men gan aft astray.
Or to to put it another way, you can plan a charity trek to Everest Base Camp for a year, and Mother Nature steps in at the last minute to stir things up a little.
As I write to you from an internet cafe in the middle of Kathmandu, Mother Nature and I are a little peeved with one another.
But let’s rewind for a second and cover how we got to Kathmandu in the first place, what happened on the way, and why we’re here.
Plans for departure
For the past year we at three sixty° have been meticulously planning a trek to Everest Base Camp to support The Break Out Project, who work with street and slum children in Mumbai, India. You can find more about the trek and us here.
Over the past 4 months everything has been planned meticulously, kit bought and packed, so on the evening of Weds 9th Nov the team met at Manchester Airport to begin our journey, each of us aiming to raise 2000 pounds for The Break Out Project.
Dave had a business class ticket which he had selflessly put aside in order to join us in economy, only for the airline to tell him he had to take it (or so he says ;o)), so we didn’t see him until Dubai.
Mumbai
The flight went uneventfully enough, and upon landing in Mumbai, the team visited some of the children The Break Out Project is supporting. Photos and video will follow, but we played some volleyball, watched a fab cooking display and got to understand why the money we’re raining by trekking to Everest Base Camp matters so much.
Then we headed to Colaba and to one of my favorite restaurants for food, and a couple of team drinks which ended in a high speed, beats pumping taxi ride through Mumbai, and dragging most of the by now high spirited team out of an Irish bar at 1am so that they were functional for the next day and the flight to Kathmandu. A stern talking to ensued!
Kathmandu
Now I’ve spent some time in Kathmandu, and this city never disappoints, but on this occasion Mother Nature has let us down. Our intended route is to fly into Lukla to begin our trek, the only being that Lukla was closed for most of the week preceding our trek, and was again today when we took off at 6am, flew around in the cloud for 2 hours, before returning to Kathmandu. Babs was petrified but stoic, Nick threw up, and we were all disappointed. We spent the rest of the day in the airport waiting for Lukla to open, but it was not to be.
As it stands we’re trying again tomorrow at 5am, and if Lukla airport is closed to planes, we’re hoping to talk the Nepali Airforce into giving us a lift in one of their massive helicopters. I’ll keep you posted on how goes, but rest assured we will get there in the end whatever is thrown at us!
Lots of love from everyone, and if you want to sponsor one of the team, just go here.
Matt Brereton-Patel & the three sixty° Everest Base Camp Team