Ten Gorgeous Days in the Mountains

Hiking from Ghoda Tabela to Syabru Besi felt like a welcome, downhill reprieve.  We were trying to kill a three day effort in two, but the goal of a private shower, a warm room, a varied menu, and jeep ride back to the capital made the extra output sweetly justifiable.   The trek down was long, but uneventful: no near death missteps into the unknown and irrecoverable. 
We did see wild marijuana growing beside the trail, which Norsang said was everywhere and used during certain celebrations.  Trafficking is a crime, but these little one inch Spring beginners threatened no one.

One never knows whom one might encounter at the end of the earth, or the end of time?  At the last little vill where we stopped for lunch, there was an American family, parents about my age with a son and daughter-in-law, about 30ish.  After dealing with personal matters and the luncheon menu, the elder asked me, "Where are you from"

"I live in Northern California, Bay Area," I responded, always proud to boast my geographical (current and historical) identity. 

"What part?" he asked, seeming interested.

"East Bay, just over the hill from Berkeley," I responded.

"What part?" he continued to carve away at my geo/bio/econo/prof/ography. 

"I live out in Contra Costa County, Walnut Creek/Pleasant Hill," I said.

"Oh," he said, "I have clients in Walnut Creek."  I assumed he was an attorney of some sort.

"We live in Oakland, just off Claremont," his charming spouse chimed in.

"Oh, really," I said. "I just finished working in Oakland (and Berkeley) for the last thirty-five years," I responded.  "I have been working at Alta Bates Summit Hospital since 1995, and before that I was at the Field Office of the US Dept of Energy, which was located in Oakland, for the seventeen years preceding that!"

"We live very close to Pill Hill, and I have seen and heard of so many changes at Summit Hospital," the wife commiserated.

I went on to describe the merger of Alta Bates with Sutter Health, then the merger of Summit with Alta Bates...the problems with the economy, healthcare in America, Protected Healthcare Information, which was costing the industry millions of dollars, etc., etc.

We all agreed that everything was a mess, and that is why we were here in the beautiful Himalaya.  The father had also opted out of  Kyangin Ri the previous morning, and was not feeling the least depleted about it.  I decided that his approach would be mine, and I enjoyed the rest of the hike down all the more. 

Never got their names, and will never see them again, but I found them on the other side of the planet.  Neighbors....

As we descended we were near the river...

Blogger does not do videos well.  If the above works, I will be grateful.  As we approached Syabru Besi we saw more teamsters with their small pack horses loaded going up, and unloaded coming back down.  Once in Syabru Besi, we saw several on the street.

See the pink honeycomb attached to the rock...

And, that was that.  A good meal, a good night's sleep, and we boarded a crowded public jeep the next day for a six hour drive back to Kathmandu.  It will take me a while to process the ten days into something cohesive enough to put on paper.  The resilience and compassion of the mountain people; the camaraderie of the western (and eastern) tourists when encountering each other, more closely here than at any time in either's homeland; the majesty and absolute control the earth has over the lowly air breathing animals traversing its rocky uplifts and lush and wooded curves.  I will study these photos and my memories and once inspired, will draft an attempt at description. 

Next stop: Kathmandu, on the way home...

Ghoda Tabela - 3,010 m - 23FEB14

 

I went to bed last night determined to head straight downhill.  But, Jean and Terese, the French couple, said they were headed for the summit of Kyangin Ri. 

 

I could not help thinking, "Am I going to regret, for the rest of my life, not doing this 740m ascent/descent?"  Letting my male pride convince me I could do it, I said, "So am I!"

 

I could already see the dark, ant-sized figures of another group halfway up the gigantic, snow-covered mountainside.  It did not look that difficult.  It was.

 

We were walking up rock strewn mud trail, or hard, calf deep snow pack, nearly straight up.  At nearly 13,000 ft the air is already thin, and with each step, it gets thinner.  It was extremely slow, and I kept thinking of my knees descending.  At about mid-point, I told Norsang that I should go down, due to the difficulty and the potential knee issue. 

 

He took us down a different route, for the view, across a boulder field of huge jagged rocks.  I asked him if he had seen the movie of the young climber who had to saw his own arm off after it had become stuck in the crevice between boulders like the ones we were walking across. 

 

We took photos with Langtang Lirung (7,227m) in the background, and began traversing down on tiny terraced paths created by yak and horses over the centuries. 

 



 

  

 

 

Finally back in Kyagin Gompa, we had coffee at the guesthouse where we had spent the night, then began our descent to this village (about 300m below last night).

 

The general direction is downhill, but there are always climbs, steps or rock trails, to get to the next stretch of downhill.  I met some more Australian college age people who had been on the IRCTC (Indian Railroad) and had some of the same impressions of Varanasi, Buddhism, the railroad, Indian culture as I did.  They had been at it for several months. 

 

The sky here is so beautiful at night.  I have never seen the starry blanket so clearly nor so populated.  Not even from the high Sierra Nevada.  I wish it were not so bloody cold, so that I could go out at night and gaze for awhile.  I'll need lower altitude for that, although I think altitude, less atmosphere, is what makes it so clear.  Last night I had to get up five times to pee.  Here the toilet building is many steps away from the sleeping building, so I'll just pee near this building and stargaze in the process. 

 



Day 7 - Kyanjin Gompa - 3,870m

We had our usual breakfast this morning.  As described in a previous post, a selection of banana pancake, omelet with yak cheese and vegetables, chapatti or Tibetan bread, and milk_coffee or tea.  I was sorry to leave Langtang.  The teahouse was well kept, comfortable, and fairly warm.  The Australian girls livened the place up.  Melissa was fair-skinned, thin, with purely European genes, and eager to get to the next phase of her life, maybe TEFL.  Louise, the darker one, was part aboriginal, maybe all native, and spoke less.  She smoked tobacco, so had some coughing fits that I could hear during the night.  She would go out with their guide, a dapper, mid-forties, Kathmandu business man, who spoke about eight languages (he said), and smoked a lot.  I could not figure out how he could fill his lungs with that much smog and still climb the hills we were climbing. When first encountering these women I made the mistake of asking if they were just out of high school and trekking before entering college.  "Oh, no, we're twenty-one, and just out for the term, trying to decide if we want to go back or do something different."

The other memorable character's photograph is the last image on yesterday's post.  But, to keep readers from flipping back and forth, here he is again.

As we were strolling through the village, seeing life lived in this high altitude enclave as we had been seeing it for six or seven days: weaving and washing hung on every rail of every balcony of every stone house; children playing; horses, cows, long haired goats, and yaks munching anything green, or hay, if they were lucky; grain pounded by hand; this ancient mountain man came up and started talking with Norsang in Tamang, and trying to show me something.  It was a tarnished bronze disk about the size of a half-dollar hanging around his neck by a leather thong.  He pulled it off and began describing the design that had been roughly tooled.  Norsang translated, explaining that it was a Tibetan calendar, each year designated by an element, an animal, and a gender.  Each symbol was distinguishable, but the way they all related to each other was difficult to understand.  I could tell he had been drinking and needed whatever he was asking for another bowl of whatever fermented concoction he had been imbibing.  I wanted a photo of that face to ponder and follow each crease in whichever direction it would take me.  I offered him the number of rupees I had on me, $6 US, which was less than we was asking, $10 US, if I could take his picture.  He grumbled a little but agreed.  I felt extremely fortunate about the necklace, but Norsang said he was out there every time he brought a group up, selling these Tibetan calendar necklaces.  The calendar is still unique, but the image is something I will treasure.

This Kyangin Gompa teahouse is the last overnight on the way up.  There are only day trips from here to higher elevations (peaks like Kyangin Ri, 4,779m, and Tsergo Ri, 4,982m).  I told Norsang that I did not need more steps up that led to more steps down; so we will head down, back to Langtang Village, and possibly farther, tomorrow. 

We are above the clouds, so the valley below and all around us is filled with cold fog.  It is snowing, and with the fog, there is no scenery available.  Maybe it will be clear tomorrow.  I still do not want to go up just to say I've been to X,000m in the Himalaya.  Nothing left to prove.

It is freezing in this room.  The flushing bucket at the toilet at the end of the balcony is frozen.  I have eaten lightly today, so maybe I won't need to flush.  The Diamox (high altitude sickness prevention) causes frequent urination, and with no lights and at this temperature, climbing out of the mummy bag to find the toilet is no fun. 

 

The trip here from Langtang Village just took three hours, so we have been sitting around a wood stove in the dining area of the teahouse, staying warm, reading, (the guides and porters are playing cards), for about eight hours.  Someone had left a book about being gay and traveling in Muslim countries.  It was a compilation of travel articles by gay writers, some of it quite scary, some funny, but generally, very good writing. 

Norsang took me on a walk to the Yak cheese factory.  This is a collective that has been in operation for a few decades.  The sign in the photograph is incorrect, but the correction does not show in the picture.  The factory itself was closed, but the curing shed/dispensary was open while a man wiped the large yellow disks with a damp rag.  The cheese cost about $1 US per gram.  I bought three grams and passed it around at dinner.  It tastes kind of like emmantaler.