It was a fairly respectable wake up call this morning.... 7.30 for an 8.30 leave. We had a nice breakfast of Banana Pancakes and were pretty soon backpacked and booted ready for the climb from Monjo to Namche Bazaar.
We all gathered outside the Everest Summit Lodge and were treated to a fantastic performance 'Goodbye Girl' by Glenn Tilbrrok who managed to get everyone involved and singing along... He was incredibly funny and managed to have us all in stitches and provide the perfect send off for the Everest Rocks trekking team.
It was a fairly warm day and after an hour of trekking alongside the D'ud Ghose river we found ourselves at the beginning of a very steep climb to Namche Bazaar.
The first base was reached at the Hillary Bridge upon which I stopped to film a piece for BBC News and shot an interview for the Everest Rocks documentary. It feels incredibly spiritual to be here with every step taking me higher and higher.
We had hoped to get our first view of Everest today and although the clouds obscured our first potential sighting it only seemed to heighten the dram as I pulled up a steep incline and found Alex Coletti and the documentary team waiting to film my reaction as I set my eyes upon Everest.
There she was in all her majesty framed by the trees of the Khumbu Valley. According to our sherpa we were very lucky to see her this well as the clouds are often blocking the view. It was a wonderful moment and I was encouraged to perform a song.
'Breathe' was the song I chose and it was quite something to be singing at the highest altitude I
have ever been and to have the mighty Everest mountain range behind me.
The rest of the trek took us higher and higher and we all had to dig in and concentrate. I gave my very young sherpa my iPod to listen to and he was blown away by 'Anarchy In The U.K' that came on in the shuffle mode... probably the first time he had ever heard it.
We climbed in silence except for the odd sherpa grunting along to the punk rock blasting into his mind.
East meets West.
We finally arrived at Namche Bazaar the sherpa capital of the Himalaya. It is a very colourful village perched on the hillside and at the heart there is a Tibetan market which I am about to go and explore....
