Zero
"I'm not going to pay someone ten dollars per day to walk in front of me", said my neighbour Sandrine. She lives in a mountainous region in France, and is to the fact au fait with trekking and orienteering. I don't know how far she managed to get as the recently-introduced Trekking Registration Certificate (TRC) requirement means that independent guide-free trekking is supposedly dead, which is a problem if you like your space and alone-time. Jeff and Liz, for instance, ended up quitting their Annapurna Circuit trek because of it. I, on the other hand, have done one multi-day trek since 1990 and since solo travellers are liable to violent robbery on a couple of stretches and I'm lazy enough to let someone port my pack, a guide-cum-porter was not unwelcome.
Back before getting to Nepal, indeed back before leaving Australia, I had the idea that I would do the Annapurna Circuit. Once I actually arrived in Nepal, it didn't seem like such a great idea for a few reasons. Firstly, inertia and laziness kicked in -- I'd been on the grind of tours for over two months, and the last thing I felt like was another three weeks of movement. Secondly, I'd been in Tibet, and had minor altitude related problems there -- actually needing to walk and risk altitude-related problems while walking over 5000 metre passes didn't seem fun. Thirdly, the landscape of the middle of the Annapurna Circuit seemed to be high and barren and similar to Tibet -- I'd had enough treeless desert for a while. Fourthly, I wasn't sure of my general fitness -- I've had one multi-day trek (the three days in Tiger Leaping Gorge) since 1990. Fifthly, I wasn't sure whether three weeks of trekking would pall -- after a week, for instance.
While Alain, Florian, and Steve had bookings for the Annapurna Circuit trek and joined up with other groups as our tour finished, therefore, I hung around Kathmandu doing very little, then travelled over to Pokhara and did... more, but still very little. And, after two or three weeks of not doing, and being at last ready to do at least some trekking, I found myself a tour agency and chose the Annapurna Sanctuary trek, which is commonly known as "the ABC trek" since it goes to the Annapurna Base Camp. It's a nice easy trek, normally taking ten to twelve days including Ghorepani (Poon Hill), so my guide Shyam and I did it in six and a bit days. Though we did walk quickly, this is really not as impressive as it may sound since Shyam was carrying about ten kilos more than I was, and I'd retained my altitude conditioning from Tibet so we didn't need minor ascents in order to acclimatise.
Day 1: Phedi to Landruk
If you had to, you could guess what "Phedi" means from its sound and its location. Just like the root in "pedal" and "impede" it means "foot". More properly it's "Dhampus Phedi" since it's the bottom of Dhampus village, though Dhampus proper takes over an hour to reach. The bus from Pokhara dropped Shyam and I at Phedi, which is basically just a small row of roadside eateries across the road from what I thought at the the time were rather a lot of stairs.
We climbed stairs and we climbed slope and we climbed stairs again. It's farming country, it was harvest time, and the trail wound upward through fields of crops and stubble. At the main village area of Dhampus, lodge upon lodge crowds the way. The farms give way to forest. The trail runs down to water and then back up. The forest gives way to farms and then to forest again as the trail runs down to water. At about 4 that afternoon, we arrived at Landruk. It's yet another farming village (perhaps easier to appreciate from a distance so you can see just how many houses there are, as the buildings on the trail are mainly lodges), and sits upslope on the eastern side of the Modi Khola, the river Modi. Over the river but higher up sits the village of Ghandruk.
I suppose I should write a little bit about the carrying situation, and this is as bad a place as any. My backpack was maybe 9 kilos, and Shyam's pack 5 or 6; I was carrying 4 kilos or so in my daypack and could have carried my pack. Having a professional carry it meant that we could travel at a quicker pace (which was set by Shyam). Also...
*drumroll*
...I'm lazy -- please trust me on this, if only so I never need to type it again! It was, believe it or not, a light load for a porter; we passed a lot of them on the trail. Trains of mules or ponies are used on the main routes, but for many lodges, porters are the way to get food and other necessities there. Those porters bear a ridiculous weight using their neck muscles: a strap goes around their forehead and is attached to a basket, container, or other object. We passed one lad who was toting a metal water cylinder which was not only higher than him, but a metre and a half in diameter. Worst off weightwise, I think, were the porters for the package tours. Customarily they'd carry two full backpacks or more (I'd really winnowed out my excess, leaving much in Pokhara). Others would carry tents and twenty litre water canisters. Others would carry baskets piled high with supplies. I really don't envy the porters their job.
Day 2: Landruk to Bamboo
From Landruk the track led down to New Bridge, with its shiny new metal bridge, then up to Jhinu. We could have headed down to the hot springs there, but instead continued further up and down to where we could cross the river for Chhomrong, the last major village of the area; there's a school there, and homes, farmland too, and (as you would expect) lodges and shops. So: lunch at Chhomrong, down the hill, up the hill, Sinuwa.
Sinuwa is an odd village. The section of Sinuwa nearest to Chhomrong, for all that it's across a river and on a different hill, is really part of Chhomrong, being still permanent settlement with farmed terraces carved down the hillside. Far Sinuwa is a cluster of lodges only open during the trekking season, as all lodges from this point forward are. Separating the two is an hour or so of uninhabited unfarmed forest.
A sign warned of the perils of landslides. As if to illustrate, not five minutes afterwards there was a clatter uphill and a few rocks bounced down. This was not, fortunately, the result of a landslide, but just the dislodgements of sheep forcing a path through the bushes. Further along, landslips were evident. On a shady corner of the path there had been a shrine dedicated to the god of the area, but only the waist-high petal-covered fragment of a larger structure remained; the rest had spilled down the slope in a litter of stones. A bell was attached to what was left and Shyam rang it thrice before we carried on.
"German Bakery", said the sign outside our lodge at Bamboo, and a glass case displayed pastries and pies. We'd arrived just on dusk after a long day, and it was an odd remnant of civilisation in so rustic a setting. The water was solar-heated but the evening air wasn't, so I shivered my way through a shower in the dim confines of the concrete shower room. The dining room had a kerosene lamp for light and a kerosene burner under the table to warm it; the bedroom had a thin quick-burning white candle for light and warmth.
Day 3: Bamboo to Machhapuchhre Base Camp (MBC)
Even though November is the dry season, the path on the lower reaches between Sinuwa and Dovan was soft, with frequent creeklets cutting it. In parts, the creeklet was the path. You could see why trekking Nepal during the monsoon season would be unpleasant, since during those wet months trekkers also have leeches to contend with.
Bamboo was a fit name for the area: there was a lot of it around there. Oddly, I saw far more bamboo on the ABC trek than I did in China. You have certain expectations, and one of mine was that I'd at least visit some vast whispering forests of centuries-old bamboo in China. Instead I only saw one small stand in the wild (Tiger Leaping Gorge), and the only largish quantities seen were planted in the Panda Park in Chengdu. There's a variety of bamboo up on Nepali slopes, including one or two which are very grasslike and look like they could do with a mow [bamboo is, of course, a grass, but you don't always think of it as such], and one which, because of the angle of its leaves, gives the impression that someone has stuck bits of praying mantises to thin dowel. Nepal is so green compared with Tibet - just a few hundred metres in height makes so much difference, though the rain patterns in the Annapurna region probably help a lot too.
Machhapuchhre translates as "Fishtail", the reason being that the sides of its face curve inward with reasonable symmetry so that lower down it's narrower than its flattish top. and the best place to see the symmetry on the ABC trek is between Deorali and MBC, where the mountain can be viewed front-on. Before and after there, the view of its face is oblique and its the appearance of the "fishtail" is skewed and less obvious. Owing to the height the area is fairly barren, with low brown grass. The branches of the last of the trees were leafless and dripping with moss. It's the worst stretch for landslides: a treeless valley bounded by cliffs, with chunks of rock embedded in the path and bouldered channels to clamber over. It's safe in November, said Shyam, but earlier in the year it's very dangerous, and you always need to keep an ear out for the groan of an avalanche and move quickly.
Machhapuchhre is a sacred mountain which has never been summitted and where climbing is banned so "Machhapuchhre Base Camp" is a bit of a misnomer, but we stopped at a lodge there for lunch anyway. In its dining room were two Canadians who were dining before they headed down-mountain in the hope of reaching Dovan. The daughter of one had died a couple of years back. The other, a friend and colleague, had been vacationing in Nepal at the time she died, and had built a cairn up at ABC in her memory. They'd gone up that morning to add new prayer flags to it.
Shyam and I had been intending to head up to ABC after lunch (it's only an hour or two away), but while we were eating the weather turned nasty. Cloud rolled up the valley, and before long there was wind, rain, horizontal sleet, and flurries of snowflakes. The snow didn't stick this far down but it was still freezing, so cold that our breath fogged the dining-room's air. By the time the weather cleared it was later afternoon, so we overnighted there.
Day 4: MBC to ABC to MBC to Sinuwa
We started day four in the pre-dawn light with a walk up to ABC. It was the first time on the trek that the altitude had hit me. With the packs left behind at MBC, and I still with my daypack, Shyam now walked faster than I did, and I was puffed. Above MBC the terrain continued to be barren, with frost-brittled grass, rocks and boulders, and what was left of the day-before's snow. The stream was iced-over.
As you arrive at ABC, Annapurna South is on your left, and on your right is a ridge. The ridge overlooks a huge dark glacier-scoured strip perhaps a hundred metres or more wide and half that in depth. The Canadian's daughter hadn't died in Nepal, but hundreds of others have while attempting to summit its peaks. Many have died on Annapurna, and there are lots of cairns on the ridge. There's a more permanent monument there for Anatoli Boukreev, a Russian climber who died a nearly a decade ago trying to climb Annapurna I. The monument's plaque includes a lovely quote as his epitaph: "Mountains are not Stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve, they are the cathedrals where I practice my religion".
But the Annapurna Sanctuary does resemble a stadium, arena, or amphitheatre, with its the panorama of snowcapped mountain against sky almost all around, only broken by the brown dirt of one hill, perhaps 20 of 360 degrees. We walked up along the ridge to where we could see the frozen glacial lake and a small waterfall of snow-melt, and then down across a depression where enough snow had settled that it made a satisfying crunch underfoot as we crossed.
After breakfast, we returned to MBC, where a centimetre of ice on top of the bathroom's water bucket made cleanliness an unnecessary luxury. We descended quickly as coming down from altitude gives a rush since your blood gets saturated with oxygen. Tea at Deorali, where a Victorian with fears for the integrity of her legs had remained behind while her group ascended. Late lunch at Dovan, where the threat of bad weather never eventuated. Through Bamboo in the late afternoon, where the lodge proprietress said "Stay".
I waved a hand at the sky and smiled "The day is still young", though to be honest, the day with its minor wrinkles concealed by fading light was not as young as I blithely suggested. We finally arrived at Sinuwa in the gloom of evening. It was perhaps far too long a day, but at Sinuwa there was electricity and really hot water.
Day 5: Sinuwa to Deorali (near Ghorepani)
It was another long day and the oxygen had worn off. From Far Sinuwa to Near Sinuwa and down to the bridge where Chhomrong was far more intimidating a climb up than it had been on our outward journey, we went. From Chhomrong our route was different to the way we'd come the first time. Instead of returning down to the river, we followed the hill round. An eagle hunted the skies. Something small, brown and sinuous with a white ruff around its face scampered out, looked up, and disappeared over the side of the trail. It was a thief of chickens and eggs, said Shyam, but not a snake killer, so it wasn't a mongoose. Maoist grafitti appeared on the occasional building.
The farms were scattered, the groups of tourists passing the other way were frequent. We left the farmland below us as the track climbed through forest. Shyam made a warning cry as we passed through, and a troupe of monkeys retreated watchfully. We skimmed through Tadapani at the top of the ridge - it's customary for those coming from Ghorepani to stop there, as there's quite a lot of uphills between the two - but we continued down to the bridge and then back up again. Halfway up the hill, another guide-cum-porter strode down the hill past us, his Sydneysider hobbling twenty paces behind. "I'm not a Nepali. I'm not a Nepali", she moaned.
Up to the hilltop with its pair of lodges, we travelled, and down to the base of the ravine where more lodges huddled, we trudged, and upstream past a small and rudimentary hydroelectric station and up stairs and up slopes, we travailed, and so we came at last to Deorali.
Day 6: Deorali to Ghorepani to Hille
"Deorali" means "pass", and there are (unsurprisingly) more than one of them in Nepal. In other words, this one was not the same village as the Deorali near MBC. One of the standard activities of the ABC trek is to climb Poon Hill before dawn so that you can watch the sun rise over lots of mountains, but it would have been near-impossible to reach Ghorepani on day 5, so we spent dawn on the lesser-known Gurung Hill Tower instead. Gurung Hill is above the lodges at Deorali, but is only 15 minutes' climb, rather than the hour that the top of Poon Hill takes in the dark from Ghorepani. The view is a touch different but you still see peaks in the Dhaulagiri range, Annapurnas South and I-IV, Machhapuchhre, Himalchuli, etc. It has an excellent vista on the eastern hemisphere; the view westward is blocked by a ridge.
After breakfast we left Deorali, climbing through rhododendron forests (supposedly lovely in March but flowerless now) and along the bamboo-lined ridge to a point above Ghorepani. Cloud covered the heights while we were there, so instead of climbing Poon Hill we just descended and headed through Ghorepani and along the trail to Nangathanti and Banthanti. From Banthanti, we had miles of the most painful stairs I've ever experienced to clamber down. Shyam had no trouble as he strode down them. I hobbled forty paces behind him, whimpering "I'm not a Nepali. I'm not a Nepali".
An hour from the bridge at the bottom of the hill (fifteen minutes under normal non-sheep-and-goat-herding-obstructed travel) we were in the aptly named village of Hille. For a village so close to towns, I was surprised that there was no electricity, but was told that a landslide earlier in the year had killed several people and wiped out buildings including the hydroelectric plant for the area. The government was unlikely to repair it while the Maoists had control over the area.
Day 7: Hille to Nayapol
An night's rest did wonders for my legs - I was back up to speed for the final hour and a half. At Nayapol we caught the bus for the two hour ride back to Pokhara. Miraculously it was an express service so an hour later we were back in Pokhara, and by midday we were at Camping Chowk in central Lakeside.
Verdict: Highly recommended guide, route, and tour company. Highly non-recommended schedule.
