The Night I Thought I Was Lost in the Himalayas

Between Tengboche and Deboche, Nepal

The building was dark.

I swept my headtorch across its windows, looking for the dining room where I had left my gloves drying beside a flask of hot water.

There was a padlock on the door.

I checked the building again, as though a second look might change it.

This wasn’t my lodge.

Behind me, the path disappeared between the trees. I had been so certain of where I was going that I hadn’t paid much attention to how I got there.

Now I couldn’t remember the last junction.

Earlier that afternoon, I had arrived in Deboche tired, hungry, and pleased with myself.

I was twenty-seven, travelling in Nepal alone but trekking with a local guide. We had walked through Tengboche and descended into the forest to spend the night in Deboche.

By the time we reached the lodge, my shoulders ached beneath my backpack straps. I ordered tea and sat in the dining room without taking off my jacket.

My guide asked what I wanted for dinner.

“Whatever’s biggest.”

He laughed and wrote down my order.

Outside, cloud had begun to cover the upper slopes. Through gaps in the trees, I could still see pieces of the mountains.

I wanted another look before the light went.

I told my guide I was going outside to take a few photographs.

“Stay near the lodge,” he said. “Dinner at six.”

I nodded.

At first, I stayed close enough to hear people talking inside.

Then I followed the path a little uphill. I recognised it from our descent earlier. There was a gap in the trees where I thought I might get a clearer view.

The mountains were mostly hidden, but occasionally the cloud opened and a bright patch of snow appeared above the dark branches.

I waited.

Then I waited a little longer.

There wasn’t a single moment when I decided to go for a walk. I moved to another opening, then around a bend, then farther uphill because the view seemed better just ahead.

When I finally put my phone away, the light beneath the trees had changed.

I took out my headtorch.

I remember feeling rather pleased that I had brought it.

Going back should have been simple.

Downhill. Follow the path. Look for the lodge.

But the forest no longer looked like it had that afternoon. The headtorch showed roots, pale stones, and the next few metres of ground. Everything beyond that small circle was difficult to place.

At a branching path, I chose the direction I thought I remembered.

A roof appeared between the trees.

Relief made me walk faster.

Then I saw the padlock.

I stood outside the wrong building and listened.

No plates. No conversation. No footsteps.

Somewhere below, water rushed through the valley. It had been part of the background all afternoon. Now it seemed unusually loud.

I turned back towards the path.

Was the junction just around that bend, or farther up?

I couldn’t picture it.

That uncertainty frightened me more than the darkness. A few minutes earlier, I had known exactly where I was. Now every decision seemed capable of taking me farther from somewhere familiar.

I took out my phone and opened the map I had downloaded.

It showed the main trail and my position, but I hadn’t saved the lodge as a waypoint. I could locate myself on a mountainside without knowing which building contained my backpack, my dinner, and the person expecting me.

I tried calling my guide.

The call didn’t connect.

I tried again.

Nothing.

It was only a little after six.

People were probably sitting down to eat.

I imagined my empty chair and felt a sharp mixture of relief and embarrassment. Someone would notice.

Then another thought arrived: I had only said I was going outside. Nobody knew how far I had wandered.

I put my phone away, zipped my jacket to my chin, and resisted the urge to choose another path simply because standing still felt unbearable.

I had passed the junction recently. I could return to it.

Slowly, I retraced the short stretch from the building, checking the ground where I had come down.

When I reached the fork, I stopped.

I called out.

“Hello?”

My voice sounded small, but it didn’t vanish into some endless wilderness. It travelled between ordinary trees, beside buildings where people lived and worked.

Remembering that helped.

I called again.

The first light appeared higher up the trail.

It moved once, disappeared behind a trunk, then returned.

I raised my headtorch and shouted.

“Here!”

“Ema?”

My guide.

I answered so loudly that my voice broke.

When he reached me, he looked first at my face, then at my hands.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. I went to the wrong building.”

“Did you fall?”

“No.”

He nodded, waited while I adjusted my bag, and turned towards the other branch.

“This way.”

There was no dramatic rescue. He didn’t have to carry me. I wasn’t injured or stranded on a cliff.

I had taken a wrong turn near a settlement, and darkness had made that small mistake feel enormous.

My hands shook anyway.

We reached the lodge in less than ten minutes.

That was almost the hardest part to accept.

I had been imagining a long night outside while people were eating dinner a short walk away.

Warm air met us at the door. Someone moved a chair so I could get past. My gloves were still beside the flask.

The woman serving dinner asked whether I wanted my food.

“Yes, please.”

I sat down and realised I was still wearing my headtorch.

Across the table, my guide waited until I had eaten a few mouthfuls.

“Tomorrow,” he said, “tell me before you go farther.”

“I will.”

I didn’t try to make it sound less foolish than it had been.

That night, I saved the lodge’s location on my phone, even though we were leaving in the morning.

Then I sent a message home.

“Made it to Deboche. Long day. Going to sleep.”

I stared at it before pressing send. There was much more I could have written, but I wasn’t ready to explain why ten minutes of uncertainty had left me so shaken.

Outside my room, someone walked down the corridor in heavy boots. A door opened. A tap ran.

I lay in my sleeping bag and listened until I fell asleep.