The drink stop at the cafe was exactly what we needed. Sit down, breathe, pretend the last few hours of stairs didn’t happen.
The espresso signs on the wall were aspirational at best, but it was a place to sit and that was enough.
Once everyone regrouped, the pace picked up. The problem was that Nicholas doesn’t really have a slow setting. He was supposed to be taking it easy. He was sick. Pokin knew this. So for the rest of the day, every time Nicholas passed her on the trail, she’d yell “bistari! bistari!” at him, which is Nepali for “slowly, slowly.”
It did not work. He kept going fast. She kept yelling. This became the soundtrack of the day.
The Stairs Continue#
The trail between the lodge and the national park entrance is more of the same: stone stairs, steep inclines, and occasional painted boulders reminding you that Namche is still ahead. Not behind you. Ahead. Uphill.
Sagarmatha National Park#
Then we hit the gate.
Sagarmatha National Park was established in 1976 and became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1979. It covers 1,148 square kilometers and ranges from 2,845 meters at Jorsalle, where we were standing, all the way up to 8,849 meters at the summit of Everest. That’s a park that starts at “uncomfortable” and ends at “death zone.”
“Sagarmatha” is the Nepali name for Everest. It means “forehead of the sky.” Which is more poetic than “really tall mountain that people keep trying to climb,” but means the same thing.
Manoj had gone ahead and handled all the permits before we arrived. He’d taken our passports earlier that morning and sorted everything at the checkpoint. So our grand entrance into a UNESCO World Heritage Site was just… walking through a gate. Nobody checked anything. Nobody stopped us.
Into the Park#
Past the gate, the trail continued through Jorsalle with more mani walls, prayer wheels, and painted murals than we’d seen all morning. The whole area felt more deliberately sacred, like someone had decided that the entrance to a national park containing Everest should look the part.
Lunch at Jorsalle#
We stopped at the Jorsalle Guest House for lunch. The kind of place where the Snickers bars in the display case cost more than the dal bhat, and the dal bhat is what you should be ordering anyway.
Pokin ordered momos. She’s been ordering momos at every stop since Kathmandu. Steamed dumplings stuffed with vegetables or meat, served with a spicy sauce. She’s already scouting ahead for places that might have boiled ones, because apparently the momo quest has levels.
Nicholas got dal bhat. Rice, lentil soup, vegetable curry, greens. The standard trekker fuel that you’ll eat approximately 47 more times before this trip is over. It was filling. It was warm. It was exactly what you need when you’re sick and have been climbing stairs for five hours.
Lunch was good. The group was together. The fevers were holding off. And the hardest part of the day was still waiting for us somewhere up the mountain.