We have now arrived at the Hotel Shanker in Kathmandu for a few days R &R. It is essential to leave a few days spare at the end as planes cannot land at Lukla if the wind is in the wrong direction or the mist comes down. We have international flights booked on Saturday and need to be 100% certain of catching them. The more reliable alternative is to take a helicopter down the mountain but this costs $500 per person.
As it happens both the incoming flight at the start of the holiday and the outgoing one this morning ran to schedule. 

As I mentioned previously the turn round time of the planes is very short, ours was five minutes. In this time they unload 16 passengers, all the hold bags and cargo from lockers at the front and rear of the aircraft then loaded 16 new passengers and their bags. Both propellers were spinning when the passengers got off and one kept going throughout the process. We climbed into our seats and off we went. My seatbelt was not anchored to anything, I pointed this out to the stewardess who just said wait till we are airborne and I will see what I can do. A customer not strapped in is no cause to stop a speedy departure.

We are a very scruffy and unhealthy bunch (we are all suffering from wheezing chests and runny noses) we arrived at the Hotel Shanker at 9am and made their marble foyer look decidedly scruffy especially as our bags have spent the past fortnight on the back of yaks on dusty paths? As in all good hotels they did not bat an eyelid and what was better they found us rooms straight away (probably to get us hidden away) and we all spent the morning having baths, doing washing and then having another bath. Hot water, a bath, toilet paper, universal sockets, usb charging sockets, a washing line, tea and coffee making facilities, good wifi, everything you expect from a good hotel but rarely get.

This afternoon we will probably wander round the city, tomorrow we have a formal tour booked and then on Friday our guide has invited us all to his house, we now need to find the correct present to buy our host.