Howdy all! To work our way to the true ‘highs’ of the trip to Nepal, this post will now focus on the first few days of trekking. Well, actually, part of the post will focus on the DRIVE to get to the trekking, which was an adventure in itself! While I had hoped to share exact trekking maps for all parts of the trip, the first few days didn’t make it, as my GPS watch ran out of memory and overwrote the first couple days. Too bad, as one of them was a pretty good distance. At any rate, there are far too many stories to talk about EVERYTHING we did and saw along the trails, but the post should definitely give you a flavour of this section.
Kathmandu to Besisahar
The next morning, after having supper at the tour company owners’ home the night before, we piled into a private car which was going to drive us from Kathmandu to a little village in the Annapurna region known as Besisahar. Before leaving the big city, our actual guide (Ram) and our personal porter (Purna) joined us for the ride. These two would be with us non-stop for the next couple weeks, so we hoped we’d all get along. For the ride, we did our best to start getting to know each other a bit, and also to try and figure out how their English skills were.
I’m happy to report they had excellent english, and while things weren’t ‘perfect’ the entire way, we all got along very well and we’d definitely recommend them if you ever find yourself in Nepal! The drive to Besisahar, while only 175km or so, took well over 5 hours. Believe me when I say that even though you’ll see lots of roads on Nepali maps, they are not ‘western roads’. At any rate, once we arrived at Besisahar, we had our first ‘acclimatization’ hike as a group. I actually think it was more a case that our guide wanted to assess our fitness level. Fair enough. We passed. It was stinkin’ hot here, but with little to do in the small town, Deanna and I headed off on our own after this hike to do a little more exploring, ending up a fair bit downhill by a river. There, I collected my 2 stones that I intended to carry with me and eventually leave one at each of our two major summit passes.
The plan was to overnight in Besisahar before hiring a 4×4 for the next days’ journey, which would take us to the start of the real trekking, which we were quite looking forward to.
Besisahar to Tal
Clicking the link below will take you to the full album on Flickr, or you can scroll through the images here.
Alright, so this day started with a pretty amazing 4×4 adventure. While a car had been sufficient to get us this far, our next ‘road’, which took us from Besisahar to Chamje, would require some heavy machinery. Although it was only 37km of road, this trip took us almost 4 hours! Ironically, people would pay a lot of money for the 4×4 experience we had, but for us, and the locals, this was actually more like the ‘taxi service’. It was amazing, with sheer drops on our side, deep mud to get through in parts, and even sections where we all had to get out so that the road could be ‘fixed’ on the fly by either adding or removing rocks / boulders!
After this very impressive ride, we arrived in the tiny village of Chamje to enjoy our lunch before *finally* starting the actual trekking portion of the trip. We both opted to have some tasty curry dishes to energize ourselves. This is where we first noticed a funny etiquette point of utilizing guides / porters. Ram and Purna would take our orders and relay them to the restaurant owners, but would then disappear and leave us alone. Apparently, they are not supposed to eat with us. Over time, we convinced them to dine with us a couple times, but generally speaking, they would eat with the other locals in the kitchen, then rejoin us. They also wouldn’t get to eat until we were served. Lucky for them, they can eat really fast, so they were almost always ready to go before us.
This first leg of trekking was relatively short and sweet. All told, we would be hiking less than 6km. However, given the jungle-like atmosphere, with heat and humidity, we were happy to not go too far on this first day. The journey took us along a very lush green valley. And when I say ‘green’, that involved a rather impressive marijuana field. Yes, I’m not kidding, we just trekked right through a weed field, and kept going! We also had our first experience with the local critters, including leeches that were all too happy to latch onto our heels / ankles (we each had a few). Later in the day, we also had a visit from a big spider in our room!
We finished our day in the late afternoon, and had our first experience of staying in a proper ‘guest house’ or ‘tea house’. Essentially, along major trails, all the villages comprise of enterprising residents. Almost every home turns out to be a guest house, a restaurant, and a store! Very rustic, but very practical. You can always be guaranteed of finding a place to stay. The plus side of having a guide is that they know the ‘good’ places with the best cooks. Never mind that the menus are pretty much IDENTICAL everywhere, but they can still be better and worse. For our first night on the trail, we had the place pretty much to ourselves. We also learned on this day that once the day is done, there is very little to do, so we were glad we had Kindles, and feet to explore!
Tal to Koto
Clicking the link below will take you to the full album on Flickr, or you can scroll through the images here.
The next day, after a simple breakfast, and the obligatory tea, which we had in quantity anytime and everywhere we went, we set off on our way to Koto. Originally, we had been set to hike from Besisahar, stop in Tal, then continue to a place called Dharapani, but we’d changed things on the fly due to Ram’s recommendation. What that ultimately meant for this 2nd trekking day was a nice long day of walking. Total distance was over 22km. While that sounds like a short distance to those who know the races I do, this was NOT a race. We were here to soak it all in and experience everything we could.
The terrain on this day started out once again very lush and hot. However, over the course of the day, we climbed up from about 1600m in Tal up to 2600m in Koto, so the terrain did start changing a bit. While it was still predominantly green, I’d compare it to leaving a junglescape and making your way into more of a forest environment. The trail became more like a typical trail you might encounter on a wooded hike in the Rockies for example.
Along the way, we stopped at an obligatory checkpoint in a village called Dharapani (where we had originally been slated to stop the day before). Interestingly enough, we happened to show up there on the exact date of the 36th World Tourism Day. We were also the first tourists through, so we were treated to a special little ceremony where we got scarves, and I even got a typical hat worn by locals. It was a pretty unique experience.
After our little ceremony was completed, we carried on our way, with me feeling a little silly wearing the hat, but not wanting to appear ungrateful by taking it off. Our journey continued on along the road for a while before veering off into the woods once again. In order to make it to our lunch stop, we were now faced with a pretty steep climb straight up. I was loving it. The trail was a very impressive thing, with some sections actually more like a cobbled road, while other sections were really gnarly dirt tracks. Interestingly, these really aren’t just tourist tracks, but also a main way for local villagers to move throughout the valley. It was not unusual at all to bump into people along the way, and greet each of them with a warm ‘namaste’. It’s not just for Yoga over there, it really is the normal greeting.
Today, like the day before, was not raining, but the skies were also not clear either. It was just a white / grey day overall. This prevented us from seeing any peaks in the region just yet, but we were pretty sure they would make an appearance in the next few days. After all, we were getting ever closer to the highest peaks! Our lunch stop was high up in the hills, and apparently would normally have a view, but instead, we just had a chilly light wind cooling us off up there. However, it was interesting as we learned more about how people live here. Most of the food you eat is basically whatever they have grown / raised on their own. Here, they had been drying out chili peppers and beans, to feed them over the next few months, along with other assorted vegetables. Everything is very fresh and tasty.
To feel more like a local, our porter Purna and I spent some time foraging for food in the woods. Our prize? 40 walnuts that ended up being lugged across all the high peaks for the next 2 weeks, as I patiently waited for them to be dry enough to be ready to open. More on this in future posts ;-).
With lunch finished, we carried on our way, navigating another mix of access roads and trails to finish off in Koto, another small village. Most tourists continue up the road to a place called Chame. However, most tourists are trekking the normal Annapurna Circuit. We were about to start our own adventure in the Nar Valley, an area accessed from Koto, and only open to those with the proper permits and a guide. In other words, we’d be heading off the beaten path. As a result, in Koto, we were once again in a quiet town, although we did share our guest house with a few others. I also had access to some gas-heated water to approximate a shower of sorts. I cleaned up a little, knowing that it would be several days before we had that luxury again.
To close out the night in Koto, I had a chance to try a local home-made alcoholic beverage. It’s name: Raksi. This is a distilled spirit made from millet or rice. It is also made by many of the guest house owners, if they have the time. It is cheap compared to bottled beers, but definitely an acquired taste. I eventually learned more about the process, and am curious to try and make it on my own some day, but I’ll need the appropriate pots to make a go of it. As there isn’t a lot of refrigeration around these parts, the drink was served at room temperature, and left a nice warm spot in my stomach.
Well, there you have it. The first few days of the trekking. They really are the tip of the iceberg, but were a great introduction to the sublime pleasures of trekking in the Himalaya, and in the Annapurna region specifically. We were building up our ‘team spirit’ for the next few sections, as we’d climb higher and higher. Stay tuned for our next installment, where we’ll cross our first high peak! For now, this post signs off at 2,600m a.s.l with a smile on my face thanks to the hooch!
