Day 27 -- October 24 => Dingboche to Deboche

This morning, our group would split for our journey to Deboche, diverting from the standard itinerary. The CHE itinerary while well planned, was not carved in stone and there were a couple of times during the trek where we were given the opportunity to diverge from it. Pemba, Sarah, Baboram, Chris and I would attempt to reach Ama Dablam base camp by crossing over to the east side of the Imja Khola and making our way up to base camp. Pemba told Chris that he had taken a similar route to Ama Dablam before and had taken him and a friend about three hours of fast walking (we would later realize that this really meant about five hours for us Westerners!). Everyone else would take the standard trail and we would meet up in Lower Pangboche for lunch.

Sarah, Baboram and Chris on our attempt to reach Ama Dablam base camp

We left Dingboche at 8:45 am, backtracking about 10 minutes towards Chhukung to find a small wooden bridge across the Imja Khola. There is also a hand pulley setup nearby with a basket so people can cross the river when the bridge gets washed out. It looked pretty old and while I had become accustomed to crossing the suspension bridges, I would have been quite hesistant to give the basket a try if it had been needed.

We followed beside the river for a while on a rough narrow trail but eventually we had to do some fairly stiff uphill. We reached a clearing on a ridge, which was near the summer village of Tulo (4413m/14,478'). The area would have made an exceptional campsite if not for the lack of a close water source. The ridge gave us great views of Nuptse, Dingboche and Pheriche. I had binoculars so I was able to spot some climbers decending Lobuche East (6119m/20,075'). I would estimate that they had probably reached the summit around 8 am at the latest.

Nuptse (7896m/25,905')

About 15 minutes beyond our rest stop, Pemba had previously taken the trail that descended back towards the Imja Khola to avoid the majority of a landslide. We decided that we really did not want to do that so we pressed on to cross the landslide closer to its mid-point. The ascent was fairly steep at times on a sketchy trail and a lot of boulder hopping. Just before noon, Chris talked to Pemba about our progress and they concluded that Ama Dablam base camp was still a fair ways off. We needed to catch up to the others in Lower Pangboche for lunch, so Chris decided that we had to abort our attempt. It was disappointing to give up on it when we had come this far. Now, we had to find a way to get to Lower Pangboche, which was on the other side of the Imja Khola. After about 30 minutes of traversing around Ama Dablam, we found a good trail. About another hour of up and down before beginning our final descent to the Imja Khola. There were short, steep switchbacks to reach the wooden bridge over the Imja Khola. After crossing the river, we then had to regain a couple hundred feet to reach Lower Pangboche (3901m/12,800'). We arrived at our lunch stop at 1:45 pm. The others had eaten already so they left shortly after we started lunch.

West face of Ama Dablam (6856m/22,493')

As we finished lunch, we spotted some climbers high up (above camp 3) on Ama Dablam. It appears they were fixing ropes but over the next two days we never saw them again so they might have been removing the ropes on their way down. We were told that the usual summit time from camp 3 is 8 hours.

We left Lower Pangboche at 2:40 pm and about 15 minutes along, we came across about a dozen Himalayan Tahr below us. A lot of up and down on this section, with another crossing of the Imja Khola on a steel suspension bridge. We arrived at our campsite in Deboche (3757m/12,326') at 3:30 pm. After tea, the kitchen staff provided me some hot water to wash my hair for the first time since October 15 (Dingboche). It was the 26th consecutive day of no shower.

Day 26 - Island Peak Base to Dingboche Day 28 - Deboche to Kyangsuma

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Created: March 1, 2003. Revised: March 30, 2003.