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Published: March 24th 2013
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Lobuche 4930m - Dingboche 4360m - Pangboche 3860m
Time taken:
Lobuche - Dingboche 2 hours
Leaving Lobuche early, our plan was to trek back down to Tengboche via Dingboche, on the opposite side of the ridge to Pheriche to give ourselves new views and villages to stay in. Dingboche is a quiet place, considerably less open and windy than Pheriche and we stayed at a lodge called the Sonam Friendship Lodge. This was a great place to stay with a cosy dining hall and good food. Today was the first day of the trek I can say I felt hungry again and I managed a whole plate of roast potatoes with two fried eggs on top. The owners were a Tibetan couple and Suriya told me that the wife is actually married to her husband's two brothers as well. Fraternal polyandry as it is called is actually common in rural Tibetan communities and the rationale behind it was that it meant the farming land was not divided up between brothers, this allowed men to retain land enough to support their families. Any children were assumed to be the eldest brothers. It is a strange idea to me and
I guess this is probably a practice which is now dying out.
I manage a warm shower outdoors in a sort of make shift hut and have 8 minutes of blissful hot water to enjoy before curling up in my sleeping bag to dry off and read. At dinner I chat to an Australian guy called Adrian who is trekking with a Finnish couple (both of whom are unwell this evening) and are planning on trekking Mera peak. He is enthusiatic and encourages me to think about doing it in future. The memories of Kala Patthar are fresh in my mind though so I just smile and listen to his plans. Over dinner, a large group of Danish trekkers amuse everyone as one by one they go to their rooms and come back to the dining hall with their down sleeping bags! They all have a uniform powder blue down jacket and sleeping bag and end up looking like a table of enormous blue caterpillars! They are in great spirits and giggle throughout the evening. When it comes time for the guides and porters to eat they are served in the main dining hall half an hour after the
trekkers are (this is quite commonly the case) and I have never seen dal bhat eaten so quickly. They must have amazing digestive systems to cope with that quantity of white rice and lentils in such a short space of time!
I sleep well, the air seems so rich and it is much warmer here than Lobuche. I managed toast and marmalade for breakfast before wishing Adrian and friends well on their trek. The Finnish couple still look a bit rough and I offer them my back up ciprofloxacin antibiotics as they have a stomach bug but it turns out they have started their own course. We head off at a leisurely 8.30am and take a wonderfully downhill scenic hike down to Pangboche which lies between Dingboche and Tengboche. Pangboche is incredibly quiet as we arrive and I can hear a mother singing to a crying baby. We go into a little teahouse with a tremendous view of the valley and spend an hour or so drinking tea before having lunch there.
The afternoon's trek is fantastic, great views, warm sun on my face and in too short a time we have reached Tengboche.
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