We start our trek to Annapurna Base Camp in the Himalayan foothills near the town of Pokhara. A private car takes us to Nayapul, where we pile out, anxious to be on our way. Our cheerful porters Anik and Teka hoist up their packs and start off ahead. Nayapul seems to go on for a while. Rows of tiny shops crowd the dirt street: jumbles of modern clothing, alternating with shops with wooden display shelves of chips, bottled water, and soft drinks. The absence of pavement means we’re kept alert by oncoming traffic, often the bleating trucks from India known as Tatas. Dogs lie in dispirited heaps in front of stores or snuffle among the garbage. There’s some buying going on, but mostly people line the streets, chatting, smoking, or looking at cell phones. Unlike some other impoverished areas of the world, the Nepalese do not try to frenetically engage with the tourists, although some call out as we pass.
The town of Pokhara is the gateway to the mountains
The hot sun, humidity, and traffic combine to make us long for a more natural setting. After an hour we’ve walked through fields and crossed a river. On the other side of the modern bridge, our guide Madan takes care of our trekking paperwork while we take a long lunch break. A young woman is painting a second-story ledge there; finally she climbs off it by exiting through an open window. We’ve noticed a lot of paint ads. Nepalis are serious about painting their lodges, especially after the monsoon’s come through, and a new influx of tourists are expected. Blue corrugated roofs crown the buildings, mostly white with decorative elements. Unlike Bavaria, people here don’t have the leisure to plant many flowers, so we see them mostly sprouting up in unattended wasteland. Thickets of blue morning glory wave tendrils in the air; cleome, the spider flower, pops up here and there.
Dwellings give way to pasture land, clumps of grass with thickets. There’s no large-scale grazing. Animals are encountered singly, humped buffalo or a rangy goat. Amazingly, chickens roam without molestation by the mournful skinny mutts, we recommend you take a look on the guide of campingfunzone.com because you will see a lot of animals.
We spend the night in a lodge in Tikedhunga, balanced on a hill-top above a rushing waterfall. All night long the sound of rushing water fills our ears.
The next day our friend and trekking companion Ted sees a mushroom harvest in progress and buys mushrooms. We inveigh on our wonderful and accommodating guide, Madan, to have the lodge prepare them as part of our lunch. As we continue on, Madan shows us the ripening millet heads in nearby gardens. Fields of emerald rice are spread out below us as we climb.
Rice fields on the way to Annapurna
Lodges and tea houses seem to be the only businesses about; if it weren’t for the tourists, like us, the area would have almost no income. Harvests are not adequate for generating cash. Some lodge owners have put an effort into making their places attractive; plastic buckets filled with marigolds and dahlias add brightness and cheer. The Nepalis we pass greet us without great cheerfulness, but I also don’t see any looks of hostility. Our porter, Anik, brightens up as we get to know him, and reveals a fondness for singing and dancing. The porters, Anik and Teka, and our guide, Madan are from a Tamang village. The Tamang people are known for business acumen. Anik explains that he and the other tribesman have Mongolian origins, unlike the people of Nepal who have an Indian origin. Indian people are of Aryan descent, and lack the sharp cheekbones and slanted eyes of the Tamang, and numerous other tribal people.
One of our friendly porters, Anik. He likes to practice his English.
The trail for Annapurna continues in the Himalayan foothills. The morning after Tikedhunga we cross a river and are confronted by a challenging series of stone steps cut in the hillside. We’re on our way to the village at the top, Ulleri, 1960 meters. I climb ahead of our group, happy I invested extra time in training. Every time I start to curse the never-ending stairs, I notice another group of school children climbing next to me. They have to make the trip all week long. School starts at ten. The children are wearing uniforms, and also have to pause and rest, like we all do. Occasionally we all have to step to the side for mule trains or ponies descending. It’s a long way to the top. So long.
After a tea break and an impromptu fight between a Tibetan mastiff and a skulking stray, which stops when a couple of tourists lure the stray away from the teahouse with kind words, we descend into a river gorge. The high cliffs provide welcome shade. Ferns that could be maidenhair and staghorn cascade down the stone sides of the mountains. Lunch at Banthanti is enhanced by the cilantro from the nearby garden.
We spend the night in Tadapani, a big settlement, where once again Madan takes care of paperwork for us. Morning call is for 4am for a visit to Poon Hill and views. After finding out that we’ll have similar views further along the trek, I decide to sleep in.
Poon Hill, a popular destination
We hike down to another river, the Kimrong Khola. A noisy Chinese party interrupts my quiet meditation. They prance back and forth across the bridge, yelling exhortations to each other and taking photographs.
Soon after crossing the river, the real forest starts. I’m comfortable in the gloom and the shade, as the sweat of climbing has drenched my T-shirt. Though many other people are underway, during the day our groups spread apart. It’s easy and fun to imagine myself as a solitary explorer in the days of the East India Tea Company, mapping a route to Annapurna. The thick forest crowds right up to the edge of the path. The trees are mostly rhododendrons. Though they’ve already bloomed in spring, I still find their reddish twisted trunks and dark green leathery leaves attractive. Delicate plans with azure blue dainty blossoms dot the stone pathway. The dappled shade gives ways to vistas of steep rice terraces shrouded with mists, and then the forest comes again. I notice other flowers, orange flowered ginger and what could be a type of trailing snapdragon, or asarina. The rest of journey, several days more is mostly through this terrain, until we pass Dohvan and the tree-line. Then we’re close to Annapurna. Check in on the next post…
