Well the other Jagged Globe groups may have left he hotel yesterday, but they came back later, and they weren’t happy. They’d spent the day at Kathmandu airport being promised flights that never materialised, and they were blaming Jagged Globe’s agents in Kathmandu.
When it became obvious that we weren’t going to fly, we tried to arrange yet another night in the hotel, but discovered we couldn’t all fit. We were only booked for Sunday night originally so six of us had to move down the road to the Greenwich Village hotel, which wasn’t quite as nice as the Summit but had the bonus of free wifi.
We were stood down at about 3pm yesterday afternoon, when it became clear we weren’t going to fly. Lukla was open yesterday, but there’s now such a backlog that it may take days to catch up,
and since our flights were on the third day of delays, we’re at the back of the queue: they fly each day’s scheduled flights first, and then start on the oldest part of the backlog.
…and the wait goes on. We gave up in the middle of yesterday afternoon and Rich (my room-mate) and I walked to Patan Durbar Square, one of the seven Monument Zones that make up the Kathmandu Valley World Heritage Site. The square is full of temples but seemed pretty similar to Kathmandu Durbar Square, so Rich and I adjourned to a bar overlooking the square and sampled some Nepal Ice beer.
A small group of us went out for some food in the evening, and Andy told us a few stories from previous trips he’s been on. I came away thinking that I don’t want to be one of his future horror-stories, so had better put in a good effort when we start climbing!
Arriving in Kathmandu I was very grateful that I was part of a group. Andy, the leader, told us that we shouldn’t tip anyone, which has already proved useful advice – as we pushed our trolleys towards the bus we were approached by “porters” who asked “Are you part of the Jagged Globe group?” then whisked our trolleys away, only to demand payment a hundred metres later at the bus.
