Itinerary: 12 days trekking, Dec 6 to Dec 18 Then fly from Jomson to Pokara to relax for 2 days.
We started out fairly strong, but it didn't take long for us to have to face up to the reality of the fact that we did not really train for this trek. John went on, hmm … lets see, probably 1 or 2 hikes before we left town, all below 3000 feet, and although I had been hiking regularly I was still only logging about 10 miles a week and all at sea level. Day one of the trek started with a 5 hour drive to the trailhead. About half way there the horn stopped working on our beat up little compact car. Doesn’t sound like too big of an issue, unless you are driving the mountain roads in Nepal. The horn is how you signal the truck in front of you that you want to pass, then they signal you, then you beep again, in case someone is coming the other way. Our driver became much more cautious without a horn. We stopped a few times to try to get it working again, but any adjustment only provided intermittent functionality. So the last half of the drive was slow going. The trek started on a dirt road. At first I was disappointed to hear that we would be walking quite a bit on dirt roads rather than trails, but as the days passed I learned to enjoy the road as it meant a little more stable ground.
Days 2 & 3 were definitely the longest, 17 kilometers and about 7 hours of walking each day, gaining quite a bit of elevation. We actually started the hike at 800meters which is lower than even Kathmandu. For the first three days we did not see any others trekkers- a bit reminiscent of our first hike down the Narrows in Zion National Park. This solitude, which can usually enhance your ability to enjoy the stunning scenery and allow you to “connect” with nature, makes me a bit nervous when we have such lack of knowledge of what lies ahead. I wonder if the lack of other trekkers should be a sign - did everyone know something we didn't? We had been told it was the end of the season, but this seemed odd - no one else? Was the pass closed in by snow already? We asked our guide, Saroj, but he said we would just need to see when we got there but he believed the weather looked good for us and we should keep praying to the gods each night to keep the sun shinning.
And pray we did. And the sun continued to shine. Every day we woke to clear skies, fantastic views and hardly any wind to speak of. We passed through many local villages where each family member played a role - cooking, cleaning, farming etc. They lead simple lives but seem to work very hard to put food on the table and shelter their families. The children are typically covered in equal amounts of dirt and smiles, playing with the simplest things - like using small quarter size ring gaskets to throw against a wall - similar to marbles. The trail got interesting very quickly. There had been many landslides due to rain several months earlier and what may have been faulty road construction to start with. In many spots there was no trail to speak off. We would walk across a loose dirt and scree field hoping not to slip down the hillside as we were certain that we would not be able to climb back up. At several spots crews of local Nepali were scattered up and down the hillside doing trail maintenance and trying to secure the hillside by first pulling out all the loose rocks, which they just let roll down the hill, and then constructing terraced rock walls. The terrain seemed certain to guarantee continued employment for the trail builders, unfortunately I got the impression it may not have been a very well paying job, if they were paid at all.
