[Tom wrote today's posting: I chose to sleep in rather than see Everest from a plane. My decision was based on cost value. I honestly didn't think it was worth the cost of the flight for me to see the mountain from the window of a plane. I would like to hike to Everest base camp one day, so perhaps I will see it then.]
On the 22nd of April 2014, I went with my sister Hope and my father on a flight to see the Himalayas. The fight was on a small twin engine propeller plane. There were eighteen people on the flight, and we all got window seats.
To go on the Everest flight, we had to wake up at 04:30, so that the weather would still be clear enough to see the mountain. Unfortunately for us though, the hotel was not open and the door was still locked from the inside and there wasn't a key. I do not want to be in there if there is a fire at night. To solve this problem, we called the desk phone which woke up the guy who was supposed to answer it and he unlocked the door for us. One problem down. [1]
The next problem we faced was getting a taxi at 04:45. There are not very many taxis on the road at that hour, but eventually we found one and started negotiating a price. During the day, you can get to the Airport for 350 Rupees (about 3.50 US dollars) but this guy started at 700 rupees. We got him down to 650 before we found a new taxi. The new guy went down to 550 rupees and we took him.
When we got to the airport, there were a group of people from the west coast U.S. who were flying out to do some trekking, so we chatted with them for about a half hour before the airport opened at 06:00. When we got through check-in and security (which consisted of being quickly patted) I looked at my watch and saw that it was almost 06:10. So we had to sit and wait for our plane (leaving from Kathmandu and arriving at Kathmandu two hours later) at 06:30. eventually we got out to the plane and boarded.
Because of our breakfast (Snickers and Coke), we were a little hyperactive and we had difficulty sitting still, so we didn't. The whole flight we were bouncing around and just being annoying.
Before too long, there were beautiful mountains in sight and we all (and by all, I mean all 18 of us on the airplane) went to the side with the mountains.
And finally we saw Mt. Everest (it was an Everest flight after all).
After seeing Everest, we went back to the Airport where I may have or may not have taken this beautiful picture.
(Hint hint, I didn't, I got it from this):
I think that overall it was a good experience but I think that it could have been later in the morning. I think that it was nice to be able to see the view from Mt. Everest without having to climb it. The certificate that we got at the end said "I didn't climb Mt. Everest but I touched it with my heart" which is exactly what we did.
Next: India
______________________________________________________
[1] Mom's note: Yeah, that freaked us all out. The windows were all covered with drop down steel covers, so there was no way to get out of the building unless someone came down and unlocked the door. A fire and we would all have been goners.
Comments