enormous Himalayas
Who knew there’d be so much climbing involved in hiking the Himalayas? Our whole day today was a series of steep climbs with short hilly (up and down) sections in between. The scenery is amazing. We still haven’t gotten into the majestic, snow-capped mountains–the mountains we’re walking through are the foothills to the enormous ones, which are more than 8,000 meters (25,000 ft)–but sometime today, the landscape grew an order of magnitude in size. Yesterday the tops of the hills around us seemed reachable and conquerable, and today the tops of the hills disappear in the afternoon when the clouds roll in. It is a humbling experience. It makes one feel small and insignificant, like an ant crawling over boulders.
The other thing that is humbling is the size of the packs the Nepalis carry and the ease with which they do so. We saw an old man, he must have been at least 70, carrying a pack that was 4 ft by 4 ft square. It’s impossible to guess how much it weighed or what was in it, but it looked heavy. We’ve seen younger Nepalis carrying 85 to 100 kg packs like they are no big deal. It boggles my mind to see them running past me down the hills carrying such huge loads.
The hike goes something like this: we climb for 10 days, spending one day in the town of Manang to acclimate to the high altitude, and then we go over Thorung-la, a 5400 meter (almost 18,000 ft) pass and spend the next 7 to 10 days walking back to the road. We gain about 300 to 700 meters (1000 to 2000 ft) per day for the next four days before our rest day in Manang. The trail follows the Marsyangdi River, crossing it and recrossing it, towards its source, high on the Tibetan plateau, the so-called roof of the world. We follow another river down the other side of the pass through an area that is much more heavily traveled by tourists and much flatter.
I seem to be out of things to say. I can’t remember that ever happening before. Strange . . .
Tags: Travel
awrichner
well, i guess there’s a first time for everything. chalk it up to altidude suckness maybe??