Feeling uneasy at an unexpected snowfall, the Nepalese guide woke Ron and Deborah Plotkin in their tent in the dead of night and told them pack up.
Moments later, the mountain toppled with a rumble.The avalanche just missed the Plotkins. For the next three days, they and their guide crawled and stumbled through thick banks of snow and waded across icy rivers, trying to reach safety.
At night, they dug caves in the snow for shelter, and thought of their three children in San Diego: Ian, 14, Rachel, 9, and Melia, 5.
"I prayed to God: `Don't snatch me from them, please. They need us'," said Deborah Plotkin, 41.
At least 46 people, including one of the Plotkin's six Sherpa guides, were killed in avalanches and landslides this weekend in one of Nepal's worst disasters in decades. Twenty were foreigners: 16 Japanese, one Irishwoman, one German and two unidentified Westerners believed to be Canadians.
The bodies of 13 Japanese victims were flown to Katmandu Thursday, where relatives who flew in from Japan wept as they put marigold bouquets on the caskets and burned incense sticks.
Another 538 people, including 297 foreigners, have been rescued. But hundreds of hikers and Nepalese villagers may still be trapped in the Himalayan mountains, including more than a dozen Americans. Helicopters rescued nearly 60 people on Wed-nes-day and were continuing the search.
The Gokyo Valley trails buried under the avalanches, along the ancient trading route between Tibet and Nepal, are popular with adventure tourists because they offer panoramic views of the world's tallest mountains, including the 29,028-foot Mount Everest.
The secretive kingdom opened its borders to outsiders and its majestic mountains to tourism in 1950.
"It was a dream trip," said Deborah Plotkin, a teacher. They set off Nov. 1 with six Nepalese porters and guides, and two yaks to carry their baggage, on an expedition to 20,423-foot high Island Peak.
On Friday, when the couple pitched their tents at 6 p.m., it started snowing.
"The little flakes seemed innocuous," said Plotkin, a 39-year-old psychologist.
But at 2.30 a.m., one guide woke them. As they came out of their tent, they heard a rumbling sound, and tons of snow crashed down near their campsite.
"Just after the sound, I looked back and saw four of our Nepalese staff gone," apparently buried under the snow, said Deborah Plotkin. The four later escaped.
Snow had piled up to nearly 6 feet. Even the yaks couldn't move.
"And then the crawling started. We could move only 20 feet in one hour," said Plotkin. Before dusk Saturday, they and their guide dug a cave in the snow to protect them overnight.
"I came out of the snow cave and looked at the sky and I saw one glittering star," said Deborah Plotkin, struggling to speak through tears.
She remembered telling her youngest daughter, Melia, that when she loses her first tooth it will become a star in the sky. "It was as if her face was there in the star."