Uphill Both Ways

Port Havelock, Andaman Islands, India

Well hello everyone. Its been a long time. Sorry about that. A lot has happened since I talked to you last. Daysha and I have been trekking on the Annapurna Circuit, safariing in Chitwan National Park, and snorkelling off beaches on the Andaman islands. But most of that your going to have to wait to hear about(unless you write me back personally), because I've decided to write about our adventures only after you can see the pictures of what I'm writing about. You can always check out pictures of our trip at http://www.flickr.com/photos/moemntm/.
So with that said, sit back, relax, and let me tell you about our trek on the Annapurna Circuit, in Nepal. The Annapurna Circuit is a three week trek around the Annapurna mountain range crossing the 17,500 foot Throng La pass half way through. It's definetly not a small hike, but you don't realize the magnitude of it until you actually do it. We started on January 3(god, it has been awhile!), I had just gotten over being sick with what I had thought was a bacterial infection, traveller's diaharrea. We thought about waiting for a few days until we were sure that I was better, but it was already January and we were worried that if we waited much longer it might snow on us. So Daysha and I along with a small Nepalese man named Krishna that we hired as a porter, started our hike. The first few days went fantastic. We were feeling like we were still in good physical shape from a small trek in Northern Thailand, and exercising in Ko Tao;. We followed the stunning Marshiandy river gorge, the days were sunny and hot and the nights cool. As we wandered during the day we saw water buffalo grazing in rice paddies, and army trucks blown up by Maoists. At night we stayed in tea houses run by toothless old men drunk on rice whisky and hard working women with grubby, crying children. Everything reeked of the adventure we were looking for. On the fourth night, however, my sickness came back, I was up all night on a, hmmm, well I would like to call it a toilet, but it was more like a hole in the floor. If you don't know, Asian toilets are not built like Western toilets. Their built sunken into the floor, so you don't sit on them, you squat like a catcher in a baseball game, and even as Asian toilets go, this was not a good one.. Unfortunately, my body is not really meant to squat(which explains why I played first base) and so Asian toilets are not my favorite. On this trek, I had to go without three things that are close to my soul: Beef, Beer, and Sit down toilets. I really missed the toilets. So, needless to say, I had a very uncomfortable night, with virtually no sleep.

This did not make for a good hike the next day. As Daysha ooohhhed and aaahhhhed at the mountain vistas, I aaahhhhhed and ooooohhhhed from stomach cramps. I made it, though, and after a good nights sleep was just fine the next day. I continued to feel fine right up till that next evening when I again was sick, but the following morning, I was a trooper and kept on going. Meanwhile the landscape was changing. We were still following the Marshiandy river valley, while it was still sunny, it was getting quite a bit colder. Yaks replaced Water Buffalo, and herds of goats roamed the countryside. We finally stumbled into Manang, the Northeast Annapurna region's metropolis(pop. 6,000 or so). At this point we had been hiking six hours a day for seven days, we were also at 12,000 feet and starting to feel the affects of altitude sickness. For these reasons its recommended to stay an extra day in Manang to rest in acclimatize, but I was still sick as a dog so we stayed two. Luckily we finally figured out what was wrong with me,(I've already been graphic enough, so I won't tell you how) I had Giuardia, a stomach parasite. Thanks to Daysha's preparedness(I never would have thought of it) we had the proper anti-biotic to treat it, and after two days in Manang we were ready to go again.

We hiked about four hours, and thought about continuing on to the foot of the pass, but because of the altitude we decided to stay where we were. When you're up at high altitudes you want to take it slow. The weather had been perfect up to this point, but as we started the next day we saw some snow clouds gathering. We hiked to Throng-Pedi, the foot of the pass, and had lunch. It was too late in the day to go all the way over the pass, but we decided along with a Dutch couple who had joined up with us, to hike the most difficult part of the crossing that afternoon, and stay the high camp, a cluster of tea houses only 2 hours from the highest point, that night. Luck was not with us. As we started up the steep incline the first flakes of snow fell, and by the time we made it to the high camp it was coming down hard. At this point, we were at 16,500 feet. That's 2,000 higher than Mt. Rainer in Washington. That night while we slept bundled in just about every piece of fabric we could muster, the snow contiued to fall. The next morning we woke up to four feet of snow, and it was still falling. After wearing out all the expletives in three or four different languages, we came to the conclusion that we had to go back down. We were simply not prepared to make a hike through that kind of snow, through terrain that we didn't know. And if we stayed put, the way the snow was falling, we could still be there. So, after 10 days of hiking, we had to turn around and go back. You would think that going down would be easier than going up, but going downhill in waist deep snow is quite a bit harder than going up with no snow. The snow stayed with us for four days on the way back down. The cool thing was that the snow transformed the land so we barely reconized it. It was just as beautiful, but in a different way. When we finally made it back, we had been hiking for 18 days with only two days rest. I lost 15 to 20 pounds. Its amazing what a little exercise and a smidgin of giuardia will do for you. Well, that's enough for today. I feel better now that I've finally gotten that story off my chest. All righty, talk to y'all later, Moe