Walking between Kathmandu & Tibet - Day One

Walking between Kathmandu & Tibet - Day One

Loosing your Destination to find your Path

My entire life could be summed up with this phrase: "Oh My God! I didn't perceive what I was getting myself into!" This is pretty much the definition of an adventure. An adventure requires going beyond your limits and your known experience.

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I wanted to try something separate when I was selecting a trek in Nepal. There are three major areas that the Kingdom of Nepal offers to wandering foreigners. The most popular is the "Annapurna Trek" in western central Nepal. It's astonishing by all reports. The second most common is the "Everest Base Camp Trek". Naturally hiking to Everest has a romantic appeal. The last is a miniature known and rarely traveled path to Tibet called "Langtang".

Langtang, a valley winding through small Himalayan villages and prominent to an aged mysterious Monastery of Kudzon Gompa at 12000 feet on the border of Tibet. Hmmmm, sound appealing. I pride myself on 'going native' and try to rework the maps to end up in some mischief along the way. Sometimes I'm a miniature too flourishing at this.

My girlfriend Kirsten and I purchased a map at a long trekking store in Kathmandu and tried to come up with a plan. It turned out there were some very remote and untraveled paths even in Langtang (an beloved trekking area). We would begin at a small village called Dhunche. It appeared that there were a few paths from this small Himalayan rock village that head the back way to the Langtang Khola (river) and effect it to the Tibetan border. Perfect!

Day One: The Himalayan Express

We took a rickety local bus from the obscure Kathmandu station (no more then a miniature shack) at 6Am the next morning and began the slow winding accent toward the mountains. This part of the journey took 12 hours through numerous police check points (to look at our trekking permits) and continue through some dusty small villages.

The bus was a colorful movable shrine. On the front was a painting the Eyes of Buddha, Mantras (sacred words), and the Hindu Elephant Deity Ganesh. He has many attributes, but safe of tourist and remover of obstacles is his primary power. What could be good for a bus? Inside the driver had photos of various Hindu saints Ramana Maharishi, Sai Baba, plus a few Deities for balance: Laxsmi & Krishna.

We were smashed in with a few too many habitancy who also brought along their chickens, pigs, and many other items from a Kathmandu Valley shopping spree. It was one of the world's scariest roads: one lane, dirt, with 1000 foot drops two feet from edge of the bus with no guard rail. If you could brave a peak it was enthralling with rice fields terracing every hill. Prayer flags were adorning small stupa temples places magically at the top of each small rounded peak. This was a great initiation into to trust your destiny when you have no ifs ands or buts no control over it.

It was dusk when we arrived in the Himalayan village of Dhunche. The bus driver was incredulous about our departure in this small remote stop and that made us a miniature nervous too. A cold shiver of hope rippled up my spine as I left the safety of my hard bus seat and entered the rock village to find a guest house for the night.

We were the only travelers in town and the friendly locals directed us to what someday (when they terminate building it) might be a guess house. Fortunately, the bare concrete block room in the building site had a sort of hard futon bed with thin sheets and rock like pillows. We paid a dollar for it and then became painfully aware of the inadequacies of our gear.

You see, we were not planners. We're spontaneous adventures. We had a integrate of summer weight sleeping bags, sneakers and some thick Yak wool sweaters. My jacket was from an army surplus and my backpack from a thrift store. We were not the geared up olympic mountain team that we would see later on the same trail. We were just a integrate of habitancy realizing what kind of gear they would like to buy when they get back!

For some bizarre reason, the Himalayan houses do not have a chimney. Instead, to stay warm in the winter they fill the room with smoke and have strategically located holes in the side wall for the smoke to blow out. Not terribly productive or cozy. Honestly, I don't get it. I daydreamed about bring the new technology of chimney here someday. What a revolutionary vision!

Our room didn't have an hearth or fire smoke, but they had already created the holes in the walls so the frigid night breeze could refresh and invigorate us (practically to death). Needless to say, some vital innovation was needed. We put on all the clothes we had and laid both sleep bags on top of ourselves to try and stay warm. It was mid November and we were at an elevation of 6138 feet.

As night descended in earnest it got dark. This was no commonplace dark. It was darker then dark. It was a dark that needs new words to recap the absent of light. There was no one, no where, with even a candle burning. Mountain habitancy go to bed early and by 8Pm there was an omnipresent silence and darkness. That's when we discovered our flashlight didn't work.

It was a cheap small travel flashlight and somehow it got turned on in the backpack which drained the battery. I guess you could call this the flip side of spontaneity.

What to do? I conception we could get by without a flashlight, until an hour later when Kirsten announced she had to pee. This improvisational concrete room could not by any means offer a toilet near by. In fact, I don't believe there was one within the building at all.

We never perceive in our cozy daily life the astonishing creativity of the mind and it's mystical capabilities until times of crisis. Kirsten bravely got out of bed and somehow found what I can only guess must have been a paint mixing can and did the necessary. It truly was a small miracle.

Hence forth, we carried a new legal trekking plastic water bottle known as the pee bottle. It was exact more indispensable then the flashlight or all manner of other useless accessory gear. Even today, I doubt if it is offered by Rei camping stores, but I can assure you all experienced Himalayan women travelers have created a movable potty.

To be continued in a few days...

Walking between Kathmandu & Tibet - Day One

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