Asia by Hammock

Woke up feeling good after a surprsingly good night of sleep (aside: don't ever say you've slept in the worst place ever because the next night, unfailingly, will be worse. Just eight matresses side by side on a loft last night). Weather was perfect, hot even, sunny without clouds. Started a bit after 7. Basically climbed for two hours. It was tough, and I think ten days of trekking has taken just a bit out of me. My best description: take two-a-days, add the widowmaker, toss in San Fransisco style slopes and just for fun throw in some Franz Joseph glacier hiking complete with ice bridged crevasses (and what happens to ice in "perfect, hot even, sunny" weather?). It was fucking rough, we were scrambling up rocks, slipping on ice and gnerally huffing and puffing. Definitely the hardest day so far, and that was just the first two hours.

That being said, I can't think of a much more satisifying feeling experience than seeing the prayer flags that mark the top of the pass against the shimmering snow and back drop of a whole new valley. Went down, took years off my knees and had lunch in Dagnak. By then the fog and clouds had come back bringing a sprinkling of snow. We decided to press on to Gokyo. This may not have been the smartest decision I've ever made. The slight ups had me winded and hadn't even reachd the evil evil evil Ngozumba glacer.

The glacier was pretty neat at first, a crazy landscape that looked more like the moon than ice except where there were huge lakes. Apparently, said lakes have washed out the trail making us loop around on completely untrod paths. This meant repeatedly ascending, descending, skurying and scampering on the loose rock slopes. The quintessential one step forward two steps back (or worse: one step sideways six feet sliding down). But we made it finally, I was guite angry with the glacier by the end. Gokyo looks really nice, I have a big single room and don't plan on leaving too soon.