Section 1 – Days 3 to 6
Four days of walking and the muscles are warming up, the legs seem to remember this walking thing and my mind seems to be calmer and calmer… I have had many moments of absolute bliss walking through the cardamom slopes and seeing the morning sun reflect on the luxuriant green cardamom leaves which are kept wet by simple irrigation systems… long bamboo sticks holding up a turning sprinkler. Bliss also hearing and seeing the light turquoise coloured icy river next to us as it rushes over and past massive granite boulders! Bliss when I hear the rain on my tent while I am tucked nicely in my sleeping bag. Bliss when I notice the valley getting deeper and narrower, the slopes steeper as if the impressive mountains are pushing in from both sides. Bliss whenever we are crossing suspension bridges – four so far and I have decided to count them all the way through!
Bamboo seems to be the main building material here: mats, fences, baskets, chairs, the roof and walls of houses and even bridges are build with it! The other two materials of course are wood and stone. We see many women and men sitting on piles of rocks hammering big rocks into small gravel to eventually mix it in with concrete… Wood provides the frame for the houses but rarely is a whole house built out of it. The wood frames are either filled with stone or much more often with bamboo which is then plastered and sealed with cow and water buffalo dung and then painted.
Walking through a village I watched women crush coriander seeds into powder with a big beam like a seesaw that had a small metal wrapped knob protruding on the one end of the beam pointing down and landing in a little hole filled with seeds and on the other side a young women kept pushing her foot down on it to repeatedly crush the seeds in the hollow that the metal knob kept crushing into. It looked like a job that would take a few hours and it was easy to see that the five or six women that were gathered there also used the opportunity to chat and hang out. Other food making and production we see as we walk through the villages and pass homes is turmeric laid out to dry on large bamboo mats, or corn being dried and de-husked or de-kerneled (I don’t think there is such a word but you know what I mean). The de-kerneled cobs are then used as firewood- nothing goes to waste!
Of course we have also seen the women make local beer out of millet – “Chang” and have met a few local elders clearly having consumed quite a bit of it! Speaking of local elders – we come across many, short statue and bend over from many many years of hard physical work on the fields – each line in the face seems to tell a story – their eyes often milky and squinted – the sun is strong out here. The women still with the golden nose and ear rings as is custom here. There hands and feet hardened and leathery. What stories they could tell? What wisdom they carry that must lie in the deep knowledge of the land, the river and its valley the plants and animals. The trees! We met one 88 year old women who lived right under a majestic Banyan tree – that tree had a souls of its own! What would she be able to share about her life next to and under this tree? What are her thoughts on the road that is busy being build through her valley towards Ghunsa? And then there is the weather! The hot mornings and the rain in the afternoon – and many a thunderstorm. Has she noticed changes in the weather patterns over the past years and decades?
Regarding weather and other natural phenomena – our first night out at Mitlung was breathtaking in more than one way! As we were heading into our tents after a delicious dinner the mountain slope across the river from us suddenly went up in flames! It was a very windy evening and whoever started that fire in the forest had probably hoped it would spread quickly and efficiently up the mountain side – and did it ever!!! It lit up our entire campsite and the crackling of the fire was loud enough to crackle us to sleep! It seemed too close for comfort because the valleys here are so steep and narrow, yet it was probably a good couple of hundred meters away from us and of course a massive river bed with a roaring river separated us from the flames. Still a scary sight to have as a view out the door of our tents. So the villagers start the fires to encourage the grass to grow – they say! I however have heard many other stories about how burning gives them easier access to harvesting the trees for firewood. An environmental and conservation disaster wide spread in Nepal’s remote mountain regions.
So that big wind I was talking about earlier- it didn’t only help the fire to race up the mountain, it also brought the biggest thunderstorm I have ever experienced in my entire life! In a tent! Right underneath the heart of it! I must have fallen asleep to the crackling sound of the fire only to wake up about an hour later from sudden thunder and lightening and the heaviest rain imaginable hammering down on our tent. I had to close my eye because the lightening was just too bright – and it struck incessantly- I began to count to see how long there was between each lightening strike (no point counting the time between lightening and thunder as it thundered non stop for at least 20 minutes) so counting the time between lightening strikes I couldn’t get further than three or four before the next one struck, I almost felt the little hairs on my arms raise with all that electricity in the air. Although it was shit scary to be right in it – or rather under it- I also felt very safe. Warm and safe. And another blissful moment was waking up the next morning to a blue sky and bright warm sunshine!
Everything always changes! Such an obvious wisdom here in the mountain so close to elements. Not just the weather. The paths. The gradient. The terrain. The body. The way we feel. The mind. The heart.
For those who have been wondering! My Piriformis Syndrome causes me little to no problems. I am beginning to get my mountain legs back – almost like arriving back home in my own body! A wonderful feeling…I think another week and I will really be in synch again.
In terms of our route- we are now at 2380 m. While the first day was a complete downhill walk the next two days were were gentle up and downs in which we barely gain 600 meters but followed the river which for three days in a row has been providing blissful bathing and washing opportunities whenever we arrived in camp – ice cold and super refreshing! Let’s see whether this routine will be possible again higher up without complete brain freeze….
Today, however, we left the cardamom slopes behind and instead crawled into the steep river gorge up towards Ghunsa. At times the river has carved its way deeply into the vertical mountain sides so much so that the only way a path can continue is by building hanging walkways supported either by hairy bamboo constructions combined with rocks and dirt or where the old ways proofed to precarious and short lasting, I suppose, they now build concrete slaps with steel reinforcement bars – much more sturdy yet less romantic looking. After our early 10:30am lunch today we went straight up first through thick forest and then on tight switchback trail on a grassy ridge. We climbed 800m today and I loved the wonderful feeling of getting into a sweaty heart pumping rhythm seeing the landscape change each time I ventured another look downwards and saw the river getting smaller and smaller further and further down in the gorge while at the same time a whole new view opened up on the highest snow covered peaks in the direction that we are heading. Kanchenjunga.
Marian and Julia, my sun-umbrella hat is amazing and draws much attention amongst the locals- chata topi they call it ….and laugh!
