In March 2024 a couple of friends and I did the Everest Base Camp Trek. I’m planning to put together a few posts around the trip in the coming weeks, but thought I’d go ahead and publish the following walk through my packing list.
The last 2-3 months before leaving for Nepal I watched a bunch of videos going over packing lists and talking through what items to be sure to bring as well as some of the unnecessary things. The following is my packing list for the trek and I’ll add a few comments to several of them.
Clothing Essentials
Keep in mind that the timing for our trek was March. Most of the days while we were hiking we had temperatures in the 30 to 50°F (0 to 10°C) range. As we went higher the daytime highs came down some, but the nighttime lows definitely dipped lower. The first couple nights of the trek low temperatures were probably in the 15 to 25°F (-9 to -4°C) range. The last night in Gorakshep we estimated we were down around -5°F (-20°C)
I’d check with your guide service ahead of time and see what they are estimating daytime highs and nighttime lows to be during your trek. If you’re doing the trek yourself some googling for temperatures might give you a good feel for what you’re working with.
Before we proceed any further it is important to understand that I am a little different than most people I know in how I regulate heat. I just get warmer and start sweating more quickly than a lot of people, so please keep that in mind. If you use a layering approach you should be able to adjust on the fly if you need to.
The biggest tip I can give about clothing is to embrace the “layer lifestyle.” Most mornings I’d start hiking with the following layers for my upper body – a base layer long-sleeved sun shirt, a long-sleeved merino wool shirt, and a puffy jacket. When we got higher and were starting with cooler temps in the morning I’d add a fleece pullover in there as well.
You may have noticed that I used the thin sun shirt as my base layer. This is directly related to the fact that I tend to get warmer while hiking than most people and within a half hour or so of beginning to hike, except on the highest days, I’d usually be down to just my sun shirt.
For my lower body, I just wore a thin pair of hiking pants. For the last leg of the journey up I did add a pair of merino wool pants underneath the hiking pants. Unfortunately, it’s a little more cumbersome to remove layers on the lower body, so I just went with what I knew I’d be comfortable in later in the day, even if that meant hiking cold for the first little while.
So, here is the actual packing list I made of all the clothes I packed.
- Sun shirt – fairly thin and long-sleeved with a hood, mostly for keeping the sun off of exposed skin
- Two merino wool long-sleeve shirts
- One synthetic base layer shirt
- Two regular t-shirts
- One merino wool base layer pant
- One synthetic base layer pant
- Underwear – Whatever you’re comfortable with, I should have probably taken a pair or two more
- Three pairs of hiking socks
- A thicker pair of wool socks for sleeping
- Beanie to keep the head/ears warm
- Cap that can go under beanie with a visor
- Thin pair of gloves
- Thicker pair of gloves – I ended up mostly just using the thing gloves but did pull the thick ones out for the higher/colder days
- Hiking boots –
- Extra pair of shoelaces just in case
- Shoes for evenings in the tea houses, something light and comfortable, bonus points if you can slip in and out of them
- Thin buff to cover mouth/nose for dust
- Thick fleece buff for higher-up when colder
- Fleece jacket for layering
- Puffy down jacket for layering
- Raincoat for rain and wind-blocking
Body Essentials
- Electrolytes – Every time I refilled my water bottles I’d add a Nuun Electrolyte tablet. I’d recommend this not only for the electrolytes but also to help get sufficient amounts of water down through the day.
- Sun Screen and Chap Stick – The sun can get pretty intense while trekking. If you have exposed skin you’ll want to make sure you’re protecting it.
- Blister tape – With the steep climbs and descents on a couple of the days it’s a good idea to have a way to deal with rub spots. I ended up putting tape on a couple of spots before they got bad and had no issues.
- Toothbrush/toothpaste & Deodorant – With as few showers as you’ll likely take its always good to stay fresh in the ways that you can. 😅
- Cough drops – With the amount of dust that can be on the trail its nice to have something to alleviate the urge to cough.
- Baby Powder – This wasn’t on my radar until we got to Namche Bizare, but if you have some rubbing happening in the “lower regions” a good application of baby powder before hiking for the day really helped me out.
- Small first aid kit – Ibuprofen, bandaids, etc.
- Diamox – Several people in our group had gotten Diamox before arriving in Nepal, however, our guide had us covered as well. I started taking it around Namche Bazaar, and other than having to drink more water, urinate more, and the occasional tingles in my fingers I had no altitude issues. Lots of people do this hike without using a high altitude medication, but I figured I had enough other things that could go wrong so hopefully this would be a positive thing that I could do proactively.
- Imodium – Just in case you have a serious issue with diarrhea.
- Benadryl – A friend of mine had some Benadryl which we used to help us sleep at higher altitudes. Don’t go overboard on this, but if you can get some sleep where you wouldn’t have been able to otherwise it’s a good thing!
- Hand sanitizer – Places to wash your hands are few and far between.
- Baby wipes & Toilet Paper – I think one of the places we stopped along the way had toilet paper. You can buy it as you go, or just bring a roll or two with you. The baby wipes are great for wiping down your face/hands/arms/etc after a long day, they can also be useful as a supplement to toilet paper.
- Microfiber towel – I took one and didn’t use it but I could see this possibly being helpful in certain cases.
Odds & Ends
- Knife/multitool (little scissors for cutting blister tape)
- Pack & Rain cover – We had porters who carried what we didn’t need during the day, in our packs we carried whatever layers we shed and drinking water as well as any other odds and ends we needed.
- 0°F sleeping bag – At your lower stops you can probably just get by with the quilts on the bed at the tea houses. However, as you get higher and it gets colder a combination of a good sleeping bag and the quilts can be helpful.
- Trekking poles – I wouldn’t do this hike without trekking poles. I purchased a pair in Katmandu and they did very well for me.
- Sunglasses – The sun is bright and the wind can be strong. A good pair of sunglasses is a must.
- 2 Nalgene bottles – I used a couple of 32oz bottles each day. The idea was to drink between three and four liters of water per day.
- Water filter – I took a Sawyer water filter and ended up leaving it in Katmandu and just purchasing water as we went. When you first leave Lukla it’s fairly cheap, the higher you go the more expensive it gets.
- Headlamp & batteries – We didn’t need headlamps while trekking, but it was useful a couple of times at night to get around my room in the tea houses.
- Photo/video gear – Don’t overdo it here unless you’re for sure up for it. If I was going again I’d cut back to about half of what I ended up taking. I did use everything I took, but I could have gotten by with less and the lower amount of weight in my pack would have been a good thing.
- Power Bank – We were able to charge freely at the lower tea houses, but once we got past about Namche Bazaar charging your phone would require a payment.
- Power plug converter – We encountered several different plug types along the trail. Keep your options open with a plug converter.
I’ve got a couple of other posts I’d like to finish putting together but I’m not entirely sure when I’ll get that done. 😅
If you have any questions about anything feel free to drop them in the comments below or ping me over on X (Twitter);