Visiting Namche Bazaar Saturday Market on your Everest Base Camp Trek is so much more experiencing Sagarmatha area.
Highest mountains in the World is an extraordinary experience in your lifetime.
An opportunity to watch people who live in Everest region concentrated in one place trading in Namche Bazaar Saturday Market makes you understand life in these altitudes even more.
People cope hard life in the high mountains and nature’s adversity living normal life there. Just like you back home.
If you want to buy a milk and flour you drive to a deli and just pick which one you like… High in Nepal mountains life look’s little different. Most people grow their own crops and try to sell in the market. Young Sherpas tote cargo over their limits. These young boys lift sometimes twice their weight, not like in Karakorum in Pakistan where porters have limit up to 25kg.
Saturday is a day where so many people from local villages come to trade.
I knew about Saturay market in Namche nearly 3500m above sea level. That’s why we started our EBC Trek from Lukla on Thursday to be in Namche Bazaar on Saturday. If you are fast and most of all well acclimatized you can take friday first flight to Lukla from Kathmandu and reach Namche Bazaar in the evening the same day.
Altitude sickness is a real problem so don’t rush and better gain hight slow.
Namche Bazaar Saturday Market
Trading starts early in the morning, at 8AM most people arrive to buy and sell. Nearly whole event is gone before midday. So traders can go back to their villages. That’s why it’s better to be in Namche Bazaar friday night and sleep there.
I met young Sherpa guys twice during my EBC trek and we had a good time together.
They are real tough and can carry up to 100kg of cargo on their back. It’s a really hard job… Only few porters use Yaks.
People sell goods like grain, sugar and meat… which is carried a few days without stricked chilled conditons.
Even monks from Tengboche monastery come there to buy esentianls.
It’s the last bigger village in Everest region with bars, restaurants and even mountain equipement shops… yes 🙂
Believe it or not, internet connection too.
For me Namche Bazaar Saturday Market was such a good experince to watch Nepalese people from Everest region in one place. Usually they are in their little villages high in the mountains and only way to see them was this Saturady morning event in Namche Bazaar.
