Altitude: 2,650m Climb: Descent: 130m Time: 6hr Daily Cost: 4,380 rupees ($45/£27) We left Marpha on the road, but after about 10 minutes we crossed a bridge onto the other side of the river. From here we skirted the edge of a pine forest. Sometimes the path would be down in the riverbed, then we’d go up the hillside a little into the forest, then back down by the river. The riverbed around here is probably half a mile wide and the loose stone riverbed is famous for ammonites. As we walked across the riverbed we hunted for ammonites but with little luck. Then, just as I was about to give up I found a decent sized ammonite. Yay! On the east bank of the river there were no lodges, so we’d have to cross the river to eat. There were only a few channels of water in the riverbed so it wasn’t difficult to cross, but it was quite painful. Walking across those stones was very damaging to our shoes and really hurting our feet. A bridge spanned the widest section of the river. It was the most rickety wooden bridge we’ve ever crossed, held up only by counter weights (rocks) on each side. It took us 20 minutes to cross the river valley! On the other side was a small village. Totally deserted! Just like the start of the trek. I guess this is for the same reason, many people start their trek in Chame and they finish their trek in Jomsom. We went into one of the lodges and ordered food. I had sweet and sour and Annemarie has egg fried rice. The food was OK but we could’ve done without the flies. After lunch we decided not to cross the river again. It was just slow and painful. So we decided to walk down the road to the next bridge over the river. After been on the road for about 20 minutes we reached a section where the road followed the riverbank into a huge detour as the river merged with another river valley. The path went straight across the valley. Typical. Just can’t stay out of the riverbed! We had to find the stepping stones (just large stones) for good crossing points over the streams. After crossing the valley we decided it was best to stay on the road as Kalopani was on this side of the river. Lete was on the other side but we’d read that Kalopani had the better lodges. It was another hour before we reached Kalopani. It looked like it was going to rain. This would be the first...
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Altitude: 2,800m Climb: Descent: 220m Time: 6hr Daily Cost: 3,600 rupees ($37/£22) We left Kagbeni at our usual time of 8:15am. Then we took the path out of the village following the Kali Gandaki valley south towards Jomsom. The gorge is huge and the river at the centre is tiny. I guess in the wet season this river valley is filled and the river will be a mighty sight. After a while the path joined onto the road and we walked along the dusty road. A few Jeeps were travelling along, those going down were mainly filled with locals, those coming north were filled with tourists. The road skirted the edge of the valley all the way to Jomsom. We skipped through Jomsom quickly as there wasn’t anything worth seeing. Jomsom is a hub for the area. It has an airport, lots of Jeeps, buses and lodges. Surrounding Jomsom, like many other towns in the valley, are apple orchids. Planted by volunteers, these are organic apples and used for apple juice and cider. We climbed up and out of Jomsom towards the large village of Thini. There was nothing there and we continued to a lake, which was actually tiny and nothing special to look at. A little further uphill was a Gompa. Annemarie was tired so I climbed up to the Gompa alone. After paying the 100 rupees entrance fee went in for a look around. As I entered this totally silent building I was surprised to see a western guy sitting on the floor reading a book. I reached for the camera but was quickly told no photos were allowed. The paintings were very vivid colours on all three walls. The front wall was an altar with Buddha statues. Outside the keeper of the Gompa offered me a cup of tea. We sat in silence and drank the tea. After a while Annemarie came looking for me because I’d been gone slightly longer than expected. After the Gompa Harry was starving and we were pretty hungry, so we decided to get to Marpha as quickly as possible. The path takes a long route, down past Marpha (which is on the other side of the Kali Gandaki river) up and over some hills, then after about 90 minutes comes to a bridge which crosses the river to the road to come back up to Marpha. Harry knew an alternative. We walked around the front of the hill, which the Gompa was perched on and crossed a small wooden bridge. We then walked for 20 minutes along the road. By now the wind was extremely strong and it was...
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Altitude: 3,800m Climb: Descent: 870m Time: 4hr Daily Cost: 3,530 rupees ($37/£22) + 1,750 rupees ($18/£11) on extras We slept until late and only came down for breakfast around 8:15am. We’d washed some of our clothes the night before and they weren’t dry yet, so I’d been on the roof hanging them in the sun. Annemarie wasn’t feeling too good either, another bad stomach and lots of time on the toilet! At breakfast we said goodbye to Marco. He was getting a Jeep to Jomsom then flying back to Pokhara to spend a week there. He’d travelled with us for 11 days and we were sad to say goodbye. We would miss him. After breakfast the clothes weren’t dry, so we took our time getting ready and we didn’t leave until 10:15am. We had a choice of which way to go. Back up the valley for a long climb to Jhong, then come back down and past Muktinath to Kagbeni. Or we could visit the Gompa (monastery) of Jharkot just south of Muktinath then continue down the road to Kagbeni. Because Annemarie wasn’t feeling good we picked the easier option. The road/path from Muktinath to Jharkot was dusty. The area around us was more desert like. It looked like Tibet. The monastery at Jharkot was hundreds of years old. It was brightly painted inside and looked good. We looked around for a few minutes then went up into the roof to look at the surrounding area. It really was like a desert. A faded yellow colour with a few green patches of field near the river which runs down the middle of the valley. We left the Gompa and walked down the road. The wind was picking up fast and very soon there was an almost continual head wind blowing up the valley with gusts which must have been 40mph. It whipped up the dust too making the route annoying. Worse were the Jeeps. This road was busy and the Jeep drivers drove fast! The Jeeps blasted down the road, horn beeping whilst driving like a mad man, creating huge clouds of dust behind them. This section we weren’t enjoying so much. Then the most surprising sight. Deep in the valley was a large patch of green. It was Kagbeni, a few hundred metres below us and surrounded by green fields. An oasis in the desert! Between us and Kagbeni the road had to navigate a drop of about 200m. It did this with a set of long switchbacks. The path took a more direct route, it went steeply down the hillside. We skidded on the loose stones with...
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Altitude: 4,540m Climb: Ascent: 1040m Descent: 1620m Time: 7hr 15m + 1hr 30m lunch Daily Cost: 6,660 rupees ($70/£41) We woke at 5am and got dressed for the day. We’d spent a few days thinking about what to wear for the pass. The sun would only just be rising so it’ll be cold and the pass is at 5,400m. We’d read about strong and bitterly cold winds on the pass. Annemarie had been thinking about wearing her thermals for the day. I decided that based on the weather from previous days, where in the sun it’s very warm, I’d risk going up with no thermals, and in fact no more clothing than usual. My Berghaus trousers are wind proof and great for anything from 0°c – 35°c, so I’d be wearing them, along with a t-shirt, fleece and wind proof/waterproof coat. Annemarie agreed and wore pretty much the same. We went for breakfast at 5:30am and sat with Marco and Marc. The dining room was almost empty. Marc had gone up past High Camp the day before with his bike and left it at the first tea shop, which is about 45 minutes past High Camp. The lodge owner had suggested this to make the crossing of the pass a little easier. Marco and Marc’s breakfast arrived, but nothing for us. Finally, we asked where our breakfast was and we were told it was coming. I have no idea why any lodge asks people to write the time they’ll have breakfast on the order pad, everywhere we’ve been has made breakfast when we arrive. It’s never ready at that time we ask for nor waiting for us. Anyway, this made us late. By the time we’d eaten, finished packing, last minute preparations and a few photos it was 6:15am. The view of Annapurna III as the sun rose was excellent. We set off up the steep slope. Marco set off about 10minutes before us and so was ahead, Annemarie seemed to struggle a little but still caught up with Marco and Harry who had left a little earlier. I felt far worse than I had been the day before, much more out of breath. We still made good time to High Camp. We struggled up and thought we were going very slowly, but in just 45 minutes we had made it. I had to take off my fleece, I was already feeling very warm. We took a few photos to celebrate then continued. The section immediately after High Camp was terrifying. A long, steep slope down to the right and we had to make our way over a narrow...
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Altitude: 4,020m Climb: 520m Time: 2hr 10m Daily Cost: 4,960 rupees ($52/£31) This was going to be another short day. The altitude meant it would be a bad idea to go any further. High Camp is only 45 minutes after Thorong Phedi but it’s another 300m to climb, which would be a dangerous altitude gain. High Camp is only safe to sleep at if you’re coming from Letdar, which would have been dangerous to reach from Manang because that’s about an 800m gain. As far as I can tell the only people who do Manang – Letdar – High Camp are those who have been to Tilicho Lake or those who disregard the advice on altitude. Almost all the trekkers we met were in the second group. Altitude doesn’t affect everyone the same, so only a few people get ill, hence why people feel safe and ignore the advice! The night before the huge British group had received a prep talk from their guide. It was mostly the usual rubbish you get from guides, a list of figures of the mountains and heights (all guides do is set an itinerary and list mountain heights). But he’d announced the breakfast time. Armed with that information we made sure that we had breakfast after the group, giving them plenty of time to eat and get out. Why did I hate the group so much? Well, they were incredibly loud and because we could understand them it was harder to block out the words, every other word was LIKE, so nothing they said had any substance, just a bunch of likes strung out into a sentence, they said lots of stupid things, but mainly it was because groups (well the guide or leader) acts like the group owns the place! They tell people to move so the group can sit at the table, their food is the priority for the kitchen and all other trekkers have to wait, tables sometimes have reserved signs on them. This is why we either stay in lodges where there’s no groups or if we accidentally (or have no choice) end up on a lodge with a group we do our best to avoid them. They really are annoying! As we ate breakfast the group assembled outside and headed off up the path. The weather was in our favour yet again. Blue skies and the sun was shining, although the air temperature was pretty low. It had snowed late in the afternoon and well into the evening the day before, now in the morning sun it looked great. The path was a bit muddy from the melting...
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