8 itchy feet

Sipping sweet Bedouin tea

Published on May 11, 2016May 11, 2016 by 8itchyfeet1 Comment

Well now I’m lost, I finally admitted to myself. For the past day and half I had been instinctively endeavoring to memorise cliff faces, track junctions and other markers in the huge, wild, remote, dry and enthralling Wadi Rum – a 720 square kilometre wilderness in the deserts of Jordan.

I had been trying to keep a mental track of where we were because we were headed into more and more remote territory. No signs, no roads, none of the usual landmarks with which to orient yourself. The vast expanse of desert was like a maze. Tracts of gently undulating sand, kilometers wide, formed valley floors punctuated dramatically by massive rocky outcrops, up to 800 metres high. They disappeared off into the distance in every direction. I wished I had a map. I am usually more comfortable knowing exactly where I am.

I trusted our guide to know his way around, after-all that was what we were paying him for, but he seemed very young and he didn’t speak all that much English. How many times could he have done this before? The beaten up old Toyota Hilux in which we were riding in the tray back also did not strike me, on first impressions anyway, as the most reliable vehicle in the world. It did have personality though and was comfortably fitted out for carting foreigners around with cushioned seats and a thick blanket stretched across a metal frame overhead to keep us in the shade.

Fortunately for my peace of mind, by the time I conceded that I really couldn’t navigate our way back to where we had started I was also convinced it wasn’t going to be a problem. Yousef may have been young, but he had clearly spent his life growing up with Wadi Rum as his backyard and he never hesitated or faltered in delivering us on our way on this magical mystery tour of the desert.

It was a wonderful experience, rich in history, culture, geology and ecology and all in a stunningly beautiful landscape. It’s the colours I love the most. Pastel shades of yellow, orange, red and purple which merge into and out of one another in that wonderful way that only nature can. The desert scene was set off by a deep blue sky and faint tinges of green from the sparse desert plants.

It was quiet too. So quiet you could hear the wings of birds tearing at the air as they flew past overhead. Crows were common, circling in groups up above the horizon, or half way up the rock faces and providing perspective to the scale of the rocky monoliths. Swallows and other smaller birds darted around low to the ground swooping like albatross over the waves as they scooped up insects before gaining a little altitude to spot another morsel and swooping down again.

We toured Wadi Rum with an outfit known as the ‘Rum Stars’. The name struck me as more appropriate for a basketball team than the business name of a Bedouin desert tribe, but who was I to question? We finished each day at their desert camp, a series of structures which were not quite a tent but not quite a solid building. Thick black cloth was stretched taught over metal frames providing a surprisingly snug interior, cool in the heat of the day and warm at night. The common area was lined with plush red cushions, with a campfire suspended on a metal platform in the centre of the open sided shelter. A pot of sweet Bedouin tea was constantly on the boil.

The hospitality shown us by Yousef and his brothers was far more genuine than I had perhaps expected from a business which sees people like us for a matter of days and probably never again. We listened one evening as Yousef’s older brother, robed in a full length white gown and Arabic keffiyeh (headdress), spoke about his desire to show people from around the world his home. His hope was that all who came to visit would then return to their own homes and speak warmly of Jordan and its people.

The same brother also spoke lovingly about Jordan’s King Abdullah and his progressive attitudes – towards women, politics and education. He contrasted this sharply with Jordan’s neighbours suggesting that while Jordan may be expensive, people were not imprisoned for expressing a political view and that there was nowhere he would rather live. ‘We love King Abdullah’ he said affectionately. I can’t remember an Australian politician invoking that kind of following.

Deserts call to mind barren, inhospitable wastelands of little value or interest to anyone. It’s an unfair and unwarranted reputation. Wadi Rum, like outback Australia, is an enchanting place with more to do than time on offer.

We hiked through canyons, scrambled up cliffs to stand on precarious rock bridges, watched as our guides prepared and cooked meals over campfires at the base of massive rock faces, leapt off the top of red sand dunes, raced across the desert floor at break-neck speed as Yousef tried to outdo his brothers in delivering us and other visitors back to camp. We also soaked in sunsets from high vantage points while Amy and Oliver scrambled up and down the rocks to deliver cups of yet more Bedouin tea.

Waiting for the sunset – the Bedouin tea is brewing over a fire below

We even spent four hours trekking on camels which was almost, but not quite, too long. It was kind of romantic, and helped evoke a stronger sense of times past. The reality was though that romance came at the cost of a blister on your behind and that made it hard to maintain the dream. We all squirmed to get comfortable on the ungainly but lovable beasties. Oliver found it best to ride backward, Amy and I attempted to imitate the cross legged style used by our Bedouin guide while Emma just urged us to keep going so we got to the end as soon as possible.

Trying different methods to get comfortable

‘I like the desert’ Oliver declared spontaneously as we raced back from our sunset viewing one evening in the twilight. ‘You get to be all dirty’ he declared with a cheeky grin. Yousef seemed to encourage him in this endeavor. Like an oversize school friend, he seemed very pleased when he found a partner in Oliver to play frisbee with at every possible opportunity. They played hard, diving in the sand to take a catch, or to avoid a throw intended more to make the other guy duck for cover.

Sand boarding helped everybody get a little grittier too and has been a favourite past time for Amy and Oliver ever since our first adventure on the dunes of Kangaroo Island. I think I’m still snorting some of the sand that went up my nose when I put my feet down to slow Amy and I up before we screeched across a rocky road at the bottom of the hill. Emma took some video of Amy and Oliver careening down the slopes and Yousef snuck up behind us while we watched it back after exhausting ourselves climbing the slope. ‘Did you get me?’ he asked like a kid who didn’t want to miss out.

Amy couldn’t figure out why the board kept going crooked

We also visited places made famous by Lawrence of Arabia, including the remains of his home in the desert and the springs where he apparently took a bath on the 13^th September 1917. The springs emerged from the rock about a hundred metres above the desert floor at a line in the rock where sandstone sits atop an igneous base. If you looked closely you could see a horizontal line of greenery contour around various rock stacks where this phenomenon was repeated in other places as well.

In Lawrence’s own words from his book Seven Pillars of Wisdom:

“so, to get rid of the dust and strain after my long rides, I went straight up the gully into the face of the hill, along the ruined wall of the conduit by which a spout of water had once run down the ledges to a Nabatean well-house on the valley floor. It was a climb of fifteen minutes to a tired person, and not difficult. At the top, the waterfall, Al Shallala as the Arabs named is, was only a few yards away”.

There is actually plenty of water if you know where to look, enough to support a very long human habitation in any case. According to the dry but informative UNESCO website,

‘Petroglyphs, inscriptions and archaeological remains in the site testify to 12,000 years of human occupation and interaction with the natural environment. The combination of 25,000 rock carvings with 20,000 inscriptions trace the evolution of human thought and the early development of the alphabet.’

We visited three of those 25,000 rock carving sites. I wondered if those who chiseled their marks into the rock all those years ago had any inkling the world would consider their work of global heritage significance in years to come. Probably not. How could you know?

The farthest point of our tour took us to the start of a three hour walk in which we climbed up an unremarkable gorge, scrambled up a reasonably challenging scree slope, across a sun baked plateau before climbing steeply to the summit of a high peak. On the climb we spotted an electric blue lizard (the Sinai Agama) basking on a red rock in the sun. The male turns this wonderful colour during the breeding season which I can only suppose occurs around May each year. The view from the summit was spectacular and we gazed off into the distance and into Saudi Arabia.

Three days slid past and it seemed like it was all over before it had really begun. Amy, Oliver and I were really starting to like the Bedouin tea (too much sage for Emma) and we all could have spent much longer hanging out in the desert. Alas it was time to move on. Aqaba and the Red Sea were just down the road and we were off to trade the red rose desert for the sparkling blue sea.

Who would’ve thought?

Published on May 8, 2016May 8, 2016 by 8itchyfeet4 Comments

The air was choking thick the morning we packed our belongings in Pokhara, and it didn’t improve during the day long bus ride back to Kathmandu. Although our trek to Annapurna Base Camp was undoubtedly a highlight of our trip the smog that sometimes hung heavy, sitting on our lungs and blocking what should have been spectacular views, was an unwelcome reminder of the pressures on our little planet.

News reports tell us the monsoon on the sub-continent has failed twice and the lack of rain means there is nothing to scrub the air of the pollutants pumped into it on a daily basis from all manner of sources. Low temperature incineration of plastic and other garbage appears to be standard practice here in the absence of any other waste management infrastructure. I couldn’t wait to get out of the thick cloying air. I also couldn’t help but dwell on how unfair it seems that we have that choice while others continue to breathe it in.

A matter of hours after climbing out of Nepal’s choking smog the world had shifted around us. We landed in Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates for a layover before flying on to Amman in Jordan. Women robed in black with only their eyes peering from behind their veils walked the airport corridors while men in white robes and Arab headdress sat in coffee shops. I still marvel at the miracle of air travel and how quickly it transports you between worlds.

The opulent Amman airport was a world away from Kathmandu’s basic aging infrastructure and I feel a little ashamed to admit how welcome I found the clean, modern and shiny environment. It was around 10.00pm Jordan time (1.00am Nepal time) as we climbed into a taxi before being dropped off at the house of a friend of a friend in Amman’s equivalent of Canberra’s Yarralumla (with the exception of the armed guards carrying automatic rifles over their shoulders).

I’m not sure if it’s convention or regulation, but Amman’s architecture is dominated, almost without exception, by honey coloured square shaped buildings around five or six stories tall. Christina’s place was on the ground floor of a building firmly fitting the mold and although Christina herself was not there to greet us her house was a welcome dose of homely comforts.

We spent three days catching up on school work, making plans for the next two weeks in Jordan and plotting our approach to travel through Europe. We didn’t actually move any further than the local supermarket about a kilometre away. The kids cooked us dinner and I washed dishes for the first time in nearly four months. We are very grateful to Christina for ‘hosting’ us when she wasn’t even there!

We picked up a rental car the next morning with barely enough fuel to get us to a petrol station. We must have been running on vapour after a few wrong turns and a very circuitous roadwork detour stymied our attempts to find somewhere to fill up. We were however spared the inconvenience of being stalled on the side of the road and were soon speeding our way south on the Kings Highway through Jordan’s dry and barren lands.

Petra was on our list of must see places but to be honest I knew very little about it. I guess Emma and I just liked the look of the iconic Treasury building carved into the sandstone cliffs that finds its way into almost every travel book we owned and had drooled over back home.

There is a risk with such places that reality is unable to live up to the expectations we create in our imaginations. Were Petra not more than the Treasury this may have been the case, but there is so much more to it. The Treasury is just the gateway, a dramatic building thought to be designed specifically as a statement of wealth and power intended to leave visitors no doubt as to who was in charge in this neck of the woods. It is actually a tomb, likely to have been built for a King and his family, like most of the other stone carved ‘buildings’ of the city.

The 1.2 km long ‘Siq’ or canyon which leads down to the Treasury has got to be the coolest driveway in the world. It twists and winds with canyon walls up to and over a hundred metres overhead. Every corner makes you wonder whether the next will reveal the view of the massive sandstone edifice of the Treasury. An involuntary ‘wow’ passed my lips as it finally came into sight.

The Siq – note the ‘shelf on the right’ it carried the water pipes

Beyond this grand entrance the city continues with more and more building facades, 50 and 60 metres tall, carved into the rocks all around. Around 2000 years ago, 30,000 Nabataeans used to call these rocky canyon-filled mountains home. It is a truly remarkable thing how the Nabataeans exploited their geographic location on the trade routes between China, India, the Far East, Egypt, Syria, Greece and Rome to grow wealthy enough to plumb the desert springs and supply water not only for themselves but for camps of up to 500,000 others living outside the city.

Throughout the site there is evidence of the engineered water management systems which made life here on a grand scale possible. Lining both sides of the Siq itself are the remains of a terracotta pipeline around 10 cm in diameter falling at a perfectly consistent 4-degree slope. The pipe funneled enough water from the surrounding mountain springs to supply 8 litres of water per day for each person living in the city, not to mention filling grand pools, baths and gardens leading some to call it the Las Vegas of its time.

Side canyons in the Siq also bear the remains of dam walls built to protect the city from flash floods and at the top of the canyon a tunnel has been carved through the rock to divert the course of the river channel which created the Siq itself. Having mastered water, the Nabataeans then sold it, no doubt at extortionate prices, to the endless camel trains bearing goods along the trade route from the orient through to Europe.

Nabataean society was also curiously progressive for its time, even by today’s standards in many parts of the world. Women were equal to men and played an important role in politics and society. Queens ruled with their husbands and appeared alongside them on coins – apparently the Nabataeans are the only ancient civilisation found to have done this. In the hereditary system of the monarchy, should the king die with an heir too young to take over immediately, the queen would rule until her son was old enough. According to Nabataean law, a woman’s inheritance was also equal to that of a man and women signed business contracts and ran their own affairs.

We spent three days trekking into and out of the site up and down the dramatic Siq all the time declining the constant offer of horse, donkey or camel rides. Donkeys are the most common ‘taxis’ through the site and are really quite comical on occasions as they are ridden back and forth by fully grown men on the hunt for business.

Ma ‘donkey’ in front of the 6000 seat theatre

Boo ‘donkey’ on the Roman Colonnaded Street – ‘the shopping strip’

We were often solicited three times in a little as 30 metres. I started to have a little fun with it, complementing the operators on the quality of their fine animals and thanking them enthusiastically for their generous offer before indicating that on this occasion we have decided to walk. It was a little cheeky I suppose, but so are the unceasing offers which could, if you let them, detract from the whole experience.

Royal tombs – more intricate than those for ‘regular’ Nabataeans

At the far end of the ancient city of Petra is ‘The Monastery’, reached by what we probably would have considered a significant climb up through the canyons if we hadn’t so recently been trekking in the Himalaya. The Monastery itself is the second best preserved and most impressive of the facades carved into the cliffs. We ordered the best tasting flat bread and hummus you could hope for and were photo bombed while taking selfies from the former Nabataean tomb where the little café had its chairs and tables.

Beyond the Monastery are a series of viewpoints which knocked my socks off. Perched high above the Rift Valley the view looked out over a huge gorge onto the plains beyond. We were told we were looking down into Israel to the left and Palestine to the right. I had to say it to myself twice for it to sink in. Here we were standing in Jordan looking out into Israel and Palestine. Who would’ve thought?!

‘Jhong, jhong’ Annapurna Base Camp

Published on April 29, 2016April 30, 2016 by 8itchyfeet4 Comments

We reached Tadapani at 4.30pm on day 3 of our 13-day trek. The rain and hail had stopped, but grey clouds continued to swirl and thunder still rumbled overhead. The twelve members of our party had been stretched thin by a steep climb up from a river crossing a couple of kilometres back.

Amy and I turned around as we reached the first tea house and waited. Peering out from under our rain hoods we could see other trekkers through the windows of various guesthouses, already comfortably settled into their accommodation for the night. Emma and Oliver came next with Tobin, Sydney, Andrea and Peter, our Canadian friends not far behind. Pasang, Nima, Pemba and Mingma, our guides and porters, were hot on their heals despite being weighed down with our gear.

Tadapani was a pretty little village, nestled in a saddle of the mountain foothills. Heavy set stone guesthouses roofed with the ubiquitous blue corrugated iron of this area were joined by terraced stone walkways and patios. It was surrounded by the Rhododendron forest that had made for a wonderful days trek and would have had magnificent views had the weather been clear.

It would have been nice to linger. We had hiked a full day already from Ghorepani along high ridges with views of the Annapurna range before descending steeply into a beautiful forested gorge following a babbling creek. The weather had been perfect right up until we finished lunch. Then clouds gathered threateningly and the heavens opened.

By the time we reached Tadapani we were all tired and wet and while some us may have been ok with trekking in the storm others were not. Our night’s accommodation was, according to our guides, 20 minutes further on and with the clouds again darkening overhead we drew breath and hurried on.

Nima lead the way, with Tobin and Andrea hot on his heals as we very quickly gave up hard won elevation. No sooner had we left Tadapani than the rain, thunder and lightning started up again. We were somewhat protected by the forest but that also reduced the ambient light and it suddenly felt like night was only a short time away. Down and down we went, with increasing urgency, following a goat track of a trail over twisted roots, muddy slopes and unsteady rocks.

The rain began to mingle with hail while the thunder and lightning continued to crackle. After twenty minutes of racing down the hillside our estimated time of arrival stretched to ‘twenty-five minutes more’. I tried not to be despondent, but began to question whether we should have insisted on stopping for the night back at Tadapani.

It had already been a long day. Peter, Emma, Amy and I had started walking at 4.30am that morning for a side trip to watch sunrise over the Annapurna range from the 3200 metre Poon Hill. The others were also awake and out of bed at that time, at least for a while, after Pasang had come knocking on our door reporting that the weather was all clear and the views worth the early morning effort. Whether to stay at Tadapani was, however, now a moot point. We had given up so much elevation so quickly that it would have been more than we could muster to climb back up the way we had just come.

So we pushed on, and on. Tobin in particular was on a mission to put a solid roof over his head as soon as possible. He marched determinedly at Nima’s heals. If he could have gone faster and the lead the way himself, I’m sure he would have. Andrea was right behind him equally determined to support him in his endeavour. The light got dimmer as the day faded in earnest. My own anxiety grew a little as I steadied my voice to reassure Amy our guides knew exactly where they were going.

And then, just as quickly as we had stepped into the darkness of the forest we stepped back out. Lightning still flashed and rain and hail continued to fall, but without the canopy of trees overhead everything was brighter, including our spirits. A blue tin roof five hundred metres on had us convinced our day was finally done. I relaxed, squeezed Amy’s hand and reassured her we were finally there. When we caught up with Andrea, Tobin and Nima however, Andrea looked at me gravely and informed us, ‘this isn’t it’.‘Apparently it’s just over there’, Andrea said pointing to a place out of sight below the hill which continued steeply down before us. When everyone else caught up we stepped out from under the eaves of the abandoned building we were sheltered under and followed Nima once again. Five minutes later it was ‘it’. A brightly coloured and cheery Nepalese teahouse presented itself sitting snug into the hillside. The tension lifted and Peter calmly declared, ‘that’ll be the day we talk about the most’.

The morning after the first storm – we were ready for more

Maybe. We encountered a similar storm the very next day. Despite these challenges everyday of our journey to Annapurna Base Camp and back seemed better than the last.

The trek started at Nayapol (1090m), where we were dropped off after a hairy minibus ride. ‘We go by walk now’, Pasang told us. Nearly everybody and every thing ‘goes by walk’ from that point. Just a little further on, at the village of Hille, the road ends, but despite the lack of vehicles a network of villages and life carries on. They are supplied with everything you could want by trains of donkeys laden with goods or by basket carrying Nepalese bearing up to 120 kilos at a time (or so we were told) as they climb up and down the steep mountain trails.

Trekking here therefore really requires very little. Way less than perhaps than we had loaded onto the backs of our Nepalese guides and porters. Based on previous hiking and camping experience we took everything we would usually take for a week or so in the wild minus the tents, cookware and food (we did take approximately 60 snickers bars). Even then the eight of us managed to fill three large packs and four day packs with stuff.

Our Nepalese companions by comparison appeared to bring little more than the clothes on their back (jeans and a t-shirt) and a warm coat for the evening. While trekking through afternoon thunderstorms in our fancy new raincoats and rain pants, Pasang, Nima, Pemba and Mingma simply pulled a large plastic bag over the packs they carried to keep it and them dry. I wondered what they really thought of us and all the other trekking pole wielding, gortex clad warriors they accompany.

They probably weren’t too fussed. Carrying gear for foreigners, no matter how over the top, provides much needed income. Pasang, our guide for these two weeks had his home destroyed in the massive earthquake that happened almost exactly a year ago. He and his family have been living in a leaking tent ever since as they work to save up enough money to finish off the house they are building to replace the old one.

Pasang, ‘…is a mountain man’, the fellow at the Trekkers Information Management Office in Pokhara had told us before issuing our trekking permit. He had insisted on meeting our guide before issuing the relevant documentation. Pasang however had only to say a few words before the permit man was convinced of his credentials. Pasang himself would say, ‘I’m Nepalese strong’. He was too, although I didn’t really know what ‘Nepalese strong’ meant at first. I thought we were pretty strong too. Emma and I have both been known to run long distances and we have both lugged twenty plus kilo packs uphill and down dale in our time. Andrea and Peter have similar, and probably even more adventurous, credentials. If it weren’t for the cultural expectation that a guide and porters be employed before heading into the mountains, I probably would have insisted on lugging my own bag here as well.

By the end of day two however, I had changed my tune. The day started out innocently enough, contouring around the side of the plunging ravines which make up this area (and most of Nepal I suspect). The stone trail soon turned to stone stairs that went up and up and up. Then they went up some more. Up we went too until we had climbed so far I found it hard to comprehend that there could be anymore land up there above us.

‘Bishtari, Bishtari’ or ‘slowly, slowly’ Pasang urged us all, but by lunchtime the collective burn in our thighs was enough to cook a meal. We sat and enjoyed a lunch of potato rostis, fried noodles and rice and other items from the set mountain menu while enjoying the view from a terrace perched precariously on the edge of the slope. And yet our days work was only half done. We had climbed 800 metres since starting out that morning and still had 600 more to go before reaching the village of Ghorepani at 2800m.

For the most part everyone took the day’s toils in their stride. Tobin displayed character which belied his age initiating game after game of ‘20 questions’ as he hiked along in good humour. So, for that matter, did Sydney and Amy. Andrea and Peter’s ‘peg game’ kept everyone well entertained. We all snuck around trying secretly to deposit a clothes peg on a fellow hiker without their noticing and then watching with amusement to see how long it would take them to discover they had been ‘pegged’. Oliver found some demons to contend with late in the day as the efforts of our ascent took their toll, but kept on regardless.

We reached Ghorepani, our home for the night, nearly eight and a half hours after setting out and with a collective sigh of relief. An apple strudel from the German Bakery below the rustic Fishtail guesthouse revived Oliver’s spirits and I reflected on the meaning of ‘Nepalese strong’. I was forced to admit I was very grateful for the company and assistance of our porters and guide.

_DSC2995 — Pasang and Nima – ‘Nepalese strong’

Back to the the morning after our trek through the storm (day 3) – it dawned clear and calm. The rain had washed much of the smog and haze from the air and mountain peaks which had appeared ill defined and floating, as if in mid air, from Poon Hill suddenly crystallised. I felt 20% happier just for standing and looking up at the ice covered ridges, peaks and flutes.

The mountains from Poon Hill were mostly hidden by ‘smog’

We set off by continuing steeply downwards to a suspension bridge over a river before climbing right back up the other side. Nowhere in Nepal is flat. Obvious I know, but still quite a thing to experience. In the mountains of Nepal, you walk everywhere and everywhere is either up or down and steep, regardless of direction.

It was fascinatingly wonderful to walk through the landscape. Not a wilderness, but still wild. Small stone villages dot the massive slopes, surrounded by terraced agricultural land and interspersed by patches of forest, plunging creeks and waterfalls. On some slopes landslides stood out like scars with huge piles of rubble and debris accumulated in the river channels below.

Flat spaces upon which to stand, live and grow crops have all been hard won, hewn by human hand from the hillsides. As we occasionally contoured around the hills rather than climbing up or down, I felt like I was flying, such was the perspective granted by our vantage point over life on the hillside below.

On day 4, at the village of Chhomrong three valleys intersect. To our right the valley descended the way we would travel upon our return from the top. Behind us was the path we had just traversed from Tadapani and to our left the valley leading up to Annapurna Base Camp – still 2000 metres higher than where we stood.

_DSC3525 — Pemba, Pasang and Mingma enjoying milk tea at Chhomrong

I could have turned back to finish our trek at this point and been eternally grateful for a magnificent experience. There was however no need for that. We all seemed to grow in strength each day, even if we were well ready for sleep each night. Oliver, having found the third quarter of day 2 tough had landed upon a sound strategy for managing the physical ups and downs and was now taking the whole experience easily in his stride. Tobin struggled with the afternoon storms which crackled across the sky but despite that showed no sign of wanting to turn back.

Overall, the eight of us, twelve including our guides, were getting along so well I couldn’t think of anywhere I would rather have been or anything I would rather have been doing. The whole experience was so enjoyable you couldn’t help but be present. No thought of where we were going next, or what had happened to bring us here entered my head, so absorbed was I in the company of our Canadian friends, the sights and sounds of life in the mountain foothills and the huffing and puffing of steps, stairs and trail.

It only got better from there. As we climbed up the valley towards our goal, agricultural and village life gave way to bamboo forested slopes filled with birdsong and the occasional group of monkeys. As we went higher the forest fell away too. Massive glacially carved valleys were filled with alpine grasses and all around us waterfalls plunged from impossible heights towards the river we were following. Surely this valley must have been the inspiration for the elven homeland of ‘Rivendell’ in the movies of The Lord of the Rings.

The scale of the place was hard to process. From exactly how high on the mountainside the many waterfalls tumbled I cannot say despite standing, pondering and marveling for quite some time. It must surely have been hundreds of metres, but could easily have been much more. Just as in the Australian outback we found it impossible to capture a sky which stretched 180 degrees from horizon to horizon in all directions, here it was impossible to point a camera at anything more than a sliver of the mountain scene. Though Peter and I tried our best!

We climbed the final 900 vertical metres to Annapurna Base Camp on day 7 and for one reason or another it seemed a whole lot easier than the climb to Ghorepani on day 2. We made Machapuchare Base Camp (MBC) by 11.00 am under bright blue sky and with brilliant views. Machapuchare is a sacred mountain standing 3 metres shy of 7 kilometres above sea level. It has an unusual shape, something like a fishtail and often goes by that name.

Ahead of us was a snow fall leading towards Annapurna Base Camp. The weather closed in quickly as we set off for the final leg. The temperature dropped markedly and t-shirts were soon replaced with coats and beanies and gloves were dug out of packs. Visibility also diminished as misty clouds blew silently past and the mountains disappeared from sight.

_DSC3051 — Heading to ABC – the sun still shining

When we reached ABC a couple of hours later it was impossible to imagine the mountains even existed. They must surely have been all around us, but all we saw were glimpses of snow and rock as the swirling clouds parted briefly before closing again. We played cards, read books, and drank warm drinks in the relatively warm common room with folk from all over the world and trusted the next morning would reveal the sights we had come to see.

The girls played cards… out that window the next morning there would be mountains

Too much lemon ginger tea stirred me from my warm and cozy sleeping bag at 11.30pm that night. I reluctantly stumbled out of the dorm room we were all sharing to be greeted by a most excellent sight. The light of a nearly full moon illuminated crystal clear, 360 degrees, views of the Annapurna amphitheatre of mountains.

Annapurna Base Camp is surrounded by peaks. Our ascent in the misty weather now felt like climbing through a trapdoor into this secret, hidden place. Now it was the way back down to the world below that was hidden from view. I was so awed I stumbled around for 15 minutes before the sub zero cold and lack of clothes forced me back to bed.

I got up again a short time later when Peter went through the same experience. Peter however had no intention of returning to bed. Instead, after returning from the loo (washroom for Canadians), he started to fumble about in the dark as quietly as possible for his camera equipment. We both dressed more appropriately before spending an hour marveling at the sight. Tiredness saw us reluctantly return to bed around 1.00am.

We all emerged one by one from around 5.00 am that same morning though I wasn’t sure daylight could do anything to enhance the view. It was however like changing from black and white TV to colour making the scene that much more vivid. Many photos were taken.

Here is a video taken in the early morning light – it gives you an idea of how magnificent it was.

We very reluctantly started our descent at 9.00. We wanted to stay longer but Pasang was worried about the weather which closed in each afternoon. ‘Jhong Jhong’ (let’s go, let’s go) he would say, and we knew he was right but it was oh so hard to tear ourselves away. Oliver became a little emotional when we informed him we had to go. He wanted to spend the whole day and another night.

The journey down was just as great as the journey up. Slip sliding down the snowy hillside eased the pain of departure for Oliver who was enthusiastically joined in the fun by Tobin.

By day 8, collectively we operated like a well oiled machine. Tobin and Oliver often lead the way, chatting happily about the ins and outs of the ‘Percy Jackson’ books they have both devoured recently. They were like a roving mountain book club. ‘Let’s list all our favourite Greek demi-gods in alphabetical order’ I’m sure I overheard Tobin proposing to Oliver on one occasion.

Meanwhile Amy and Sydney discovered that stories made hiking all the more enjoyable and so Peter and I recounted tales of Shackleton, Scott, Amundsen, north American pioneers, and various adventurous travel experiences. It was a pleasure to watch as Sydney, Tobin, Amy and Oliver gradually began to behave increasingly like siblings, much as they have with other good friends back home. It was also a pleasure to get to know our new friends better and better as we all reveled in each others antics and personalities which became increasingly less guarded the further we went on.

Tobin and Charlie the dog – he adopted us for a few days

I don’t know precisely how far we walked. There are too many possible routes to Base Camp for one standard measurement. Some signs suggested that direct route to be around 85 kilometres, but this didn’t include the loop we added to pass through Ghorepani and Poon Hill. Somewhere over a hundred kilometres seems most likely. A crude estimate of our elevation gain suggests we also climbed over four vertical kilometres to reach our goal. This however is undoubtedly a significant underestimate because it does not account for the many steep descents into and out of river crossing that had to be traversed between lodgings. Somewhere between 5000 and 6000 vertical metres seems more likely.

If someone had presented us with those figures before we set off, I’m not sure we would have gone. A 13-day trek, over a hundred kilometres in length and with a vertical elevation gain of approximately five kilometres sounds like a big ask for anyone, let alone 11 and 9 year olds. It goes to show you shouldn’t underestimate what your kids can do. It also goes to show that meeting up with adventurous Canadians should be part of everyone’s trip to Nepal!

For me the trek to Annapurna Base Camp was the best two weeks of our trip so far. I can’t wait to come back and trek to Everest Base Camp, the full Annapurna Circuit, and the Mustang, Langtang and other trekking regions.

Travel well Peter, Andrea, Sydney and Tobin. We look forward to more adventures in Iceland.

There were so many photos we wanted to include – so here are a few more that didn’t fit neatly in the text.

Some trekking shots: