2012_11_05 Trekking Day 5 - Back to Sanctuary Lodge

BACK TO

SANCTUARY LODGE, BIRETHANTI

1025 METERS, 3362 FEET

We are sitting in a German bakery on the side of a mountain near the Himalaya Lodge after walking for 7 and a half hours yesterday.  First internet connection for a while and it is pretty slow.  If you saw where we are you would understand.  Beautiful place.  Later today we reverse direction and head back downhill and return downhill to the Sanctuary Lodge.  We will have a better wi-fi connection soon and I will update more when I can.

Back at the Himalaya Lodge.  This is their vegetable garden where everything er eat is harvested.  All organic and oh so good!

 

There was a really nice line of haze across the mountains that burned off quickly

Packers hat at the top of the world

View of Annapurna South and Fish Tail Mountain from Himalaya Lodge

Close up of Fish Tail Mountain (Machapuchare).  The most easily identified mountain of the Annapurna Range because of its unique shape.  This mountain is not climbed - considered  holy.

A real close up of Annapurna South 

Breakfast at The Himalaya Lodge - Image courtesy Rich Rediker

Connie's pants hung out to dry.  Can't quite see it in this image but they were steaming.

One of our gift scarves out to dry with a Nepali rose in front.

Here's a nice look at the Himalaya Lodge.  Tables were set up for our breakfast right over by that prayer flag in the background.

Prayer flag and Annapurna South

Connie is in there!  Thanks, Mardy.

Woke up to see that all the clouds had moved to Bhutan as per Raju's prayers or strong lungs.  He said he he blow the clouds away and a combination of prayers and blowing worked!  Last night after we arrived the mountains before the Himalaya Lodge were completely cloud covered.  As promised, the views were spectacular!  After the usual tea and coffee and another tasty breakfast some of the group went on a tour of the old village of Ghrunduk.   

Luis and I walked down with Shyam (Assistant group leader) to try and connect on the internet. We found one of the 2 German Bakeries we had seen on the way up.  The fee for an hour of internet was 100 Rupees (about $1.25).  It took a real long time to make a connection but I finally was able to see some of my emails.  Also posted a real quick one to my blog letting everyone know we were doing fine.  

Some of the group went for w walk around old Ghrunduk while we were at the Bakery trying for WI-FI.  Here's a view of the old town from above.

Back to the Himalaya Lodge to pack up for the long trip D O W N the mountain back to the  Sanctuary Lodge.  We took a different route back down the mountain after we left the village of Ghrundruk.  This route was mostly downhill but had a million steps.  Maybe a million and a half but didn't seem as steep as the up route!  We passed through many farmers villages and observed harvesting of several crops - millet, oats, vegetables etc.  The life of a Nepalese farmer is certainly not easy.  They have to walk forever for everything they need and rarely if ever take a day off from hard work.  

Heading back down towards The Sanctuary Lodge.

This was where we had lunch yesterday on the way up.  That's me "pretending" to be tired with Shyam and Raju on a rock that had a pretty steep drop off behind it.

Luis and Peter at a road sign pointing to the village of Landruk which is on the other side of the river at the bottom of this steep hill we're climbing down.  We were way up high in Ghrunduk.

As we were heading down, we had to make way for quite a few horse and donkey trains that were carrying stuff up to Ghrunduk.  You could hear their bells quite a way away and needed to get up against the wall.  They like to walk out near the edge.  Their turf - we move for them.

Click on this image to see the stairs we walked on what seemed to be forever!  I am at the bottom and you can see farmers working in the fields and our people working their way down.

One more of the steps.
Connie leading the way.

Another click on this one and you can see the grain that this farm lady is sifting through a strainer.   They sift the grin over and over again to get it cleaner.  Pretty nice image if I do say so myself!

Passed this guy on the road - almost back to the Sanctuary Lodge!

After down, down and down some more we struggled into the Sanctuary Lodge after 5 hours and 35 minutes of strenuous walking.  Even though it took way less time than the climb up the mountain yesterday, it really took a toll on my right leg.  Each down step sent pain up my entire leg.  

I was thinking about my Brother-in-law Mike who has been walking at least 10,000 steps a day and monitoring it with a pedometer.  I really wish we had a pedometer with us to see exactly how many steps we took each day.  My GPS watch said that we walked 5.91 miles today and most of it was small steps, one after the other with almost zero flat land.  I bet we took a LOT of steps.  Yesterday we walked for 5.51 miles almost all straight up.  Again, a LOT of steps!  I am guessing 75 thousand.

When we got back to the Lodge our laundry was returned to us so we have a bunch of clean clothes for the rest of the trip.  Dinner tonight was a pasta dish with chicken along with vegetables and a wonderful apple crunch pie for dessert.  A welcome change from the usual Nepalese food we've been eating.  Variety…...

Tomorrow morning we will have a little more time to relax a bit.  We leave at 9:30 and only have to walk for an hour and a half (maybe two if we walk our usual slow pace) to a major road.  A Ker and Downey bus will be waiting to take us to Pokhara.  All the luggage we left behind at the trekking office will be on the bus and another 1 1/2 hours should have us back in civilization.  We're staying at a nice hotel in a pretty big city so we should have a good internet connection.  We will say good by to our friends from Ker and Downey at the hotel.  

Tour group leader Raju Kunwar

Assistant group leader Shyam Gurung

Porters: Bharat (our porter), Hari, Mongol, Sunil, Nuri, Jet and Ram.

I can't say enough about how hard the porters had to work.  Everyone we traveled with from Ker and Downey did everything they could do to make our trekking experience in Nepal pleasant.  They bent over backwards to fulfill our every need at every turn.  Well done - we will always remember our time spent with you!