Day 70 (Post 2)

Wednesday December 6th

We’re now back in Kathmandu and staying at Hotel Planet in Thamel, the city’s central area. We completed our three hundred and fifty kilometer trek around the entire Annapurna massif in eighteen days and it was simply two and a half weeks of jaw dropping, awe inspiring scenery. The circuit took us around the Annapurna Sanctuary, a conservation area which spans across forty miles and is home to forest land, many astounding mountains- including six of the world’s largest peaks over 7200meters- and massive ice glaciers.

We began in a small town called Besi Sahar which lies at about 700metres above sea level and for the first eight days climbed along the floor of the Marsyangdi valley heading upstream of the surging, crystal blue Marsyangdi River. As the days passed, strikingly vivid and colorful flowers and plants gave way to tall alpine looking firs and barren slopes housing only heather, rocks and many big boulders which we had to clamber over and around in order to follow the path. We’d chosen the perfect time of year to trek, it was just coming to the end of peak season so we came across very few others along the way and as winter was approaching the days were crisp, bright and beautifully clear. Only one day out of the eighteen did we witness any cloud. Of course this meant that night time was toe-numbingly cold but we felt fairly well prepared as we’d hired down jackets and down sleeping bags from Kathmandu before we left and bought thermals and plenty of extra woolen layers for the chilly evenings.

As we headed north and climbed higher the villages became smaller and sparser and began to take on a Tibetan like look and feel, prayer wheels and flags dominated the village’s central streets and mini Buddhist temples could also be found scattered along the way.

By the time we reached Manang, a town 3700 meters up, I began to feel myself astounded. Not only by the sight of the ever increasingly magnificent and humbling peaks which were starting to surround us but by the fact that people were living there. Only days of walking, often clambering, uphill along a sometimes undistinguishable route allows access to these mountain villages and the cold-resistant communities that thrive there. I suppose it makes sense that generation after generation stay and inhabit the same village year after year and very few make it down to the lower lying towns and areas of civilization. It would just seem like too much bother! Of course there’s really the fact that the mountain people believe that God is to be found in each one of the peaks so the higher up you live the closer you become to living a life filled with God and pure fulfillment.

It was around the Manang area where vegetation seemed to give in altogether. We were still able to get carrots, cabbage and potatoes in our soup so somewhere crops were managing to grow but the land had taken on a ‘surface of the moon’ type quality; dusty, rocky and grey.

Most trekkers take a day off in Manang to acclimatize and rest but we hardy pair decided to take a side trip ‘off-piste’ to visit the highest lake in the world; Tilicho Tal. The path was much more challenging and at times rather hairy. We crossed scree-slopes prone to landslides, navigated our way around narrow pathed mountainsides and all the while climbed higher until we reached Tilicho Tal lodge at 4200meters. We’d been walking for just under eight hours that day and hadn’t come across anyone else since the morning so as we rounded the corner of what felt like our hundredth scary scree-slope the sight of the solitary toy-like lodge in the distance nestled amongst the silent monsters came as a welcoming surprise.

Up until this point we’d had to add an extra layer of clothes to sleep in each night but at Tilicho Tal lodge and for five nights afterwards we slept in absolutely everything including all our jackets, socks, hats, gloves and scarves. It was freezing.

The lake itself lay at 4919meters, another four hours climb away, so we started out just before six the following morning in order to reach it and head back to the Manang area in one day. This was the first day either if us began to feel inhibited by the altitude. Breathing deeply and slowly became hard and headaches coupled with nausea began to creep upon us. I especially had to rest more often and my steps literally became mouse-like.

It had snowed during the night and at one point everywhere we looked we saw white, from the ground beneath us to the looming mountains towering all around. And then we saw the lake. I’d expected it to be frozen as our guide book said that by mid-November it usually is but it wasn’t. It was emerald green and turquoise blue, shimmering and magical. It felt like we’d unearthed a precious, hidden jewel that only a few people get to see and we both became a little emotional. For a few moments the cold and the exhaustion were forgotten and there was only the spectacle of the lake. Along with sitting at the top of Mount Kilimanjaro and watching the sun come up over Kenya, standing alongside Tilicho Tal in its nest-like spot cradled high up in the mountains was the most magnificent experience of my life and I shall always remember it.

After an energy boost of boiled eggs and chapattis by the lake (the eggs were especially difficult to conquer as it was too cold for us to remove our gloves to peel them) we gazed at Tilicho for one last time in order to soak up and savor its unearthly beauty before making our way back down to the lodge. This part of the trip we managed to complete in under one and a half hours as the lower we descended the more oxygen we had streaming through our blood which allowed a feeling of euphoria and giddiness to take over and we were practically running at one point. (Although I later discovered that Jonny’s real reason for bolting off down the mountainside and leaving me scampering behind following a trail of footprints was the fact that his stomach had begun a succession of serious cramps and was indeed about to give way on the snowy path. Not the most romantic of ways to end a trip to an extremely romantic lake).

After a brief stop at Tilicho Tal lodge for ginger tea and to pick up our bags we headed back along the windy mountain paths and the sliding scree-slopes back towards the Manang district. As we’d risen early and already overcome a challenging morning, the strenuous route, this time, began to take its toll. The paths seemed to go on forever and any of the stones and rocks that tumbled away down the mountainside from beneath our feet posed more of a threat due to the fact that we were becoming tired and were finding it hard to recover from losing our step.

We eventually reached another tea-house around two o’clock and rested again for tea and a bite to eat. Now, as I said earlier, the nights were becoming colder and snow was starting to fall and we still had to reach and cross the highest point of the trek: Thorung La pass which was a good three days away. We knew it was advisable that we got up and over the pass sooner rather than later in order to avoid becoming faced with an impassable route and having to wait until perhaps the snow melted. So, at this point, instead of continuing a little further to reach our starting point of the Tilicho Tal trip, Manang, we decided to gain two days by forking off on a side trail which would eventually join the main path to the next settlement, Yak Kharka and land us closer to the pass.

The route started off well, fairly flat and manageable over shrubby hills and past old, abandoned stone houses but the way seemed to come to an abrupt end when we found ourselves at the top of a cliff overlooking a valley and a river 500 meters below. We knew that we had to cross the river and traverse another few hillsides in order to reach Yak Karka but I had expected to be able to see the lodge from this point. We still had a long way to go and after walking up and down the edge of the cliff a steep and unwelcomingly thin path crawling down to the valley floor revealed itself to us.

It took us almost two hours to reach the valley floor as black ice coated certain parts of the route and made it impossible for us to pass up-right; we had to shuffle along on our bottoms and hands. I was becoming exhausted by this point and had to hand my bag over to Jonny, the savior that he is, and with my scarf he tied my rucksack to the top of his and with the strength of an ox carried on.

I could drag on about the last part of the journey as that was how it felt: a long and everlasting crawl over the river, up more hills, across more fields, around more rocks, stopping every five minutes to catch our breath and to check that we were following the right course and eventually reaching and joining the main path. It was almost five thirty, it had begun to snow and the sky was dark but at least we had reached the main path and only another half hour of head-bowed trudging brought us to the lodge.

I had a little shaky weep in our room from exhaustion and from being a bit scared. At points I had seriously envisaged (and I think that maybe just a little bit Jonny had too) losing our way, becoming too tired to carry on and having to give in and huddle up for the night between two boulders in the middle of the Himalayas. Of course we didn’t, we slept in big, cosy beds under thick, warm (well, nearly warm) duvets and drank hot, sweet chai with whisky BUT it COULD have happened so the shedding of a few tears was allowed. (We had also been hiking up and down mountains for about twelve hours that day and had finished the whole four day side-trip to Tilicho Tal in two days. Enough said.)

Even though the path over the next few days took us higher in order to reach Thorung La High Camp lodge we were now back on the main trail and life was once again easy. We had undergone a two day adventure along a trail which had been difficult, remote and all to ourselves and now we could relax and stop whenever we liked at the many tea-houses along the route and enjoy seeing other groups of trekkers around us.

Yaks became a big feature of the trail at this altitude, huge, hairy, wonderful animals with big, sad eyes (the type that you can drown in) and we often had to sit by the side of the path for a good half hour or so to let a farmer and his herd of sometimes up to two hundred pass. We discovered later that the yak cannot actually survive below around 3000meters and for this reason the local people regard them as sacred animals. As they only breathe in the high altitude air which sweeps its way round the mountain tops they are creatures which live and breathe closer to God. Therefore a special ceremony is held a few times a year which involves the drinking of yak’s blood in order to cleanse and purify the soul. The people of the lower villages will travel for many days to take part. We didn’t opt for a mug of blood but we did sample yak steaks and cured yak’s meat with chilli and garlic at a few of the lodges and it was scrumptious.

Thorung La High Camp lodge sits at 4800meters and on arrival slight feelings of altitude sickness crept in. It was very cold there and we spent the evening huddled with the rest of the trekkers around one huge table which, hid underneath the folds of its tablecloth, housed a heater. We ate very well (chilli chips, vegetable spring rolls and tomato pasta) in order to compensate for the cold and the final ascent to Thorung La pass which we would begin at four o’clock the next morning with the rest of the group as by lunchtime the wind on the pass is uncomfortably strong. We went to bed at seven that night but I didn’t sleep. The cold and the altitude got the better of me.

Like a line of slow moving ants, a group of about thirty of us (trekkers, guides and porters) set off with only torches to light the way to reach the highest point of our journey.

The pace was desperately slow but needed to be due to the altitude and it was hard not to give in to urge to breathe quickly and sharply. At around six o’clock the sun came up and we were able to see below us High Camp lodge where we had begun. The path criss-crossed up between two peaks and we could just about make out above us the spot at which it would pass through and over to the other side. Unfortunately at around this point the chilli chips wanted out and after holding on with serious stomach cramps for as long as we both could bear the two of us had to hang back to the end of the line and exert even more energy by traipsing off the path through the snow to find a boulder to sheild our modesty. It took me nearly a week to regain feeling in my fingers after washing them in ice water and the top few layers of skin peeled away.

We reached the pass at around ten that morning and after braving standing in the icy wind for a photograph by the prayer flag swamped sign (you have reached 5416meters!) we rushed inside the tea-hut (yes, there was actually a hut here with a man inside who makes tea) for a hot cup. Needless to say it did little to ease the discomfort of the minus twenty degrees temperature (outside with the wind chill it was recorded at minus forty) and so we hurriedly paid and moved on. We also had to pay for the tea of a young Australian couple that we had met as they became too cold to function properly. They had brought layers of woolens, jumpers and shawls but neither (probably due to lack of information from their guide) had a proper jacket. They were both shaking uncontrollably at the top and he was trying to wrap anything he could around his face, a kagool, plastic bags and a head scarf. They couldn’t work out what notes were what so I told them to start heading down and that we would pay.

Three hours of viscously steep, knee straining, downhill walking brought us to the bottom of the pass and to our next stop off point. The sun was out, we were able to remove a few layers and as the hardest work had now been done we celebrated with a beer.

It took us another four days of descending to come just about full circle. The trip finishes at a town called Beni which lies directly west of the starting point so we had completed what looks like a horseshoe route on the map. The last few days took us through the Kali Gandaki valley, the deepest valley in the world, where the vegetation and villages looked almost Mediterranean. Lush and vibrantly green hillsides made up of fields broken up by dry stone walls sprouted trees bearing an abundance of fruits. Apples, oranges, pears and apricots swinging from their branches lined the path and made for refreshing snacks.

The last village before Beni is home to hot springs and after arriving and dumping our bags in the room we trundled down to the riverside and joined the masses that were soaking there. I didn’t realize how tight and tense my body was until I got out of the water where-upon I suddenly turned into a rag-doll. A very happy and relaxed rag-doll.

So, our journey into the mountains is now over and so too is our time in Nepal as we leave tomorrow morning to head back to the Indian border. We haven’t really seen as much of Kathmandu as I’d have liked although, like most cities, it is noisy, busy and cramped so the lure to venture out and explore is far less than when we find ourselves in less populated areas and we actually seem to have been busy(?) the last few days.

After arriving back early that morning, we spent Saturday at the world food festival which was held in the grounds of a huge conference centre on the outskirts of the city and proved to be an extremely entertaining and leisurely day. Seventeen countries from around the globe had stalls set up where you were able to watch them prepare and then sample different dishes. We did feel that it would have been a little more authentic and perhaps a little tastier had only people from the respective countries been working at each of the stalls and cooking up the dishes but the Nepalese did a grand job, especially at the Russian stall where the women were all dressed in authentic folk costumes and served iced vodka with the meals. Tents with the usual ‘two minutes of fun’ fairground type games lined the grounds (although they were somewhat less elaborate than the ones at home and the locals were certainly gaining more than two minutes of not just fun but cheek cracking, laugh out loud and jump about pleasure from them); hook the bottle, fling the frisby in the hole and hit the cut-out head sellotaped on to the wall with a tennis-ball seemed to be some of the favorites. There was also a stage at one end of the festival which we happily lazed in front of to listen to the mixtures of music (good, bad, loud, banging and some extremely heart felt) which soared out from it. The whole affair had a slightly American feel to it, plenty of big cooperate advertising, cheesy smiles on the plastic looking couple who were wandering around the grounds interviewing people and strange, forcefully happy, elevator-like music was pumped out of the tannoys. It was a day for the wealthy Nepalese (and a few Indian) to dress up and parade themselves around for all to see.

We have also spent a delightful couple of days in the company of Don who works for Adventurous Trekker, the company who organized our trip and supplied us with Arjun, our porter. Don spends half of the year here in Nepal and the other half at home in Montana. He’s been organizing and leading treks around the world for years and it was a great reassurance, after completing the Annapurna circuit and coming across people who were very dissatisfied with the company they had used, to know that we had landed with a decent and caring organization. We joined Don in his flat for dinner one evening where Laxmi, who also lives there, cooked up the most delicious meal (Laxmi is the young son of one of the partners of Adventurous Trekker) and as usual Jonny astounded all with his voracious and everlasting appetite.

The following day Don took us to visit Orchid House, a small school/day-care centre for some of the cities poorest children. The establishment was set up to allow the tiny children’s parents to go out to work without having to take the kids with them. The school only accepts children from the ages of about eighteen months to five years and only those who come from seriously under-privileged families. Before a child is given a place at the centre the parents are interviewed and monitored to ensure that they definitely earn as little as they do.

Don is making a short film about one young mother who, before having her daughter accepted at Orchid House, used to go out to work at seven in the morning (making bricks for 120 rupees a month which is just over a pound) and tie her one year-old to a chair in the corner of the grubby corridor of a run down, dirty and cramped housing block where they live. She’d work till twelve, come home to feed her little girl and then go back to work till five, six o’clock. The child is now two years old and has been at the centre for a few months and Jonny and I both could see the difference in her compared to the other children. She doesn’t join in any of the games, she doesn’t make any sounds, she stares vacantly at everything and anyone and already she looks like she’s witnessed the pain and suffering of a lifetime. She is apparently much better than when she first arrived when a look from one of the other children or an embrace from a member of staff would set her off into a hysterical fit. The staff resolved to keep her out on the patio most days with her toys where they could monitor her and only gradually introduced her to the rest of the class.

It was an interesting day at Orchid House and a delight to watch the energy exuded by Bina (the lady who runs the centre) when working with the kids. Thirty little mesmerized faces lined the wall as she animatedly told them a story about foxes and tigers (this bit I managed to grasp) in lots of silly and scary voices.
We then headed back to Don’s where Laxmi once again cooked for us. We were spoiled this time with a thick noodle and vegetable soup laced with ginger and garlic and it really was lovely. Don and Jonny proceeded to set up a blogsite for Orchid House where they can post information and pictures of the centre for sponsors and volunteers to see.

Nepal and the trek came as a welcome change from Kolkata. The country is definitely more laid back and somewhat hassle free but I definitely now feel ready to embrace India again and see what else it has to offer. I would hate my only experience of India to have been in its poorest city.