Altitude effects - Personal impressions

At Manang, somewhere around 3400m, I went to a AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness) lecture by a Western doctor, volounteering there. In the lecture he explained that altitude effects have nothing to do with age, gender or physical fitness. It depends on your body's ability to adjust. Up to 2500m the adjustment is immediate, from 2500-5000m it takes some time to adjust and from around 5000-5500m and higher, the body can not adjust.

I really like going up fast, running up the mountains, weight or not. But after Manang I started walking real slow. My pulse raced when I quickened my steps and I had to breathe a lot. Many 50+ years old Europeans passed me by easily. I guess it is easier when you live near the Alps... And so the famous "Mountain goat" was reduced to a snail :-)
In one place (Yak Kharka) I went for an acclimization trip. The saying goes "walk high, sleep low", meaning you shouldn't sleep at your highest altitude during a day. I made some good people worry as they weren't sure if I came back. Probably because I also had an awful headache that day. That was solved with a headache pill and tripling the amounts of water I drank to more than three litters a day (Just water, not to mention teas and soups).

So all in all, my body and I handled it quite fun, well almost (see next post)