Thokla is like any dusty frontier outpost you would see in an old cowboy movie, with one rocky path winding between the one drafty outhouse and the heaps of wood and tin making up the structures. Being so far from the administrative control center of the country, even from anyone carrying any sort of official title, we felt like we were free to make our own destiny, but exposed to the dangers of lawlessness lurking in the shadows. Who would do such a thing as cause trouble in this community though? From what I saw the Sherpa people really didn’t get into much trouble, and the hikers were all amiable and considerate for others’ well-being. The yaks sure didn’t get out of hand, as long as there was some dried out grass stubble within reach of their sweeping tongues. The only time our yaks got a little bit stimulated was when our junior member Tashi hopped onto one of them and started kicking and yammering like a wildcat.

An hour or two north beyond the chorten, the memorials to the mountaineers killed on Mt. Everest, is the small break in the path known as Thokla village. This insignificant waypoint on the map was actually quite memorable for us, first with the remarkable view. This sparse collection of two or three tin huts is latched at 15,200 feet onto the side of a steep, rocky slope overlooking an eroded glacier valley, and set at the base of the massive Kongma mountain. This is definitely on the main trail to Mt. Everest, and it is a logical point for making camp since it’s still a bit of work getting on to Lobuche. So there we were, feeling like we had pushed beyond reality and the extent of our imagination after what we had seen starting in Pheriche. There are times when you feel like you must have seen it all, so nothing else phases you, and so as we were making strange new encounters in this land beyond the beyond we no longer had any mental alarms going off.

I’ve been reading a lot of reports of protest and violence coming from Kathmandu, and the level of frustration on all sides of the issue is building steadily. I just wanted to make a note that this is on my mind, but I want to continue to write up my recollections of the regions that are, at least for now, more removed from the conflict. Of course I won’t say that the region of the high Himalayas is peaceful and serene compared to the unrest in the big city. The awesome force and seemingly arbitrary shift in temperament of nature in the mountains puts into perspective how small our grievances are. People could conceivably set down their sticks and stones and sit together and talk things through, but with the cold, the wind and the avalanches the elements have the real autocracy and no amount of protesting will sway the course of nature.

A day of rest and Diamox did me very well, apart from the experience of extreme fluids management. Once my headache had cleared I started taking a smaller dose of the medication and I felt I was back on a good rate of acclimatization. We packed up and moved out for our next camping spot, this time in Thokla. As far as hiking goes things are getting a lot easier on our legs. We’ve conditioned up pretty well and seeing a little incline is not really a bother. However, that all may be canceled out by the fact that the thinner air is getting to each and every one of us, and we’re all starting to make a degree of extra effort to keep moving our hiking boots forward on the trail. On these dry days the dust kicks up a bit, so it gets a little unpleasant to be shuffling through in a herd, kicking up all the dust, imagining what all kinds of biological additives we’re sucking in. Still the magnificent landscape is all in clear view. The terrain is no mystery since there is not much in the way of vegetation to obscure the contours.