Hotel rating...

About 8km down from EBC, at 5200m elevation, there are two hotels across from Rongpu Monastery, the highest in the world (those monks are a hardy lot!).

First we checked the Tibetan Guesthouse. Rooms all w/o bath and power were basic, had heavy bedsize pads to weigh you down and keep you warm. There was a full view of Everest from each room, but I was a bit disconcerted by the wind that whistled in thru the windows and blew the curtains around and left a rim of frozen water in the washbasin. The rate was 25Y/person.

Next we checked a new 3-storey Chinese hotel which employed Tibetans (making it somewhat palatable to support more Chinese involvement in Tibet) . Room w/o bath had carpet, heavy bedsize pads with nice bedspreads, high ceilings and desk with mirror. There was a full view of Everest from each room and the windows seemed to have a better seal. The rate... a whopping 200Y/person. Outrageous. Particularly due to the huge pile of FROZEN shit in the communal toilets. Oh, and the LACK of power. The receptionist was escorted up the stairs to look at the toilets in an effort to create a lever to readjust the nightly fee. Sadly, the staff explained, there was no water, what to do? A shovel was proposed to no avail and ultimately, locked the door to the room, thereby keeping everyone from the toilets!

Further discussion resulted in a revised fee of 100 Y pp.

The room had a TV, but the electric socket was on the other side of the room. The carpets have never been vacuumed. The bedside console controlling the lights and TV (a standard feature in Chinese hotels) was not connected to the lights or TV. The only heat in this building at the base of Everest was on the second floor in the common area – it came from a wood stove fuelled by goat pellets, around which all the Tibetans sat, leaving no room for the hotel guests.

As for the toilet, you could go outside into the biting wind or you could rig something in the room.?We discovered the next morning that the trash pail had a leak – oh well.?

We woke up the next morning to thick clouds, so there were no views of Everest, bummer. We stayed long enough to find our driver to tell him that we wanted to leave sooner rather than later.

Hotel: Zhu Feng View and Admire Floor
Rating: Worst hotel in the world