The trek to Everest Base Camp begins.

It's Saturday, April 28.  We were up and off to the airport early with a bag breakfast to eat along the way.

We fly to the village of Lukla, just a 30-40 minute flight in a small 16-passenger plane over the mountains.  It is considered to be "the world's most dangerous airport" with a short runway of 1,729 feet, nestled between mountains.

One end of the runway is the side of a mountain; at the other end is a 2,000 foot drop off the cliff. There is no room for error or second chances on landing.  My assigned seat is #13!

 With a sigh of relief, we safely land in Lukla.

We meet the rest of the trek staff and porters and set off to start our trek.

This is the gateway to the Everest Base Camp Trail.  Finally my adventure really begins.

We trek to the village of Phakding, situated on the bank of the Dudh Kosi river, where we stay overnight at the Royal Sherpa Resort...

...we have accommodations for our team of 9 trekkers plus 3 guides and also our team of yaks, which carry our supplies and duffels.

The next morning we start out early for a 7-8 hour trek before reaching Namche Bazaar.  

We follow the banks of the Dudh Kosi, crossing it twice by small suspension bridges and enter the Sagarmatha National Park.

We climb steeply for about two hours up Namche Hill to reach Namche Bazaar at 11,155 ft.

This is a prosperous trading town and the capital of the Khumbu Region.  Many Tibetans cross the nearby border to trade their goods here so there is a large local market.  We spend 3 nights here in Namche to acclimatize to the low oxygen levels.

Here I am with  our team leaders. 

During the days in Namche we rest and do some trekking to higher altitudes.  On the first morning we hike up to the Sherpa Museum at 11, 811 ft.

Pasang explains to us the prayer wheel.

On this monument are two rocks:  the one on the left is from the summit of Mount Everest; the one on the right is from the Dead Sea....rocks from the highest point on earth and the lowest.

This statue is of Sir Edmund Hillary.  The 1953 British Mount Everest expedition was the ninth mountaineering expedition to attempt the first ascent of Mount Everest, and the first confirmed to have succeeded when Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit in May, 1953.

High above Namche we can see there are mountains out there but the clouds mostly obscure them.

Back down in Namche we visit with the last living team member from the 1953 Everest Expedition, Kancha Sherpa.  Back in 1953, he was in his 20's.  He wasn't much of a talker, but did like having his photograph taken with our team.

The next morning we have a much better view of the mountains and Namche.

We hike up to Shangbouche Hill for views of the whole Everest region.

 We're back in Namche for one more night.

The next morning we start our trek again toward Everest Base Camp.

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