Nepal’s Sagarmatha National Park, home to Mt Everest and the Everest Base Camp (EBC) trek, sees visitor numbers in excess of 35000 each year. Of those visitors, 95% choose to make the trek to EBC. The rest, like my partner and myself, branch off into a handful of other, significantly quieter, hikes in the region, such as the 11 day trek out to Gokyo Ri (5357m elevation) via Renjo Las Pass. Travelling on a shoulder season, we left the EBC hikers at Namche Bazar, branching off up a different valley into solitude. For the next 8 days we crossed paths with between 4 and 15 other hikers a day (With the exception being Gokyo village itself).
We rejoined the EBC trek route on our last day, and were hit with a literal bumper-to-bumper lineup of trekkers, which affirmed our decision to walk elsewhere.