For Terri the climb is over. She has been to 17,600 feet – 3,000 feet higher than anything in the lower 48 and only about 2,500 feet lower than the highest mountain in North America. It took us about 4 hours to trek down what had taken 2 days to come up. It would have been faster but much of this trail is very rocky and the footing is tricky especially going down. She will actually trek all the way back to Lulka in three days. It took 11 days to come in. Part of that is a function of downhill although no day on the trail is either all uphill or all downhill. On some days, for example leaving Namche, we would descend maybe a thousand-foot in the morning to a bridge crossing and then pay it all back, plus some, in the afternoon. I use the term bridge loosely. These are walk bridges that consist of steel cables stretched across the river from one side of the valley to the other with a variety of materials for flooring. Some were very impressive with their height, length and sway. The worst thing was to meet a herd of yak coming the other way. They really make the bridges swing and they take up all the bridge width. Terri was terrified of the bridges but she made it across in good form. It helped that we had veteran Everest submitters that didn’t like them either. We spent the night in the Eco Lodge in Lobuche and waiting for the remaining (there was another trekker who came down with us) team. It was a pleasant way to spend our last night together for the next couple of months even if it was unheated, etc, etc. The doors had a simple slide latch from the inside and a padlock on the outside. The night we spent here on the way up I left to go for a walk and pushed the lock closed when I walked out effectively locking her in. At some point when she needed to go to the outdoor facilities and discovered she couldn’t get out she had to yell to get someone’s attention to open the door. I haven’t made that mistake again.