We have been trekking for quite sometime, and were almost exhausted. Our guide told that no flights have taken off from Lukla to Kathmandu, for last four days and there has been advisory on extreme weather for next four days. We started thinking about our flight back from Lukla to Kathmandu. But it was still couple of days before we reach Lukla.

Weather was indeed not awesome for trekking. It was snowing as we started from Lobuche.

Since we started from Lobuche and not from Gorekshep, we decided not to halt at Pangboche and Namche Bazar while returning. Instead we stopped at Tengboche and Jorsale.

In between our walk, we got patches of clear sky and good view of valley.

In route you pass a stone memorial and some good valley view (As the case has been for the entire trip)

We reached Tengboche which has a small beautiful monastery. It is good but it is as small as 1/10th of the size of Namdroling monastery en route to Madikeri from Bangalore.

BTW, don’t forget that climb back to Tengboche is quite steep in the end. And no way its an easy trip even when you are coming back.

We had some drinks at Tengboche Cafe, where we stayed and next morning we left for Jorsale via Namche.

Leaving Tengboche, we had a pit stop at Namche for lunch and moved towards Jorsale. We had some leisure time in between across the stream.

With a night stay at Jorsale, we started again.

We crossed the familiar, waterfalls.

And the familiar routes.

And we reached Lukla, only to know that no flights are flying to Kathmandu.

We were stuck there, doing nothing but playing Ludo.

While we waited for weather to open up and flights to resume, we met Martin, a German working in Dubai who had a connecting flight from Kathmandu to Dubai. He was very restless and exploring options to reach Kathmandu soon. We had a couple of reserve day, so we were ok. But bored.

Soon Martin found an option for helicopter ride to Kathmandu. Anushya, Pawan, Pratik and Priya left along with Martin for Kathmandu. While myself, Ibbu, Naveen and Nitesh were strolling around the Lukla airport we met an staff from Sita air, who said a helicopter was going to Ramechhap. The place is around 4 hours away from Kathmandu by road. We consulted Raj, and then took the helicopter to Ramechhap.

Soon it started raining and we couldn’t see anything from helicopter outside.

Let me tell you that never ever, I got so much scared in my life. Not even on days when I forgot to do homework of my Sanskrit teacher.

It was almost zero visibility, with chopper flying between peaks and you can’t see the peak ahead.

Nevertheless, we reached Ramechhap safely and then to Kathmandu.

Before I move to the concluding part, let me remind. Let the fire in you, continue to burn.

  Prologue-EBC | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 – Gokyo lakes | 6 – Gokyo ri Summit | 7 – Chola pass | 8 | 9 – Kalapatthar/EBC | 10 | Epilogue-EBC