Ghandruk trek part 3 - Down and out

What a breakfast! We dined on the flower-bedecked guesthouse patio in the mild morning sun. Arrayed before us in for mountain splendour were Annapurna South flanked by Himchuli, and the incomparable Machapuchare (Fishtail Peak) piercing the sky on the other side of the Modi Khola.

Our first stop of the day was that the small museum next door that showcased traditional Gurung life. It was housed in a typical stone building with ears of corn drying under the eaves and a very low doorway - even Tenaya had to mind her head! Inside, a single room housed displays of everyday items such as bamboo baskets for every need, wooden containers and musical instruments, an array of brass pots and dishes, tools, weapons, an altar, and more. 

Old Gurung museum, Ghandruk

Entrance to Old Gurung Museum.

With stiff legs, we started our descent of the Modi Khola valley towards the end of the trek at Nayapul, initially down the inevitable knee-wrecking stone steps.  

Ang Gelu and the porters, closely followed by the young joints of Tara tear off down the steps.

Rural life carried on as we passed: people ploughing the fields with water buffalo, a man carrying such a great load of scythed vegetation (presumably for animal feed) that only his ankles were visible from behind, women weaving vivid cloth using backstrap looms or doing laundry under the village spigot or sweeping the porch with bunches of fine sticks amid scratching chickens and their broods, uniformed children walking  to school (often a considerable distance up or down), older kids herding goats. It was like a Nepali version of one of my favorite childhood books, Richard Scarry's "Busy, Busy World"; I expected Lowly Worm to rear his head. 

The girls are wishing they could also wallow in a mud puddle to cool down

During our homestay in Kathmandu, I had found the Nepali rhythm of life, the very bones on which you hang the events and chores of the day, to be jarringly foreign. The main meal of the day is around 10 in the morning (dal bhat) after which people head off to work and school. They come home around 5 or 6, and dinner (more dal bhat - 24 hour power!) follows later around 8 or 9pm. Although our western preferences of breakfast, lunch, and dinner had been catered to, albeit later than we were used to, we had had to work in with the local schedule which had left me with a constant surreal feeling of fundamental disquiet. I suppose that's the definition of culture shock.

Rice paddies

The steps ended at a recently developed dirt road along which trucks, jeeps and farm carts came bumping by periodically, adding insult to toes squashed in boots and sweat-stuck pant legs. In the distance, one jeep was mired in the mud on a newly bulldozed road. The solution seemed to be digging out with bare hands. The driver seemed resigned to his fate. Something about the country did that to you. 

Spot the car stuck in the mud on the newly bulldozed road to the left.

A local bus heads up the road. We had to walk.

I plodded along with Lhakpa as the morning ripened into a sun-drenched and sticky afternoon. Like many of the young people we met, he had studied Hotel Management, a logical career given Nepal's heavy reliance on tourism income (the other popular career was Civil Engineering, presumably in high demand after the earthquake). But was that what he really wanted to do?  He had managed an internship in Bahrain which had whetted his appetite for more experiences abroad. The Holy Grail of young people seemed to be a visa to the USA. It was a measure of the limited range of in-country prospects that this was to be strived for, despite the current political difficulties and reports filtering back of much hard work with little financial gain. At 24, this warm, engaging, capable young man was recently married (or perhaps engaged - either way, he had made a commitment) and was grappling with how best to forge ahead in life.

Lhakpa on the bridge over the Modi Khola at Nayapul

Our rough route, nowhere near to scale. Day 1: Phedi to Pothana, Day 2: Pothana to Ghandruk, Day 3: Ghandruk to Nayapul

After about 5 hours on the trail (and of course many more miles than the brochure had indicated), we crossed the Modi Khola once more and reached the town of Nayapul, a bustling center spread out along one side of the river. 

Tenaya looking very hot - nearly there!

The sting in the tail was the final uphill stretch to the waiting van that seemed far steeper than it actually was. We celebrated by liberating our hot and battered feet from boots and downing an incredibly refreshing bottle of cold Sprite.

Boots off and enjoying the best ever bottle of cold Sprite on a sweltering day.

So....we ended up finding the Annapurna range. But was it worth it? Tenaya, in a foul mood, declared "No, absolutely not. I will never do that again". Then promptly threw up. Back here in the US, people ask "Did you have fun?". It's tempting to give a blunt response to this banality: "No", but that would offend ever chipper American sensibilities. I usually instead offer a more nuanced: "Well....it was an experience", and then tell them about the leeches, the time we had to run away from fighting rhinos in the jungle, or the cremation we passed on the side of the river, rafting ("Then we saw two feet').

Had the bribe worked? When I asked the kids, at their last dinner in the country, "What did you enjoy the most?", they sat there, scrunching their brows and squirming in their seats. Tara offered, in a somewhat dubious tone, "Well, I guess the rafting was sort of fun". However, when I instead tried "What was your most memorable experience?", the floodgates of conversation burst and there was a tsunami of camaraderie. "Do you remember...?". "Can you believe....?". "The leeches!!".  And there it was. From the trash heap of fun, we had found unity. Priceless.

Namaste.

International Peace Pagoda, Pokhara

Ghandruk trek Part 2. A long day.

Unenthusiastically, we stood in the dining hall at 7:30 AM ready to go, the rain thrumming steadily on the roof. Ang Gelu decided to wait to see if the rain would ease.

There was a slight decrease in the intensity of the downpour and we were off. The drenching resumed almost immediately. Alistair and I deployed umbrellas, but the remainder of the party trudged along in rain jackets or draped in cheap plastic sheets. Because of the slippery conditions, Ang Gelu decided against taking the foot trail and instead led us along the recently established dirt road which snaked its muddy way along the side of the ridge. I wasn't sure whether it was an improvement. The drumming of rain drowned out conversation and time telescoped curiously as we plodded along robotically. What was time anyway? Did it matter? It seemed to me that unless you were at the beginning or at the end, you were in the middle, and if you were in the middle, it really didn't matter where as eventually you'd reach the end. There was no point in tracking the passing of time; it wouldn't get you to the end sooner. This I learned in Nepal, a stark contrast to my typical western time-obsessed modus operandi.

The leeches were out in full force, gallivanting about on the sodden road in search of victims. Ang Gelu had armed us with small sacks of muslin filled with salt to ward off them off, which felt like clutching garlic to ward off vampires. It seemed effective – one touch of the salt and they would fall right off. But the little bastards were FAST when they sensed blood and we stopped constantly for ankle checks. Today however, we were veterans at this game. There was a sense of camaraderie at every sucker detected and removed. Alistair was hell-bent on videoing one of the engorged beasts, provoking a great deal of banter on the subject. It helped pass the time.

At a stop at a guesthouse in the mist for some much appreciated hot drinks, a toddler shyly peeked out from the kitchen. From my bag, I drew some bubbles and blew her some. Immediate excitement. Running off to tell mama needed no translation. Her infectious and innocent joy lifted everyone's spirits.

A cow stood at the side of the road. It was quivering in the downpour, miserable, on its last legs. In a touching gesture of compassion, Lhakpa took the plastic sheet keeping his head and pack dry and draped it over the wretched beast, gently picking off some engorged leeches from its head. Almost immediately, the cow perked up and started moving along the road. It kept us company all the way to the next village where Lhakpa ensured it found shelter. 

At our lunch stop, the sky began to lighten and out of the gloom appeared verdant hillsides of forest and terraced fields with waterfalls tumbling down valleys, swing bridges across streams, and villages bright with a kaleidoscope of flowers and prayer flags. 

Terraces being ploughed and planted with rice, and a crop of corn below.

We also observed some other vegetation....

Soon after our stop, we reached the village of Landruk, perched on the eastern side of the Modi Khola (river) valley. On the eastern side at about the same elevation, Lhakpa pointed out a destination for the day, the twin town of Ghandruk. It didn't look terribly far.

A colourful and neat guesthouse in Landruk

Ghandruk is that little patch of white on the ridge about 3/4 of the way left. Far below is the Modi Khola.

Unfortunately, the river - the Modi Khola which flowed directly from the Annapurna glacier - could scarcely be seen far below. Shortly after leaving Landruk, the trail dropped precipitously towards it in our first real experience of thigh quivering Nepali down. 

Meeting some goats on the descent. Still can't see the river....

Down, down down...there are no switchbacks

After an eternity, we reached the Modi Khola, swollen and silty with runoff. The Nepali up started directly from the swing bridge. By then, it was mid-afternoon and we had been on the trail for about 7 hours. The clouds lifted, the sun appeared and the temperature spiked. Alistair later reported that we had dropped some 2500ft from Landruk. That meant an equal distance back up again....We all groaned. Some inwardly. Some not. Time to tough it out, one step at a time, grinding upwards.  Tara put her head down and got on with it, uncomplaining. Tenaya looked positively murderous. I skipped on ahead with Ang Gelu to avoid the fireworks.

A half hour staircase later, the steps vanished into a steep road cut and we scrambled up to find a line of jeeps waiting next to a roadhouse. Over glasses of cold lemonade, it transpired that this was the new road up to Ghandruk, currently closed due to a landslide, hopefully due to open soon. "Would you like a ride?", Ang Gelu asked the girls. Tenaya almost wept with gratitude. Unfortunately, I think he must have been teasing, because, after our break, we crossed the road, picked up the stairs and kept climbing. My bribery strategy was looking a little bit shaky....

From the roadhouse, we could see our first glimpses of mountains at the head of the valley.

Our party was joined by a local dog which tagged along with the group for the climb. We ended up picking up several of these canine companions along the way. They were friendly and seemed to enjoy the company and occasional ear scratches and belly rubs. Our observation of dogs in Nepal is that they are nowhere near as pampered as their Western counterparts. They were often to be seen in the busiest of thoroughfares, looking quite dead and belonging to no one obvious. We only ever saw them fed leftover white rice, so why they weren't actually dead was a mystery to us all. 

Where we had come from - the village of Landruk is directly across the valley on the left, and Pothana is on the ridge somewhere to the far right.

Some indefinite time later, after some indefinite number of stops to "admire the view" and some indefinite number of steps, we reached the sign saying we had finally reached Ghandruk. Hallelujah! 

Looking tired, hot and sweaty with one of our canine companions

We turned the corner expecting to see a picturesque Gurung (the tribe that lived here) village and saw.....another long staircase. That ended with....another long staircase. Then a helpful informational sign:

Then, to a  chorus of pained groans,  another set of steps. Nine hours after we left Pothana:

At our guesthouse, there were more steps to our 4th floor rooms (with en suite! and functioning wifi!). The description of this 'easy' trek ("suitable for all ages from the very young to the elderly") pegged the Pothana to Ghandruk leg at 5.5 miles, I distance I had judged doable with minimal teen whining. Alistair's tracking program suggested over 11 miles with 3500ft elevation gain and loss. We reckoned the shorter distance must have been as the crow flies! However, speculation ceased to matter when we reached the deck in the early evening light.

Wow!

Annapurna South 23,684 ft  - about 17,000ft above us

Tired, but jubilant

Ghandruk trek Nepal: in which a family searches for the Annapurna Range and discovers something else. Part 1.

Namaste from Kathmandu, Nepal. Boudhanath.

It didn't start well. Alistair, deathly white and drenched with sweat, was on the verge of fainting.

The stifling plane showed no signs of departing the Kathmandu airstrip for Pokhara - why waste air conditioning on sitting on the tarmac, even if it were one of the city's hottest days? Alistair had been afflicted with the dreaded "Kathmandu quickstep" the day before – an experience he'd rather forget – and the airless wait threatened to overcome him. The crackle of an accented announcement sent us back across the blazing tarmac to the terminal to wait for the weather to improve in Pokhara. Alistair staggered along and slumped across the row of seats. A concerned ama took his shoes off; another produced damp towels and proceeded to wipe down his face and limbs. Lhapka, our Sherpa assistant, fanned him furiously with a discarded newspaper. Three airport officials turned up to see what the fuss was about.

The roots of this adventure were decades deep. I had trekked for a month in Nepal more than 20 years ago, a transformational experience that shaped my worldview and ushered in true adulthood, had yearned to return. But life got in the way as it does – babies, mortgage, job – the usual anchors. When Tenaya, my older daughter, arranged to do a service project for her Girl Scout Gold award at a Women's Center in Kathmandu, there was no question of not accompanying her. In fact, why not bring the entire family and extend the trip to include a week of exploring? Could a trek also be transformative for the entire family, one of those much vaunted "bonding experiences" the subject of many a sappy Disney movie? I had my doubts. The teen years had been fraught with conflict, as they often are. Upbeat Facebook posts failed to convey the reality, as they often do, of the tenuous bridge between teen and parent.  Furthermore, my daughters were reluctant to walk anywhere, let alone up and down mountains for days, possibly in monsoon rains. A bribe would be required.  I hoped a couple of nights of luxury in the resort town of Pokhara ("spa" was bandied about casually) followed by two days of white-water rafting would suffice to buy forgiveness, if not earn bonding.

With Alistair revived, our party eventually boarded the aircraft (stopping to allow other passengers to take the necessary pre-flight selfies) which took off for a cloudy flight to Pokhara. With us was our guide, Ang Gelu, and his assistant, Lhakpa. Ang Gelu came from Pangkoma, a small village in the Solu Khumbu that I had visited on my first trip. On that trek, Lhakpa's father, Ngima Dorje had been our sirdar, and my brother and I had been accompanying my parents.  Now Lhakpa was leading, and my daughters were accompanying Alistair and I, the trek organised by Ngima's company, Nepal Myths and Mountain Trails.

Lhakpa (centre left) and Ang Gelu (centre right) flanked by our two porters

In Pokhara, a couple of young Sherpa boys were waiting to be our porters and our party of 8 boarded a van which bumped its way up the collection of potholes loosely linked by the occasional pavement that passed as the road, swerving to avoid cows, swarms of motorcyclists, and oncoming brightly painted trucks on the wrong side of the road, with a liberal use of the horn. In other words, a perfectly normal Nepali drive.

We abruptly stopped at a seemingly random spot up a valley on the side of the dirt road.  Steep lush hillsides rose up into the clouds. There was an inauspicious, ratty looking 'restaurant' and not much else....apart from a set of stone steps disappearing up into the jungle. This was apparently Phedi, the trailhead location. The girls peered up the stairs with a mixture of suspicion and dread. They were about to learn the meaning of 'Nepali up'! And so began the trek proper under misty skies.

Looking down on the road and Phedi

Our first taste of Nepali up.

It was an odd parade.  The two teen porters bounded away out front laden with bags carried on a tumpline on their heads, eager to reach the next rest stop to check their phones. The two teen clients trudged upwards, one silently and the other voicing her displeasure at the directness of the ascent. Ang Gelu led the main group, pacing along stoically, an Everest climbing sherpa massively overqualified for this small venture. Keeping up with him was Alistair who seemed revived by the challenge. I followed along in between and Lhapka brought up the rear, being assigned the job of tail-end Charlie.

The telltale signs of a leech bite - bloody socks

The mist turned to a light, cooling and not entirely unwelcome drizzle. As we paused for a rest at the top of the steepest ascent, Lhakpa casually mentioned that we should look out for leeches, but not to worry as they were usually higher up. Leeches??? The girls now looked alarmed as well as hot and tired. Finally nearing the crest of the ridge, we sat to rest again out of the now light rain. Lhakpa suggested that we check our ankles for the little bloodsuckers. I glanced down, saw a large black blob on my ankle, and picked it off with a shriek. Blood trickled down into my sock. The rest of the family gasped, then a commotion erupted as everyone discovered they'd been bitten. Shoes were discarded in a hurry to discover the tell-tale bloody patches on socks. The bites were painless and caused no itchy welt; the only inconvenience was the effect of the powerful anti-coagulant which ensured a steady trickle of blood for an extended time (our socks ran red for ages when we tried to rinse them off in the evening). But it was the very thought of the little bastards that was repulsive.

It was the last straw for Tenaya. She had just finished her final grueling year at high school and graduated just days before departing for Nepal with little chance for a break. En route via Singapore she has picked up a nasty virus and had had a feverish traumatic arrival into Kathmandu with blocked ears and the aircraft in an extended holding pattern before landing. Her week in a homestay in a developing (read: non-touristy) suburb of Kathmandu as part of her Girl Scout project was challenging: jetlag, strange meals at strange hours, record Kathmandu heat, traditional beds, the clamour of the neighbourhood still under construction, a continuously griping digestive system, and  an unsettling feeling of uncertainty about daily plans which were apt to change at the last minute. Our hosts offered us their finest warm hospitality and did their utmost to graciously accommodate the family. It was just a huge change for a California teen used to a structured, predictable and sanitised Western life. By the end of the week, we had decided our song of the trip was "100 Bad Days Make 100 Good Stories (100 Good Stories Make You Interesting at Parties" by AJR. Our favourite saying was "There has been a little bit change of plan". And the t-shirt of the trip was "Dal Bhat power, 24 hour" in honour of the traditional twice daily Nepali meal of white rice, dal (lentil soup) and veggies. We all could laugh about those later...but at that moment in the trail, enough was enough. Tears flowed amid panicked sobs. It started to rain harder.

View from our homestay in a developing suburb of Kathmandu

Homestay bed

  

Dal bhat power, 24 hour

Along the ridgetop, the way became less steep as we wound through villages and terraces being ploughed by water buffalo and planted with rice.

We stopped for lunch at a teahouse with views of the hills swirling in and out of the clouds. Warm food and the resident cat provided physical and mental sustenance before the walk continued ever upwards. 

Mid-afternoon, a sign saying "Pothana- 25 min" perked us up as this was our destination for the evening. Alas, this must have been for the locals, as we climbed through forest for the best part of an hour before reaching the village perched on the ridge. 

Amazing - some downhill! Accompanied by one of our canine companions

There must be mountains somewhere in the clouds,,,

In April, peak trekking season, this would have been a busy hub with expansive views of the Annapurna Range. In late June, we were the only customers in town, damp and bedraggled, and had to content ourselves with a faded poster of the glorious panorama as the rain beat its ever harder rhythm on the tin roof.

Arriving in Pothana

We had to imagine this!

Our accommodation was in a pair of basic rooms on the top floor with two simple bed platforms apiece furnished with a foam mattress and heavy duvet blanket, and a bald electric light. The loo was down the end of the building and was a sit-down flush variety. The plain wooden floor did little to muffle the sounds of the sherpas and the inevitable lodge dog below. I was rapt - this far exceeded expectations based on my experience 20 years prior! Down in the dining hall, one of our porters had found an outlet to charge his phone in and was busy watching a movie. The lodge had Wifi, but only when it wasn't raining, so we were out of luck - or perhaps in luck. Throughout the trek, I had difficulty reconciling my desire to recreate my previous trek experience - the month in which we left roads behind and in which the only communication with the outside world was a two-minute phone call to Alistair from the single phone in the region - with the current reality. Like in the west, phones and wifi were ubiquitous and just as addictive. The ultimate for me was the sight of some girls tending their herd of goats on the side of a steep trail...glued to their screens. 

Spot the phones...and the goats!

Roads now snaked into these villages, bulldozed out of the hillsides, perched precariously on the steep slopes and at constant risk of washouts and landslides. 

I struggled to find the charm in this connected world at the same time as recognising the progress that these links represented to the local people.

Dining hall at Pothana

That evening after dinner, we lingered in the dining hall chatting to Ang Gelu and Lhakpa. Ang Ghelu had worked on Everest as a climbing sherpa for a number of years, working his way up the ranks. In 2015, he was caught in the massive earthquake-triggered landslide that swept through Everest base camp, killing at least 22 people. He survived but spent 3 months in hospital with an injured back. Since then, he had returned and summited twice. I asked him what his motivation for returning after a near-death experience was - was it just the money, or did he love what he did? Both, it seemed. Despite the extraordinarily high risks and poor treatment - he bemoaned the terrible food provided to the sherpas - these kept him coming back each year. Lhakpa described how seeing the bodies of 14 Sherpas killed on the mountain had him retching, and the huge impact that the loss of these climbers had on their close-knit communities - wives left without husbands, children without fathers. It was a sobering and thought-provoking discussion. Should these levels of risk imposed on the sherpa staff be unacceptable to visiting mountaineers? At what price the summit? How much responsibility lay with the Nepalese government for failing to set limits on the numbers of climbers and therefore creating even more hazardous conditions? Permits provided significant income to a country hugely dependent on tourism. Like for many things in Nepal, there were no easy answers.