Day 10

Today is the defining moment of our trek as we walk over the two Lumba Sumba passes. We had another cold night of -9 degrees Celsius, my sleeping bag describes this temperature as the limit of ‘comfort’, I hate to think what discomfort feels like! Unfortunately we have been relying on the very thin and poor quality sleeping mat that was issued to us while our highly comfortable and insulating mats remain back in Kathmandu. This was our biggest mistake, contorting ourselves around boulders at the high camps and feeling the heat sapped from our bodies into the ground has left us longing for a bed!

We set out just after dawn and although we missed the alpine glow on the summits, the light was perfect and there was not a cloud in the sky.

The first pass is at 5150m where we added our prayer flags that were blessed by the monk in Olangchung Gola Gompa, the second pass requires a rocky traverse of half an hour and takes us to the highest part of the Lumba Sumba La at 5180m. 

Although we were expecting to see great mountains, the Himalayas as always, take your breath away. As we ascended the first pass, the 5 summited ridge of Kangchenjunga came in to full view, the world's 3rd highest mountain at 8586m. To it’s right the lower but more impressive Jannu then beyond that the flat ridge of Kabru. After the shot walk to the second pass we were then left in a quandary as to which way to look. An enhanced view of what lay behind us but an incredible array of big mountains ahead.




The centre piece of our new view to the west is Makalu (8468m) then behind it is Lhotse and, partially obscured  by a lofty snow field is Everest. 
Our descent from the pass started beautifully, it was reminiscent of descending The Band into Langdale or one of the long ridges in the Black Mountains of South Wales- all except the backdrop is a collection of 8000m great white giants. The pleasant grassy moraine walls that we started to descend ended abruptly followed by a horrible steep and loose path across land slips- a gentle reminder of which part of the world we were in. We camped on a rough yak pasture at an elevation of around 4200m, the sun’s path  to the horizon has been favourable in the last 2 nights but by 3pm we are taken from warm sunshine to icy air.
Distance 10km 8hrs

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