[Leica] Nepal: gear

[firkin at ncable.net.au (Alastair Firkin)]

Thanks Jacques, I hope we get out of Kathmandu faster than that ;-) We 
have a total of 20 days trekking.

Cheers
On 18/09/2004, at 2:30 AM, Jacques Bilinski wrote:

> Alastair,
>
>> I may have caught a bit of sun ;-) I've been in "heavy" training ;-)
>> should be ok and we start at about 3000 meters!!!!
>>
>>
> I take it you are flying to Lukla then hiking to the Everest base camp 
> area.
> Last time we did this we spent about ten days trying to fly out of 
> Kathmandu
> to Lukla. Each day we would check out of our hotel in Kathmandu and go 
> to
> the airport. Some days we would take off only to return to Kathmandu 
> because
> of weather conditions in Lukla, other days we would not even leave the
> airport. Each day they would change the sheets and clean our room at 
> our
> hotel only to have us come back in the evening. They got pretty tired 
> of
> this after a week.
>
> We finally did make it Lukla, but the delays cut our trip short so 
> that we
> did not have time to acclimatise properly. Tkis is something you have 
> to
> watch at these altitudes. My wife got very sick and we had to abort the
> treck to the the base camp at the last shelter (I forget the name). If 
> you
> are feeling quite sick from altitude sickness the only thing to do is 
> to
> walk to lower elevations and take more time to acclimatise. The runway 
> at
> Lukla is something else. It is on quite a slope right at the edge of a
> cliff. On take off almost as soon as the plane start moving it is 
> totally
> committed.
>
> The views in the area are just fantastic. I hope you get good weather. 
> The
> best shots of the mountains are just before sunrise so bring an alarm 
> clock.
> This is also when it is the coldest.so it takes a bit of discipline to 
> get
> out of the bag to do some photography. Re equipment you obviously need 
> to
> keep an eye on the total weight (unless someone else is carying your 
> stuff).
> I usually take a lightweight tripod. Fast lenses are not required for 
> the
> scenery. Teles are good to isolate mountains. 21mm/35mm/90mm would be 
> what I
> would take if I was carying my own equipment.
>
> Jacques
>
>
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Alastair