The light, but driven rain taps a distracting tattoo on the glass and smears the view of the river flats which fan out below me. This is the mighty Kali Gandaki Nadi, a tame and gentle beast over these stones and gravel, allowing careful petting as I ford it later in the day, but a…
It’s 6am in Muktinath and the town is already moving. School kids across the road are already dressed and are joshing about as school kids do. There is plenty of horseplay underway as I walk out on to the street. I ignore them and climb up above the town and am reminded by my lungs…
I wake at 0250 and am pleased there is no rain on the roof. The same was the case at midnight when I was able to look across this vast valley and see the ridge of rock that dominates this town. I am pretty much packed and ready to go but need to allow a…
(With apologies to the Coasters – check iTunes if you don’t know). We start out of Yak Kharka up a gentle rise, the track treating us easy. And yes, I hope we don’t come back. But we are at a height where I have to mentally prepare myself for the possibility of returning here with…
Writing here from Yak Khaka with fingers tingling – probably something I need to watch given it is apparently a first symptom of problems with altitude. Or so I thought – it’s actually a side effect of the dioxin I was taking. We’re now at 13,218 feet in yak country and higher than Mr Cook,…
And so did we. After a fashion. The plan is to spend two nights here at Manang (at 11’614 feet) to aid in the acclimitisation process. But there is a 1500’ climb we will do here as part of our ‘climb high sleep low” strategy. But we have woken to steady rain and getting everyone…
Well, if we thought we had it tough yesterday we were put through the grinder today. Those who have wide trekking experience found it as arduous as anything tackled anywhere else. Those new to the game wondered what the heck they were doing here. Actually there were moments when we all wondered what the heck…
We follow the river out of Chame, starting at a respectable hour though not at the start time the guide urges on us. Some of the team would struggle with a regimental sergeant major cracking the whip with the clock. I remind some of them that we need to respect the guide’s daily timetable but…
