We left Phakding on our way now to Namche. This is one of my favourite places in the world. It’s a bustling, colourful, vibrant little town and by far the biggest settlement and the most civilised place out here.
We stopped for lunch in Jorsalle which made for an early lunch but there’s nowhere after this.
Arriving in Namche did not disappoint. It was just as fantastically weird as I remembered. The food market was just packing up. It comes to Namche every Friday and Saturday so these are the only days when you can buy your vegetables and meat. The meat market is in a sort of cement shed that neither you nor I would ever take food from and put anywhere near our mouths. It’s not the most hygienic. But we eat in the tea houses and I guess that’s where they get their produce from. Urgh.
The walking today has been really pleasant before lunch and then approaching Namche it’s an awful lot of up, up and then some more up. Namche sits at 3440meters above sea level but our guest house Zamling is at the top of the town. No one can build above it as it’s then government owned land. The owner is Tsedam, who owns the children’s home where I sponsor a little boy. One of Tsedam’s claims to fame is that he was the very person person in the whole area to get a washer and dryer. His tea house is fabulous, the top rooms have their own bathroom with bath, shower and toilet and there’s an electric blanket on the bed and hot water in the rooms. These things are really luxurious out here. In the evening Passang, my little boy comes to see in in the tea house. He looks exactly the same from 2016 and it doesn’t look like he’s grown any. His Mum and Dad are tiny as well. He is 8 years old and he is the same size and height as Tsedam’s 5 year old grandson who plays with him. Passang is staying the night at the tea house. The school is closed for the holidays as so the children go home to their parents. Passang’s father is an alcoholic who beats Mum and takes the money she earns from working two yaks to spend on drink. But his grandfather was the legendary Ang Rita who was a famous climber nicknamed the ‘snow leopard’ and summered Everest ten times. He held the record for the most summits of Everest in his days of climbing from 1980 to about 1996. He also became and alcoholic so I have big worries for Passang as it appears to run in his family. Passang has an older brother who was put into the monastery.
Before dinner I pop back down into town to visit my favourite bakery and have warm chocolate cake and then I go to the liquid bar for my other favourite Everest lager. My trekking companions and fellow climber Bob did not want to come, they were tired and wanted to nap.