Before we left for Nepal we had lunch on a farm with some friends. Through them I met a man who had trekked to Everest Base Camp 8 years ago and told me that the day he pushed to Namche Bazaar was the hardest - it's one of the biggest gains in altitude we would have in a single day. It felt like our first real day of trekking and I knew we were in for it.







My favorite was walking past all the locals along the trail. These people are living simple and growing their own food - themes that I have been striving for in my own life. But they're not doing it because it's trendy rebellion against the consumer culture I'm surrounded by (and can choose to participate in whenever I please). It's just their way of life and it's not always this picture-perfect neo-pioneer minimalist scene (the kind of aesthetic simplicity I tend to fantasize about). A good part of this trek through Nepal was spent thinking about the balance - the life we want to live and the world we live in. The choices we have the opportunity to make.





We shared the trail with yaks. I grew terribly fond of the yaks (and cow/yak hybrids known as the dzo) and took a picture of almost every single one we crossed paths with. I think I have 1,200 photos of yaks.





As much as I loved the stunning views of the Himalayas (usually only visible in the morning, in the afternoons the clouds would roll in) I really loved walking through the little villages. Most people and children did not want to have their photos taken but they were all hard-working, ruddy-cheeked and beautiful.



The trek was hard. The first half of our day we only gained 200M and had 600 more to go. This means the second half of our day was spent walking up a very steep terrain. But I was feeling solid and happy. And at the half-way point our guides took us off the beaten path and there we found our first view of Everest. It was a lot like meeting a celebrity where you feel small in comparison and you kind of can't believe your eyes - and you know they could give two shits about you. That's how I felt about Everest. That all this love I have for a mountain was unrequited but in the meantime I'm getting all this love from Nepal. Like maybe my crush has shifted a little bit to something a bit more real. Regardless, I had laid eyes on what I came to see but it still seemed very far away.







So yes. The very steep trek was hard but when your only focus in the whole world is putting one foot in front of the other and breathing it's really not so hard. I was looking forward to this part. I was in the moment and it felt good.

We finally made it into Namche Bazaar exhausted - we were so excited arrive to the place we would call home for the next 3 nights. The town was alive with merchants, bakeries, locals and trekkers and I felt lucky to be a part of that energy. I had decided that my one big purchase for the trek would be a yak bell and there were plenty to choose from.

We settled in at our tea house lodge and I quickly found myself sick to my stomach, exhausted and wanting nothing to do with food. Jeremy was concerned but I figured I would just sleep it off and hit the ground running the next morning.

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• everest base camp trek
• nepal


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