By Celsey and Zoe
After scraping in last-minute guitar jams and ensuring maximum use of the wifi, we walked back through Namche Bazar for the last time. If breakfast wasn’t enough to fill us up, the dust definitely did it, with everyone inhaling about 700kg!
Today was the first day of retracing our footsteps, walking back through terrain we passed two weeks ago. Despite this, every bend in the trail still brought breathtaking views across the valley. One particular bend in the trail brought something even more special- Sue!! After flying Dom back to Kathmandu, Sue had once again flown back to Lukla and walked all the way back to surprise us. The reunion involved lots of hugs, smiles, and one extremely happy son, Max.
With our reunited group, we continued trekking down the valley. We caught our last views of Mt. Everest, ensuring that we all got at least 100 photos each of the same mountain. After waving goodbye to our beloved Everest we stopped for a lunch break (i.e. a carb loading session). During lunch, Sue shared with us a postcard that Dom had written to us before leaving for Australia. It was heart-warming to hear from him (P.S. thank you for the chocolate Dom!).
After six hours on the trail, we arrived in the familiar Ghat. We were assigned two jobs each, to switch positions with the Sherpas. These jobs included cook boys, washing dishes, clearing dishes, and serving the porters. This enabled us to gain an appreciation of the work that is put in behind the scenes, while allowing us to make a contribution to our amazing trek staff, even if it was just in the smallest of ways.
One component of our dinner that night was the group favourite of potato chips. Tina questioned the origin of the potato, asking ‘Are they from McCain’s?’ All the trek staff and porters joined us for cake, made by the legendary Lakpa to celebrate the end of our 16 day journey (just in case you were wondering Tina, this one was homemade and not bought from the cake shop down the road...). The cake read ‘A little bit up, a little bit down, chears.’ The misspelling of the word ‘cheers’ added a classic Nepalese touch which made us smile.
During the celebrations, we each took it in turns to pass on a tip to one of the trek staff members. The porters, Sherpa guides and cooks were ecstatic to receive their envelopes containing tip money, and all did a lap around the room to individually shake our hands.
