Hands down this has been the highlight of my trip so far. I remember reading about the Everest Base Camp trek and totally psyching myself out. It seemed so difficult, too expensive, and way too hard to plan. I figured I would just do another trek like the Annapurna Circuit or a shorter week-long trek. I kept asking people in Nepal what to do: Annapurna or Everest. Annapurna would be beautiful as you trek through multiple terrains and go through many different villages, but Everest would be an achievement (and also still beautiful since you’re trekking through the Himalayas). It’s Everest. Who can say they have trekked to Everest Base Camp? Of course being me, that’s what sold me on it. I can’t describe how badly I craved that accomplishment. I could not get this out of my head.

I did not book a trek online, which was the right choice. Going through a pre-organized trekking service was lame and it was absurdly expensive online ($1500-3000) It seemed easy enough and cheaper to book in Kathmandu on arrival. Yes and no. I was immediately overwhelmed by the ridiculous number of travel and trekking agencies. I had no idea how to get a guide, if I needed one, if I needed porters or not, or if it was even possible for me to do EBC. I had NO gear whatsoever. I was only planning on traveling to warm countries, and here I was about to trek in the snow. No hiking shoes, no jacket, no gloves, nothing. Luckily most other people are as unprepared as I was when they get to Kathmandu trying to plan a trek, and everything can be figured out there, from gear to flights, from permits to itinerary, and from finding a guide to finding a trekking group.

On my second day in Kathmandu I met up with Lisa, from Sweden, and Mohammed, from Egypt, for breakfast, whom I had both met on trekkingpartners.com (yep, this is a real thing and a legitimately great resource). They had both posted about EBC and wanted to leave around the same time I did. I dragged Chris, from England, whom I had met in my hostel room, along with me who was also considering doing EBC. We were also joined by Ola, from Norway, who Lisa had met randomly. Somehow, having nothing planned or booked at all, in less than 24 hours of breakfast the five of us were on a flight headed to Lukla to begin our trek!

We had two options to get to Lukla: take a jeep to Jiri then walk 3-6 days to Lukla, or fly directly into Lukla for around $200-300. We took the latter option, as Mohammed and Chris had a tight deadline for flights back to Europe (if you have a tight budget and more time, the former option is also excellent). We had to finish the trek in 12-14 days in order for them to make it. Some people do EBC for much longer, up to 20 days, but they add additional acclimatization days or trek to other places, like Gokyo Lakes and do Chula Pass. I would have loved to do these, but 14 days of trekking was enough for me. We decided to follow the 12 day itinerary found on the Everest app, which was actually very helpful and high quality. Theoretically you could trek around the Himalayas for months. I met one girl who trekked totally alone for 1.5 months. It’s totally up to you what you want to see— there is so much to see.

 I was able to buy all my gear that same day: hiking shoes which I prayed would get me through the trek, a four season sleeping bag, down jacket, walking stick, thermals, gloves, etc. There’s a ton of fake NorthFace and Patagonia and everything related to hiking gear can be purchased right there. If I did it again though, I would bring good quality gear from home, especially shoes. I lucked out that my shoes lasted, but I met someone whose shoe soles broke off by midday. I only packed the essentials, and I repeated all of my clothes during the entire trek. rotated between two long sleeve hiking shirts, the same 3 pairs of trekking socks, 6 pairs of underwear, 3 sport bras, one pair of thermals, and one trekking pant. I had no clean clothes and I was sweating profusely in them from all the walking. It was gross.

We ran around Kathmandu to get permits for the Everest trek. We barely made it before closing time, but for 2000 rupees we got our trekking permits to Everest! In between that time we also purchased our flights to Lukla through an agency ($308 roundtrip, which is the cheapest you can get, especially due to the fuel crisis), who set up our flights for 7AM the following day, with an open return ticket. We weren’t exactly sure when we’d be coming back so it was best to just leave it open and just call two days ahead of arriving back in Lukla.

We decided not to hire porters to carry our bags or get a guide. A porter would cost $5-10 a day, and a guide $20 a day. We were all capable human beings who can carry our own things. Plus, I would feel way too guilty making someone else carry my heavy bag. With five of us, it would be easy to figure it out on our own and we could watch out for each other. We had maps and we downloaded the Everest app with our planned itinerary (though if I was trekking alone I would have absolutely hired a guide. Much, much safer just in case anything happened). We were gonna do this real adventure style!!