For 12 year old Gunjan Narvekar, the thrill of trekking to the
Mount Everest Base Camp was an accomplishment of five months of rigorous
training. Instead of spending New Year in the comfort of her home with family
and friends, her father Pankaj and she decided to conquer the icy heights on
Earth’s highest mountain, Mount Everest. The father-daughter duo reached the
Everest Base Camp (EBC) on December 31 and ushered in the New Year by returning
to Kala Pathar to view the majestic Mount Everest on January 1.
A Class 7 student at Jnyan Vikas School,
Porvorim, Gunjan is the daughter of Pankaj and Parinika Narvekar and elder sister
to four year old twin brothers, Daksh and Darsh. Gunjan was mentally and
physically trained to take on the challenge of climbing up to EBC by her
father, an avid adventurer. Pankaj is an assistant engineer, PWD and loves
trekking. “My father is very adventurous and he often visits Spiti Valley in
Himachal Pradesh and lives there even when the temperature drops to – 25
degrees. He would return with fascinating stories and that got me interested in
trekking. In September 2021, I did a trek to Kedarnath when I was ten and a
half years old and then we completed Chandrashila Summit Trek above Tungnath
temple in May 2022. I have even completed minor treks in Maharashtra,” says
Gunjan, whose favourite subject is chemistry.
The father-daughter duo were the only Goans, who were part of
the 16 member group to trek to the EBC. “I was the youngest and my father was
the eldest member in the group of 15 Indians and one foreigner. Being the
youngest, I was pampered by the entire group who would keep checking on me. We
left Goa for Delhi on December 23 and we flew to Kathmandu and reached the base
camp of Lukla on December 24. We stayed overnight at Phakding and on December
25 trekked to Namche Bazar. Our Sherpa guide, Deepak, recommended that we stay
an extra day at this place since it is on a height of 3500 metres to get
acclimatized. Next, we headed to Tyengboche, Dingboche, Lobuche, Gorokshep and
finally Everest Base Camp at 5364 meters on December 31 at 1 pm. The weather
was very cold at -20 degrees and the wind made it even more chilly. We could
not remove our gloves to even click photos. My father clicked a few photos and
his hand started hurting immediately. We could stay there for just an hour
before we headed back down to Gorokshep, which is a drop of 300 meters. We
could not get a proper view of Mount Everest so the next day, we trekked to
Kala Pathar which is a five kilometer trek to click the sunrise on Mount
Everest,” Gunjan explains her trek.
There were certain challenges that came Gunjan’s way. “The
weather is so cold that the phone and camera batteries run out quickly. Once
you climb up to the EBC, you can’t stop walking for even two minutes, because
you have to constantly generate body heat. We could stay up at Kala Pathar for
just ten minutes and get back down because of the weather conditions. Only one
member from our group suffered Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS), an altitude
sickness and I felt bad for her because she could not complete the trek. We
descended quickly and we were back home in Goa on January 2.”
Her training came to good use as she was prepared to face these
trying times. Her father began her training five months prior to the trek. “I
had to undergo rigorous training. I used to walk 270 minutes a day which were
broken down to 90 minute walks in the morning, evening and night. With such
contradictory weather in Goa, I used to sit in the bath tub with cold water and
ice cubes with only my head and palms out of the water. All this training
really paid off as I was prepared to face the weather as my aim was to defeat
winter and the cold traumatic conditions. This is the off season as trekkers
usually attempt to climb the summit in summer in the months of April and May,”
says the young girl, who hopes to conquer Mount Everest soon.
Gunjan and Pankaj were guided by their Sherpa, Deepak, who has
completed over 40 treks to Mount Everest. “Our guide was quite helpful and
experienced. In Gorokshep, half of the group climbed the mountain and someone
informed us on the way that there were mountain lions up on the hill. Deepak
had to run up so quickly to get everyone down the hill,” laughs Gunjan, who is
next planning on trekking to the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal.
After
trekking up to the Everest Base Camp, what souvenior did Gunjan bring back
home? “I brought rocks which I collected from the EBC. There were many shops
selling souvenirs but these pieces of rock were more precious to me,” smiles
Gunjan, who was given a warm welcome by her school teachers and schoolmates.
