Everest Base Camp Trek Update — ​“It’s the Wild in Myself I Remember”

After some slow years in the moun­tains of Nepal, the busi­ness of trekking and climb­ing is back in force!

Pack­ing sup­plies. Shayan Rohani photo

The trails are bustling with activ­i­ty. Yak trains bring sup­plies for climbers dream­ing of stand­ing on top of the world. Loaded porters haul beer, Coca-Cola and TP for the teams of trekkers mak­ing their way through the world’s great­est range. Heli­copters fly more sup­plies and equip­ment up, and return with peo­ple whose bod­ies reject­ed the unfore­seen stress­es of trav­el­ing through this mag­i­cal yet tax­ing environment.

EBC team arriv­ing back at Luk­la from the Khum­bu. Shayan Rohani photo

As we walk out togeth­er, the first MM group of the sea­son, I get a glimpse of what peo­ple gain from tak­ing this chal­lenge to walk to base camp.

It sounds easy: Wake-up tea every morn­ing, yaks car­ry­ing your bags, kind Sher­pas show­ing you the way, tea hous­es with hot show­ers to wash the dust off every day. 

Explor­ing the Khum­bu Glac­i­er. Shayan Rohani photo

Yet even with all that sup­port, the chal­lenge is real. This place remains untamed. It’s such a beau­ti­ful yet harsh land­scape. Dry, rocky, dusty. Blaz­ing sun, cold nights. 

Trekking back to Nam­che Bazaar. Shayan Rohani photo

We come from our world where con­dos are the norm. Com­fy cars, cell ser­vice every­where, clean hot water from the tap, heat that turns on with the flick of a switch. Here we are ​“pam­pered ” by our won­der­ful Nepali staff, but it is still a for­mi­da­ble chal­lenge. Twen­ty to forty thou­sand steps a day with lit­tle oxy­gen to feed our vital bod­i­ly sys­tems. Thin air and close quar­ters. Under this stress we uncov­er a part of our­selves that hides beneath the com­forts of home. The piece that emerges is dif­fer­ent for every­one but the essence is the same. It’s a bit of Wild that match­es the land­scape. That Wild is what the peo­ple of this place embody every day — that Wild is the norm here, not the excep­tion. I find that after a cou­ple weeks on the trail, it’s the Wild in myself I remember.

~MM Guide Shayan Rohani

Wild suc­cess. Shayan Rohani photo