- 31 - Number of days on the Circuit
- 175 - Approximate number of miles walked as we did the Circuit (including side and day trips)
- 19 - Number of villages or encampments in which we overnighted
- 2 - Number of nights we slept at a higher elevation than any peak in the US outside Alaska (14,600' and 15,840 respectively)
- 3 - Approximate number of miles in elevation gained from the beginning of the trek to the highest point (2,592' to 17,769')
- .97 - Approximate number of miles climbed during biggest single day of ascent (5,100' from Tatopani to Ghorepani) Ouch...
- 10 - Approximate number of US dollars spent per person/per day on the trail
The first three days we walked through tropical green hills and deep river valleys layered with rice terraces and surrounded by forest. Despite our daily yoga practice in Varanasi, our legs and lungs were pitiful matches for the foothills of the Himalayas. After ending each day more exhausted, we capitulated in the village of Jagat on our second night and contracted a porter to carry some of our things. Porters are an integral part of trekking and of living in these mountains. They comprise a class of laborer similar to trucker in the West. Well before recreational backpackers ever existed, let alone heard of Nepal, porters carried much of the trade goods that moved through this entire region. Due to the challenging nature of the topography here and what that means for 'development', they still do.
We'd been hiking from the start with two very bright and very nice Australian guys just out of college, Peter and Jonnosch.* Peter had a bad knee so he, Tami and I decided to offload some of our heavier things onto our new porter, Arundha. Thank heavens for that man. The next two days were tough uphill and, if it weren't for him, they would have been miserable. His fee when we parted ways was just over fourteen US dollars. That was good for him, actually, as we only loaded him maybe forty pounds of gear. Most porters contracted by tour groups make about $3.50 a day and carry twice that weight or more. I tried hefting some of the larger porter loads I saw and, no exaggeration, could barely get them off the ground. They told me they weighed around sixty kilograms (130 lbs.)!
On the fourth day we started to get closer glimpses of snowy ridges and peaks. The temperatures were lowering and the air thinning. It started to feel like the mountains. We pushed on for a long time as it was our final day with Arundha and we wanted to cover as much ground with his aid as possible. We also wanted to avoid Chame, the marquis tour group village that marked this stretch. Organized groups of 12 to 20 people - mostly from Germany, France and Spain in our encounters - platoon around Annapurna with their retinue of porters and guides in tow. When they descend on a lodge or guesthouse, their sheer numbers impart a kind of hegemony that is tough to escape. They take over a dining room so thoroughly that, if you weren't paying attention, you might think you were in the Pyrenees or the Alps rather than Asia.
An hour and a half past Chame was the tiny village of Bhratang. We made for it but our energy and the valley light were failing badly by the time we reached it late in the afternoon. We'd only eaten a mid-sized breakfast and skipped lunch to make time. After about nine hours of climbing, we were famished. The trail approaching Bhratang was lined on one side by a long stone wall that shielded an apple orchard containing hundreds of trees. We'd seen almost no fresh fruit since we started the trail so I was surprised the trees still held most of their apples. From where we walked, I could see what looked like dozens of sizes and colors. My stomach lurched in a much different way than it had after the buffalo gore.
Our small lodge actually fronted the orchard and an old man squatted on the deck slicing a huge basket of apples for drying. As soon as I dropped my bag, I went back down to the manager and asked him, if we paid him, we could go into the orchard and taste from the different trees. Without hesitating he walked me back down along the wall, showed me the place to climb over and pointed out where his half of the orchard began. With the very whettest of appetites and an equally sharp knife, Tami, the two Aussies and I trundled down to the trees and commenced a feast. (Though it would be difficult to quantify, there is no doubt we burned more calories every day than we consumed. The net result is evident in our current emaciated appearance.)
We picked an exemplary specimen from each tree, quartered it, tasted with slow relish then moved on until we spotted apples that looked different and repeated the ritual. Each tree had unique fruit and virtually every one was better than any apple I buy at home. All were organic. Most all were too small or misshapen to make it into a supermarket bin. The flesh was often as hard and crisp as a potato but super juicy and bursting with flavor. The fourth or fifth tree we sampled stopped me cold. If I were stranded on a desert island and forced to pick just one apple , this was it; a thin skin that popped as you bit through, flesh that split under your teeth like crystals and a balance of sweet and tart that made me forget all other apples...forever. For a guy that is an avowed slave to his palate and stomach, I was in heaven.
(As a sidenote: Early on in our travels, Tami and I both read an excellent book called "The Botany of Desire". The author explores the history of Man's relationship with apples - and three other plants - in very interesting detail. I learned that all apples originated as knobby wild fruit not so far from Nepal in central Asia. The fruit we buy and eat today is much different and has changed drastically from its forebears. These apples of Bhratang were heirloom apples, closer in quality and character to their ancient relatives than anything I'd probably ever eaten.)
The sensory transition that began with the change of topography and climate and climaxed in the orchard, presaged satisfaction and joy that most 'practical' adults won't allow themselves to hope for out of fear of assured disappointment. On our hike the next day, the valley opened up to reveal Annapurna II, a glaciated peak three miles above us yet so close we could trace every foot of the incline directly from the ground we walked. That night we stayed in the village of Upper Pisang, the first of ten consecutive nights at which we slept at 11,000 ft. or higher. Apart from some modern consumer goods, intermittent electricity and plate glass, the villages we visited had not changed in hundreds of years.
Trekking evokes hiking in mountains through nice terrain and, with luck, interesting cultures. What we found out around Annapurna was an experience so dense with variation, so large in scale and still so fundamentally and sincerely different than our normal lives back home that Walt Disney or a Vegas impresario would be lost at how to wake people from their somnolent lives so effectively. Who're the lucky duo yet again? By the grace of the good heavens above, Tami and I.
* (I found out later that Peter, also unawares, walked up to the Buffalo killing just as the celebrants delivered the final hack. His description of what he saw was quite a bit more ghastly than my own.)
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