October 16, 2006: Lobuche to Dzonghla

When I woke up it was cold! A little below freezing in my room! I stayed in bed until about 7 am.  We had no rush this morning as we only wanted to hike to Dzonghla which wasn't very far nor were there any big altitude changes (read: hikes up). I had breakfast and then I took a shower and shaved. First shower since Namche. If felt gooood! After I was finally done with all my "chores" the lodge was pretty much empty as everybody was gone. Bharat and I left around 9:15 am for our hike to Dzonghla. First, we retraced our steps towards Thukla until close to the Climber's Memorial and then we headed to the right and followed the trail on the right side of the valley which would eventually round the mountain and head north towards Dzonghla. Wonderful views of Cholatse, upvalley towards Pumori and Lingten and downvalley towards Pheriche, Ama Dablam, Kangtega and Thamserku.

Trek towards Dzonghla. You can see the trail on the side of the mountain. The trail goes around the side of the mountain and then to the right.

View back towards Lobuche

Ama Dablam and Kangtega. Pheriche is in the middle of the picture.

Another view of Nuptse

Pumori

Cholatse

It took us about 2 hours and 40 minutes from Lobuche to Dzonghla through this beautiful mountain scenery. During the trek, several groups passed us coming from Dzonghla and heading for Lobuche, including an REI trekking group. Before I booked my trip, I was thinking about joining one of those group treks, but now, seeing all these people hiking together, I am glad I didn't. I was always glad when these groups had passed and Bharat and I were alone again. We finally reached Dzonghla. There are 2 lodges. Both were full (i.e. no single rooms), but there was still room in the dormitory of one of them for me. That was fine. After eating lunch, Bharat and I were taking a short excursion up to the ridge where we could see the Cho La Pass and the approach we were going to take the next day. It did not look too bad and too steep at all, except the very last part.

Ama Dablam from Dzonghla

Approach to Cho La from Dzonghla. You can see the ice field peeking out in the center.

Dzonghla and Ama Dablam

It was getting cold, cloudy and windy, so we went back to the lodge. From about 2 pm on we were spending the rest of the day in the dining room. We talked to the other guests. 2 Dutch guys and several Italians (nice Italians...) and also the older Canadian couple from Vancouver who I have seen pretty much every day for the last 3-4 days. Besides smalltalk, not much else to do. It got really cold in the dining room, everybody is sitting there with their downjackets on or even wrapped up in their sleeping bags. Lots of stories being told about Cho La Pass, except by the lodge owner who constantly says it is easy. Nevertheless, I was hiring a porter who will carry my backpack from the lodge to the top of Cho La. It will cost me 1,800 rupees. It sounds like a lot, but we are going up to 5,400 meters and I don't want to take any chances. The people who came up from the other side are saying that the lodges at Dragnag are pretty nice, but this one, oh well! Finally had dinner. Tomato soup and fried rice. What was interesting: The cook shoved yak dung into the oven with his bare hands (of course), then went back into the kitchen to fix supper. Then he served the dishes.... I liked the guy and it turned out that he was my porter the next day. Went to bed around 8 pm in the dormitory. The dormitory was big, enough room for 16 people, 8 downstairs, 8 upstairs. Three Japanese were in there as well, they slept upstairs, I slept downstairs. So I had a lot of room and slept pretty good.

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