Jum Jum = Let’s Go!

(Update from Oct 27 – Nov 7; Nepal – Part 2. Warning: this is another long one!)

Today we start our trek! Lexi and I have been preparing and looking forward to this day for many months so we were very excited to get started. Now some of you may be wondering what trekking is – the easiest explanation is to go to a sporting goods store and head to the Smartwool sock section. You’ll see running socks with light padding, skiing socks with a little more cushion, hiking socks that are very plush and finally the king of all socks – the trekking sock – for long walks day after day. I must admit all that padding really helps during the final hour of trekking up too many stairs to count after having already walked 6 hours!

We piled into a bus for a 2 hour ride to Nayapul – that’s where the road ended and our path started. All 25 of us headed out along the river on a rocky path. I thought to myself, “I hope the path doesn’t stay this rocky or I’m never going to be able to look up and see the mountains!” We saw lots of mules – and got passed by a few of them. I was surprised (and elated) that we got to choose what we wanted to eat for lunch – I thought we’d be eating dal bhat twice a day for the next 12 days. But before I was able to even look at a menu, Kavita (one of the trekkers from Seattle), yelled out “friend noodles” when Nirma asked what we wanted. Kavita thought that when 3 Sisters asked us to all eat the same thing for lunch (to make it easier for the cooks and speed up our lunch breaks) it meant that each one of us had to order the same thing every day for lunch – so she decided that she could stand eating fried noodles for the next 12 days – boy was she surprised when all 11 of us got fried noodles for lunch!

We continued our journey in the heat alongside terraced rice fields and despite a tough stint of stairs at the end, we arrived in Hille and survived our first day! After a fairly warm shower we had dinner outside while getting to know everyone a little better. The 11 trekkers came from 4 countries (Lexi, Kavita, Chitra, Lori and me from the US; Heather, Anstey & Harriet from England; Chris & Suzie from Australia; Petulia from France) and the laughs were already rolling on Day 1. We headed to bed around 8pm – I feel like my dad going to bed this early!

Day 2 was difficult – we doubled our elevation from about 4,500 to 9,000 ft in 7 hours. However, we got our first real view of the Himalayas after hiking up a steep area just before the teahouse. My soreness suddenly disappeared once I saw the gorgeous, snowcapped mountains. It was crazy how we went from the heat and rice fields to waterfalls and forests to the breathtaking mountains and coldness in one day. Our teahouse seemed like a ski lodge – there was a big fireplace in the dining room where we all crowded around and hung wet clothes to dry. Lexi and I felt like we got the “honeymoon suite” room – we had a mountain view, a bathroom and shower in our room! Unfortunately shower does not mean you’ll have hot water – but it was still the nicest place we’d stay for the next week and a half.

Day 3 found us up at 4:30am for a hike up to Poon Hill (about an hour from Ghorepani where we spent the night). It was a tough hike for that hour of the day but watching the sunrise at 10,000 feet and seeing it gradually hit each mountain was spectacular. We hiked back down for breakfast and then headed up again around another mountain. Once we were back up to 10,000 feet we could see Poon Hill and the Himalaya panorama. It was so picturesque that we took a break to take some fun pictures of us jumping with the mountains in the back. Nirma had so much fun with this crazy American (or maybe it’s just me) style of taking pictures that she had us all laughing histarically. The rest of the day was mainly spent trekking through a rhododendron forest with lots of waterfalls. We had to stop an hour before our destination as all teahouses were booked; we ended up at a small one on the side of a mountain where we took every room – including the dining room where half the assistants slept!

Day 4: After a hot shower this morning that cost 100 rupees (about $1.50) I made a pact with myself: I’m only showering when I have to pay for it. If I don’t pay, I know it’s going to be cold! Solar power in Nepal = no power (even if it’s an extremely sunny day you still only get cold water). Today we walked through the forest more and heard some really powerful waterfalls that we crossed via shaky bridges – or by jumping from rock to rock if the bridge was in really bad condition.

We started Day 5 by walking through Ghandruk where we saw lots of little kids playing in town and getting ready for school. We climbed up, up, up and then down towards the river. It was a busy day full of traffic jams – we had to stand off to the side of the trail while mules and donkeys carried loads of supplies to the surrounding villages. We saw two teenage girls during a traffic jam so I asked where they were going and to my surprise they said Pokhara. They said it would take 1 day (at the most 1.5 days) for them to walk there – it took us 4 days plus a few hours this morning to make it that far! I turned to Lexi and said, “Why don’t we just walk back to Chicago after Christmas this year?!”

After walking down to cross the river and eat lunch we had to walk back up the other side of the mountain (that’s the curse of going downhill – it’s a nice break but then you realize you are just going to have to walk up more). We ended up at the Excellent View teahouse in Chhomrong for the evening – they hit it dead on with the name. I can definitely tell we’re getting closer to the mountains; it’s been a fun journey to get here and is also exciting to know what lies ahead.

Day 6 is what our guides call Nepali flat. Translation: a little up, a little down – but never flat! We mostly went through bamboo and rhododendron forests and talked a lot with the guides and assistants. It was fun getting to know them better, hearing about their background and their future wishes. It’s also sad to think what they would be doing without the 3 Sisters organization.

Our trek from Bamboo to Deurali on Day 7 was one of my favorites. There were tons of waterfalls and I felt like I was skipping from stone to stone all day long. After a big lunch of pizza and french fries (that’s good fuel for trekking, right?) we walked through the clouds. You could feel it getting colder but it was a steep uphill climb so that kept us warm. I felt like I was an extension of the mountain today – we are really in the heart of the Himalayas now and getting close Annapurna Base Camp (ABC). I was actually glad that there weren’t warm showers tonight because I’m only adding more layers from here on out – it’s getting really cold once the sun goes down! I thought I was so clever putting tomorrow’s socks in my sleeping bag to warm them up for the morning – then I thought why not put all of tomorrow’s clothes in….well, a mummy sleeping bag is not that big and I felt like I was sleeping in a lumpy bed – I guess I won’t try that again!

Day 8 was a “steepy steepy up” day as our guides would say. We slowly made our way to Machhapuchhre Base Camp (MBC) at 12,210 feet. It was a rough climb and after Radikha (our second guide) pointed out the blue building to me it seemed like it still took forever to actually get there! Macchapuchhre means fish tail in English (the top resembles one with the two peaks) and was declared a holy mountain after someone died trying to summit it. Now the highest you can climb on it is to MBC. We enjoyed lunch here and spent some time acclimating while discussing the PPP of Snickers bars in Nepal. There’s no Big Mac Index here – it’s all about elevation and Snickers; the current price at MBC is double that of Pokhara’s grocery stores!

It was a much more gradual climb from MBC to ABC but the elevation took a lot out of us. The clouds rolled in and the mountains disappeared for awhile but after two hours we reached ABC – 13,629 feet! The clouds had shifted by then so we could see the enormity of the mountains again.  There is a complete 360 degree view at ABC of the mountains. You can stand in one spot and keep turning and naming off different peaks. I felt like we weren’t looking at the mountains anymore – we were looking up to them because we were so close now – we were standing at the base of Annapurna I, the 10^th highest peak in the world. It was an incredible feeling and a great group accomplishment! We took lots of pictures, saw the sunset, did a group dance (Change the light bulb) and then ate dinner and played cards. That night the door to our room shut but had a huge gap in between the door and the frame; luckily we had four people in our room – we figured if there was any night we wanted to have lots of people in our room it was tonight for extra body heat!

Day 9: We got up early, put on any additional layers we might not already be wearing and went outside to see the moon and stars still coving the skies. Soon afterwards the sun came up and began to shine on each mountain. After breakfast we said goodbye to ABC and started our descent. We went down the same way we came up but covered two days worth of trekking up in one day going down. This sounds easy but it was actually harder on my body to go down; lukcily we made it back to Bamboo just before dark.

Day 10: Bamboo to Chhomrong was “same same but different” – a saying the Asians love. We were almost to Chhomrong for lunch when we were stopped on the stairs by a group of bulls that wouldn’t let us through – one assistant just walked between them but I waited until another made them get off the stairs before I proceeded. We got some extra energy from a chocolate cake and then headed down to Jinhu for the hot springs. It was basically two big hot tubs with warm water right next to the river. It felt so good to soak our muscles and relax in the warmth.

It doesn’t seem possible that it’s already Day 11. We had steep up and down bits at the start and end of our day but in the middle we walked through a lot of villages and over a number of bridges. One of the bridges was super long and swayed a ton! We all made it across but it was a slow process. Nepal’s biggest festival, Tihar, has been going on the last few days but today was the main day and throughout the trek there were kids on the trail with flowers. They would sign a traditional Nepali song and then try to get you to give them money or buy flowers. At first it was cute but then they started blocking the path and not letting us through. Luckily someone had an idea of tickling the kids to break up their barrier – this was a great way to have fun with them but also continue our trek! We ended in Pothana for the evening and it was almost like a reunion. Everyone we saw in town we knew from the last few days – either we stayed at the same teahouse at ABC, ate a meal with them or just saw them numerous times on the trail. We even ran into a guy and his mom that we ate lunch with on our second day! That evening we had more laughs than usual going through all of our funny stories from the past 11 days.

Day 12: Our last day of trekking was an easy one – three short hours of downhill. We should have been able to see the whole mountain panorama again from Pothana and on our walk but it was a cloudy day so we only got glimpses of the mountain peaks. Once we got to Phedi we said goodbye to the Himalayas and took a bus back to Pokhara. It was a bittersweet moment – the people I met were amazing, the scenery was indescribably gorgeous and I have a new appreciate for the “little things” that make life easier – yet it was also sad how quickly the time went by and soon I will have to say goodbye to both old and new friends. But for now it’s time to relax a little in Pokhara!