Near the top of the Thorung Lo Pass - On top of a glacier!!!
Me and the baby lamb.... Moussaka anyone??? :p
The early stages of the Annapurna circuit
Namiste!!
We are fresh back a 92 kilometer (58 miles) that took us from 1100 meters (3410feet) to 5416 meters (16,7909 feet). As you would guess, the feet are a bit tired, but I can still use my fingers to write you - Well barely, it was kind of cold at the top.. But more to tell later...
So we are a week into Nepal and let me tell about how we have found the place;
When we walked across the friendship bridge - as mentioned in the last blog, we really stepped into a different world. That day, I didn't really realize what Nepal was and boarder towns are certainly not the best place to judge a country - those of you who have been to Mexican boarder towns would certainly agree. We saw considerable poverty compared to Tibet and China. Just a few facts about Nepal - its the 3rd poorest country in Asia, it has the 3rd worst infant mortality rate in the world, 50% of the population is literate, the water even when boiled can still give you serious diseases, but most people speak English...So I guess that makes up for it.. In seriousness, this country really relies on tourism. The poverty is quite bad, today we saw a mother picking flees out of her teenage daughter's hair. I expect disease is pretty bad having seen sores on peoples faces and the conditions they live in.
Its also a very strange country in respect to prices. Normally for a very poor country, you could live like a king on a little money - its kind of true in Nepal, depending on a few circumstances... Firstly, accommodation is cheap - we have paid $2/night to $7/night for a nicer place, but for a bottle of local beer, it costs $5 up to $8/beer - and I'm talking in normal restaurants. So drinking is expensive. Food is still cheap. And for everything, you need to be able to haggle - I mean everything, water, bus tickets, visas, airfare, etc. Nepali people have an imaginary price for foreigners, its lets add a few zeros on. When you haggle with them, even if you pay double the price they will act as if you have taken food out of the mouths of their babies. Its really amusing...
So what have we been up to;
The past week has been all about the Annapurna circuit!! This is one of the world's highest mountain hikes and it goes through numerous little Nepali villages. I'll tell you more about Kathmandu after we have seen the city in greater detail. We started by traveling to Pokhara which is a fun little town in northern Nepal near the Himalayas. This place was a great reprise from the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu. Having organised our permits in Kathmandu, we stayed the night in Pokhara enjoying our last night of civilised life. We took a bus and a mountain jeep to the town of Syange (1100 meters) and stayed the night. The next morning we would start hiking. Now many people who trek or hike the Annapurna circuit hire guides and porters. By this time I expect you know how Marina and I roll... So we packed the essentials in our day packs (clothes, bathroom supplies, snacks, water) and tied our jackets and sleeping bags to the backpacks sleeping bags we rented in Pokhara. So all in all, we probably had about 4-5kg plus water.
Each of the little towns you walk through (about every 3-6km between towns) has guesthouses and they each have restaurants. The path is pretty clearly trodden so the only thing you have to worry about is carrying enough water, dealing with altitude, and getting to the next town to sleep.
The first day of our hike we hiked a grueling 34km up seriously steep areas - some of which we had to climb with our hands. On our typical day we would go at least twice as far as guide books would recommend; sometimes three. This day we hiked from Syange>Chyamche>Tal>Koto. Staying in Koto, we had to stay, Marina would have died otherwise (we were both very exhausted), but our room at the hotel, which cost us $2, had a perfect view of Annapurna 2. Annapurna 1 is the tallest in the range and its the 10th tallest mountain in the world at 8091 meters.
The next day was tough to start walking, but after an hour the muscles and joints were accepting their fate. This day we hiked 28km and reached our destination of choice, the bustling mountain village of Manang (3540 meters). When I say bustling, it probably has a population of a few hundred souls, but it was one of the biggest. During these first two days, our hike was through forests, on cliffs overlooking river rapids, across dodgy looking bridges, and through some of the best scenery around. Snow covered mountains all around!
Our third day on the trek was to Thorung Phedi going 17km up to 4450 meters. You can guess, by climbing so quickly one its tough, but two - you need to be mindful of altitude, so to ensure we didn't have any side effects we had a few cold beers at this level - I hear it helps.. Well, we also had quite a few liters of water at this level to help. At this altitude it gets cold at night. None of the accommodation is heated on the circuit so we slept in our cloths, in our sleeping bags, covered by several blankets. It wasn't the best night of sleep in the world, but we got a few winks.
Yesterday was summit day! Writing you now it seems like several days ago. So when we woke, it was snowing. We pressed on to the top called Thorung La Pass at 5416 meters. This is a pass between two 6,000+ meter mountains. The three hour climb to the top in what was now a blizzard was just a bit cold to be modest. When we got to the top, just like at Everest, we didn't want to stay too long. Also, given there wasn't much scenery due to the snow, we pressed on down the mountain. Near the top, was a gorgeous glacier that we climbed on - see the pics. As the snow was really thick, we hiked for about 4 more hours to the town of Muktinath (13km today). In Muktinath, there was a jeep trail. All the parts we hiked it was not possible to have a car, both due to law and terrain. So in Muktinath we hired a jeep and began our decent in DRY conditions :D
After a sleep last night in Ghasa, hear we are now in Pokhara, happy, clean (they did have showers, but usually cold ones), and looking forward to chilling out tonight with good food, music and people around - who don't go to sleep at 9:30pm :D
So that was our trip - fun, exhausting, and gorgeous!!!
Tomorrow we are off to Chitwan to visit the national park and have a few safaris! After we are going back up north to the Bote Kosi River for some rafting and canyoning!
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