Walking to the foot of the world's highest mountain

Most Everest treks now begin with a short, dramatic flight to Lukla, whose airstrip, cut into a mountainside with a steep approach and a runway that ends at a cliff edge, is frequently described as one of the more demanding airports for pilots anywhere. There is an older route in, walking overland from Jiri or Phaplu, the road-end towns a good day's drive short of Lukla, that adds the better part of a week to the trek but removes the flight, and the weather delays that come with it, entirely. It follows roughly the path Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay's expedition took before Lukla's airstrip existed, climbing steadily through Sherpa villages and rhododendron forest before joining the standard trail at Phakding.

The extra week is not simply an inconvenience to be endured. Walking in from Phaplu passes through a string of lower-altitude Sherpa villages that the fly-in route skips entirely, at a gradient gentle enough to double as useful acclimatisation before the trail climbs properly into the Khumbu. Trekkers who take this route generally report that the additional days improve their tolerance of altitude further up the valley, a practical benefit alongside the more straightforward appeal of a quieter, less-walked approach.

Namche Bazaar and the acclimatisation problem

Whichever approach is taken, the trek funnels through Namche Bazaar, the unofficial Sherpa capital of the Khumbu region and the last proper town before the trail climbs into thinner air. Altitude sickness, caused by ascending faster than the body can adjust to reduced oxygen, is the main hazard on this route, not technical difficulty, and most itineraries build in rest days here and again at Dingboche specifically to acclimatise rather than to sightsee, a pace that frustrates some walkers until they understand what it is protecting them from.

The view Base Camp doesn't give you

It surprises a fair number of first-time trekkers that Everest Base Camp itself, at just over five thousand metres, does not offer a clear view of the mountain's summit: Everest sits mostly hidden behind the closer, equally dramatic bulk of Nuptse from this angle. The better view is from Kala Patthar, a smaller peak above Gorak Shep reached by a steep pre-dawn climb, from which Everest's summit, along with Nuptse and Lhotse, is properly visible for the first time on the trek. Many itineraries treat Kala Patthar, not Base Camp, as the real summit of the walk. Base Camp itself also changes considerably through the year: for much of the trekking season it is an unremarkable stretch of glacial moraine and ice, and it is only during the spring climbing season, when expedition teams establish a full tented camp ahead of summit attempts, that the site looks anything like the busy staging ground most photographs suggest.

Tengboche, and the monastery on the ridge

Partway up the valley, Tengboche monastery sits on a forested ridge with, on a clear day, an uninterrupted view of Ama Dablam, widely considered one of the most striking peaks in the range despite being considerably lower than Everest itself. The monastery, rebuilt after a fire in the 1990s, remains an active centre of Sherpa Buddhist practice as well as a well-earned rest stop partway through a demanding few weeks.

An alternative for a shorter trip

Not every visitor to Nepal wants a three-week trek to altitudes above five thousand metres, and the Annapurna Sanctuary trek offers a genuinely comparable Himalayan experience in less time: a walk through Gurung villages and rhododendron forest to a natural amphitheatre of peaks at Annapurna Base Camp, at a lower and gentler altitude than Everest's approach, but with scenery that holds its own by any measure.

When to go

October and November offer the clearest, most stable weather of the year, immediately after the monsoon, and are correspondingly the busiest months on the trail. March and April, before the monsoon builds, provide a second reliable window, with the added appeal of rhododendron forests in bloom at the lower altitudes, though visibility can be hazier than in autumn as the pre-monsoon season progresses.