Day 1 - Noon - Lukla

Somehow at the Lukla airport, Loyd was able to identify our porters (whom we'd never seen before, only emailed). They asked for our baggage claim tickets, and I watched them disappear into the terminal. Since I still wasn't sure we had identified the right guys, I was once again concerned that we would never see them or our gear again. By the way, they turned out to be amazing, trustworthy guys that we quickly grew fond of.
They returned with our gear and we were introduced to Karma, who was friends with the porters, and offering his services as a guide. Then we trotted off to a lodge in Lukla.

After counting our rupies, we decided that we wanted to hire Karma as our guide. This turned out to be a great choice. He spoke good English, and helped us with ordering food, finding lodging, and pointing out scenery as we hiked along. He even offered us free lodging our first night at the tea house he was managing.

From Lukla we actually descended a few hundred meters down a trail that parallelled the Dudh Khosi river. It was still a bit hazy, but the view down into the river and up the valley was gorgeous and we were excited to see the surprises around every corner. If we craned our necks we could see some relatively high, snow capped peaks above the rim of the river gorge above us. We ascended we passed little villages, tea huts, yak trains, porters, and wheat fields beautifully terraced into the hills below.

We were struck right away by the immense loads the porters along the trail were carrying. The biggest load we saw the first day was 6 sheets of 3/4 inch plywood strapped to a guys back as he stepped down the stone pathway and then up the other side. If each panel weighs 35 lbs (which seems low to me) then he would be carrying 210lbs. Most of the weight was carried on the strap slung across the top of his skull. Crazy heavy! (see photo)

The weather was nice. About 75 degrees. We hiked slow. We took 3.5 hours to hike what the book said would be 2-3 hours. I could feel the tinge of a headache. It became more intense at night. Ibuprofen took it away nicely. As recommended, I started guzzling water. Research told us that we could lose up to a gallon of water a day, just by exhaling at higher altitudes. Because I am keen on exhaling, I chose to drink lots of fluids. We all did.