Some of my hiking mojo returned and for a change, I put in a full day’s walking. Uphill and down to Surke where landslides scour the hills on both sides of the Dudh Kosi and whose waters run milky with the sediment from glaciers that slowly retreat up the valley.  Planes buzz overhead like angry bees on their way to Lukla and late in the afternoon I join the main trail to Namche Bazaar. The trail is wider and for the first hour I just seem to walk past an endless row of lodges by four o’clock the sun starts to go down behind the valley walls and I call it a day. This night I stay in the Lama lodge and indeed an old man dressed in robes sits in the corner chanting mantras all evening.