Hi all,
I know the world is in chaos at the moment. But I wanted to share a story with you...
in November I got a visa to go to the Himalaya for the first time, I chose Lobuche peak as my first try and I went with Summitclimb. Because of COVID I was pretty much the only tourist in the Khumbu in fact for three weeks I saw only 7 other tourists. This created an amazing adventure for me being the only people on the mountain walking the khumbu like the first ever expeditions (I.e. no foreigners) I climbed that mountain with 2 personal sherpas Tenji and Dorje. Brilliant guys who’ve done Everest 23 times between them... I am in awe of these super humans, and my message here is that although I got to see the khumbu as it was back in the 1930s I also got a real sense of how much trouble these Sherpas are in... to give you an idea these guys in a good Year carrying our shit up a mountain earn USD2000 as an annual salary... these boys dragged my arse up that lobuche peak and got paid by Summitclimb which is an amazing company using great local people. I paid them the normal summit bonus 150 each as advised but then I at the end of the trip I had another 300 usd to give them which I happily did. These boys invited me to their homes to meet family and eat with them, they even took me to Ktm tourist places to visit and shop. They knew how to barter good deals and at the end of the day I had all my gifts sorted... but then I saw a shop selling lasportiva boots and cheekily I asked how much for a discount and normally these boots were 450 quid... I got them down to 200quid... then the guy asked me my size and then I told him it’s not for me I’m buying for these two sherpas... sherpas shocked, shop keeper shocked everyone happy... for everyone out there these companies don’t supply the sherpas with gear they’re expected to buy themselves... so I happily paid for these boys new boots...
Anyone going to Himalayas need to understand these guys earn Usd2k per annum so if you have any gear/spare cash for them when your there seriously you can really help these people’s families.
anyway the jist of this is a retired rugby player had an Amazing time found out I have no issues at all at altitude and I got to help atleast 2 Sherpa families.defo going back for the big mountains
merry Xmas all
Burly
Post edited at 23:11
