Distance - 8 miles
Time - 6 hrs
Elevation - from 4,790 feet to 7,939 feet
Equivalent flights of stairs = 311
Pre-hike: so confident with his blue bandanna. Just wait a few days, sucker.
Why are these two smiling? It's simple.....
Because of him..... the strong guy with the heavy load. We over packed like two rookies.
We departed Syapru Besi at 8 am. There is a 2 hr and 15 minute time difference between Nepal and Singapore, so it was really 10:15am in our minds.
The first of many foot bridges.
In an earlier lifetime I would have been scared to cross. It's see-through and bounces beneath you. MB winked at me "don't worry, you can drive a herd of yaks across this, no problem." He really meant it, they do drive cattle, yaks and donkeys across these bridges.
Since we were walking below 9,000 feet all day we had the forest shade. We walked slowly, slower than a normal pace. MB was in the lead to ensure it. At high altitude your body adjusts slowly and if you rush it you will have problems.
We got some early peeks at the snow caps we were headed towards.
The river was loud and vigorous, not the kind you should challenge.
This is freezing glacier water. Fall in and you would be numb first, drowned second.
This part of Nepal is more Tibetan than Nepalese. Most of the people living here fled Tibet when the Chinese cracked down in the early 60's. Tibetan prayer flags fluttered everywhere, many impossibly high up on the mountain face. So ridiculously dangerously high that you cannot imagine someone risked his life to plant them.
After four hours we stopped at the tea houses in Bamboo, a small village that serves trekkers.
We took a river-side seat an were handed menus by a young girl no more than 7 years old.
It felt pretty good to sit down. I didn't stare at the menu long, my mind was already made up.
We ate slowly and sat for an hour and a half - your digestive system slows down at high altitude too.
After we got under way again, Dodo made the mistake of asking if our gentle morning ascent would continue. MB smiled. He pointed out some bee hives in the rocks above us. "A bit steeper later" he said, not really wanting to elaborate.
Of course, she pressed for more detail. This is a woman who reads the last chapter of a book first so she knows how it turns out. "Extremely steep" he said, using his arm to demonstrate an acute angle.
Didn't faze the donkeys at all, they filed past us downhill. They were on easy street, probably dropped their loads off at Lama hours earlier. We, however, were on the way up a solid hour of steep rocky stairs. Perhaps a hundred flights, hard to stay, at every turn there were more. Dodo was in front of me and I was worried. Her legs were quivering. I convinced her to hand her small backpack to MB. This was only day one and she was struggling.
After reaching Lama we spent 30 minutes catching our breath. Our room was upstairs. It seemed like a cruel joke.
As tea houses go, this was a typical one. Walls as thin as a single piece of plywood, bathroom and shower in a shack outside and a wood-fired kitchen. When the sun sets, this is where you want to be.
The guides aren't stupid, they all immediately headed for the kitchen and settled into a card game.
After dinner Dodo looked at me with a very serious face "next time I come up with a stupid idea like this, talk me out of it." I laughed. I was so happy that the trek was her idea. The sun set at 7:15pm and I was asleep by 8:00. I slept like a dead person. Dodo, not so much.
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