Day 15 - Chitre (2316m) to Ghorepani (2850m) - 4km

Toby Diary

At the usual time, or thereabouts – as usual we are stiff a little such that we eventually depart at 0830.  It only takes us one hour to get up to Ghorepani through forests of moss covered trees but basically following the power lines up the hill.  One in the centre of Ghorepani (not a big place – perched on the saddle of the hill between Poon Hill and the path up to Tatopani). We settle into the Dhaulagiri view hotel (very original name!) and sit in the sun reading and writing postcards and generally watching the world go by – the latter does not happen very quickly of course.  We have an unnecessarily large lunch and continue to veg in the sun, occasionally looking at the trinket salesmen’s wares.  Two of them claim to be Tibetan but living in Mustang.  They migrate down to this end for the tourist season particularly when the winter hits up country.  Jules buys a couple of ‘Free Tibet’ belts a prayer band and a wooden stick (!) to stir it with along with some mini cymbal bells.  The traders are also keen to trade their stuff for western clothes but the rest of us would rather have our smelly socks than the stuff on offer.  If we had cash to buy stuff things may have been different.

At 3.30 we set off up Poon Hill to catch the views.  Inevitably it is further than it first appears but we are at the top quickly and ready to admire the panorama stretching from Machapuchare and the mountains to the coast round through Annapurna range, Niligiri and the monstrous Dhaulagiri.  I want to catch it at sunset but the hazy layer of high altitude cloud is slightly spoiling the effect.  Mark A and I stick out the cold while the others return to the warm of the lodge to order dinner.  Eventually the sun cuts below the cloud to give an orangery pink glow on the mountain range and the low hills next to Dhaulagiri just edge above the hazy to reveal their outlines.  To cap it off, a full moon rises from directly behind Machapuchare.  I try my best to get some good shots but I am bit jealous of the other’s equipment as sported by the Swiss and other fellow on-lookers.  A Polaroid filter would have been good.  Back down in double quick time to the warm fire in the lodge (made from an old oil drum stove in the middle of the room on an ochre floor) and the usual nosh and beers before bed and being woken by Thorpey’s snoring, and cold visits to the loo!

Mark Diary

A late start for a short day.  It would take an hour to ascend to the next village, Ghorepani, and there we would stop.  The ascent was as before, unrelenting and up. And I felt tired, dehydration possibly.  Through woods, following the winding stone stepped paths with little respite and after an hour, and a final steep ascent that disturbed the body's movement and rhythm, we reached village.  Five minutes in and we reached our lodge, typical of all the lodges we have stayed in but with a fantastic view of the mountains as before, but which now stood clear of the surrounding hills.  The lodge was on the main street with local mountain trader stalls selling trinkets of stone, metal and cloth.  We sat in the sun on the stone terrace updating diaries and drinking tea.  To our front, on the other side of the street, more lodges while to the side lay the mountains.

The day was spent doing nothing much but at 3pm we headed off up Poon Hill to the south west of the town to take in the classic sites it offered.  An hour’s climb gave us some fantastic views of some of the world’s highest mountains.  On reaching the top there was a small wooden stand to lean on to take in the views.  Leaning on the balustrade to our front we could see Annapurna range some 18 miles away and yet despite this they seemed nearby and close.  The valley in front swept to the right and round; the valley up which we had come and some distance to the river below.  Behind this in the mist the green hills of the Himalayas, lost to the horizon in haze and cut through by the rays of the sun now sinking slowly behind.  As the sun sank, the horizon began to colour, a thin strip of pink and purple. To the left the immense peak of Dhaulagiri over 50 miles away but to our front the Annapurna range which slowly turned pink with the sky.  As the sun set, so they stood out from the sky behind them and the hills in the foreground, the light seeming to give them their own luminescence.  And just as this was fading, with the sky now red behind us and the rays cutting through the horizon to the mountains, a cold white full moon appeared rising from behind Machapuchara.  Its movement was perceptible to us as we watched it rise through a milky haze.  The mountains lost their rosy hue and radiated a cold white light.  

We descend in the fading light to the warmth of the lodge and a dinner of rice and noodle soup around the central coal burner of the main lounge.