Sabbatical Week 21 – Buyu Goes Places

This week marks the starting of my Annapurna Circuit trek (click on the link to see the rough trail) for a total of Length 136.7 mi Elevation gain 60,456 ft with highest crossing at 5,416 m

Day 1

Booked my 15day trekking with the help with my hostel for $415 ($431 with the credit card fees) with another Hungarian guy who lives in Sweden.

The Singaporean guy I met who just finished the Everest base camp trek wanted to eat some local Tibetan goodie.

brunch at a Tibetan restaurant 660NRP with a Tibetan milk tea

Post lunch, I walked around the durbar square in town a bit.

As you can see the image, lots of construction work going on

It’s Sunday, lots of locals shopping as well

Lastly, I went to Garden of Dreams (400NRP) to escape the busy city life

Went back to my room ($13 private room with shared bath) to chill for a bit

For dinner, we went out for some local momos in town for 120NRP.

Day 2

Tried very hard to search for some trekking gears. Unfortunately, named brands are just not well stocked (consider the seasonality of the trekking and purchase power of the locals). Didn’t yield much result even after a few hours of searching. This is where I really start to appreciate living in a Western country where outdoor gears are readily available and are usually cheaper.

Got a draft beer to help me with shopping decisions

Ordered some chicken nuggets as well. ($9.48 with the beer)

After some back and forth, decided to just go with the cheap knockouts (11,500 NRP for a sleeping bag / down-jacket rental. Purchase of a pair of wool socks, a water bottle with filter, a pair of gloves and a trekking pole) Boots for 5,200 NRP with a bonus pair of socks.

For dinner, we decided to feast ourselves with some Indian before the trek. $23.30, a bit overpriced but nevertheless probably the best Indian food I’ve had.

Day 3

Day 1 of the 15-day trek, though today’s just bus day to the starting point of Basisahar.

There it all began! (on the right if my tour guide, left is my trekking partner)

lots of traffic and visibility isn’t very high due to pollutions

After about 9hours torture on the bus, we were finally getting close to the village where we’d stop for the night

Ngadi is the village where we were going to stay at. The trek from the bus stop was only about 30min however

The “teahouse” where we stayed for the night (300NRP for two)

lots of guests, though most of them were on their finishing day (a different trek called Manaslu circuit – which later I learned it’s a much better route which offered what Annapurna was like before the road construction and renowned popularity)

got a beer (500NRP) to finish the day

We ended up drinking 4 more glasses of the rice liquor, so I got a slight hangover for the climb next day

Day 4

Waking up early to appreciate of the view a bit more before day 1 trek

Warm weather Trekking! It’s a bit hazy due to lack of rain, though soon that wish became something I’d actively avoid.

Rest stop #1

it’s definitely more tiring on the first day with the hot weather / population / road traffic and having to carry more than 12kilo which I hadn’t done since my Army days

Significantly of the trek was on motorized road which is quite unpleasant with the dust and exhaust.

Finally we got some property trekking route

You can see I was just dripping in sweet at this point

I ordered a curry rice (700NRP) which tasted quite bland. Service was slow which eventually we decided in the following days not to stop for lunch anymore

As soon as we arrived at our accommodation, it turned dark and stormy rather quickly.

Dinner was Dal Bhat with chicken, quite good.

Storm outside of the windows. Needless to day it turned quickly from being so hot to cold. (My trekking mate put on his jumper already)

Day 5

Woke up right after sunrise.

Ordered Tibetan bread with potato curry and two eggs for breakfast (typical Nepali, however I get heart burns easily with that curry paste when heavy exercise right after), quite yummy.

The next 2.5hours were all on the original trekking trail which is amazing along the cliffs, the view was stunning with water, canyons and mountains.

The weather was just fabulous at this time.

First sight of the snowcapped the mountain

Trekking information for the lower part of the circuit. It is also at this time the weather started turning into darkness

Tal village

Some construction project for the dem (flood prevention). The part gets flooded every year and in fact the trekking trail is completely washed away

Temporary footbridge – this area is prone to flooding during rainy season, the original trekking path was all washed away

The village has some nice views of the waterfalls

Tea break. The bamboo tables are adorable

Rain started now.

Last stretch before reaching to our guesthouse

It was only 1pm but felt like 7pm.

We narrowly dodged the storm, thus obligated to try some local rum.

Lunch 950NRP – It’s actually very good, probably one of the best ones I’ve had throughout the trip

Dinner was the same though I wasn’t too hungry at this point, called it a night early due to the gloomy weather.

Day 6

Put on my wet/cold weather gears for the stormy day. It was unfortunately the worst day of the trekking journey. I was severely underprepared believing it’s the dry season. My guide lent me his bag cover and rain jacket and helped me with carrying some extra weight as well.

We had a bit rain break where it’s warm enough for us to take off our wet weather gears

The darkness is still looming over the horizon

First sight of the majestic mountains ahead

Our guide downgraded himself to use a backup cover for porters (I had his proper gears)

Took our first proper tea break at this local lovely teahouse

Mid way for a proper much needed tea break.

We got back on the trekking trail again instead of the road. The rain just made it so much less enjoyable

some flowers at this attitude, we wouldn’t see them again until the last a few days.

We were at around 3,000 meters at this point.

Finally we arrived at our tea house. Everything from top to bottom was completely wet. Dried to dry my clothes outside, ended up getting more wet.

My mate got a yak cheese fried rice. Quite good!

After a short break, I went downstairs to be at the tea stove.

Everyone’s drying something near the traditional tea house oven

For dinner I had pork momos

The ambitious me decided to take in another order.

Though delicious but I wasn’t able to finish. 600NRP

We had a few rice wine to help with sleep and called an early night.

Day 7

We decided to start early to avoid the storm around mid-day. Trekking actually became easier than previous days. It’s just amazing to see how our body’s able to adapt in short period of time.

I got an apple pancake with tea

Crystal clear sky at this hour!

We followed the road a bit before we got back on trekking trail

The views just started getting better and better. It’s a nice reward from the stormy/rainy day suffering

There we passed by a village where some Apple farms are located

Of course, I got to treat myself with some delicious local cider and an Apple donut

250NRP for the cider and 150 for the donut

The views are just amazing

a local bus passing by. Since it rained, the road was no longer very dusty which made trekking on motorway somewhat bearable

yeah, after the bad weather I was definitely much happier

This part quite resembles the Pacific Northwest that I’ve lived in almost 10 years.

The village appeared just as we needed a tea break

Yes, we were above 3000m now, officially high elevation areas

Just another hour before we reached to our tea house stay for the day

Local cows, there aren’t much to graze on

Almost at the village

Our stay was right in between the lower and upper part of the village where we had a direct view of the Annapurna mountains.

From our accommodation, 300NRP for a private room

We started early realizing the snow storm might be forming later in the day. We aimed to reach our accommodation by mid day instead of having to eat lunch somewhere and risking trekking through storms

You can see the storm clouds are forming now

For lunch I ordered a fried noodles.

After doing laundry and lunch, we had the quite a bit a few time on my hand. Due to the the snow stormed happened on the previous day (where we had the rain storm), we were the only guests and the internet was down as well. We got quite bored. I managed to watch videos I previous downloaded to be watched on the plane.

We got a bit worried at this point due to lack of information and witnessing tons of trekkers coming back from the other side. Some helicopters flu around presumably for some search and rescue missions. Judging by the disaster in 2014 and storm happened in the previous year where both landed in the same areas, we were quite worried.

Fire! we were freezing at this point so some warmth was needed

by late afternoon, the visibility was reduced to the minimal

At sunset time, the storm seemed to be eased a bit

We walked to the local view point / stupa to keep ourselves busy

Dinner was just simple buff momos

it’s filling nevertheless, it’s freshly made by hand

Expenses

Week 21	Currency:	NRP	130
Day	Food&Drink	Lodging	Transportation	Other (tickets/tours etc)
1	$8.38	$13.00	$0.00	$5.03
2	$39.50	$13.00	$0.00	$0.00
3	$15.38	$1.15	$0.00	$40.26
4	$25.38	$3.85	$0.00	$40.26
5	$29.23	$6.15	$0.00	$40.26
6	$25.46	$1.92	$0.00	$40.26
7	$22.77	$2.31	$0.00	$40.26
	$166.12	$41.38	$0.00	$206.31
	Total		Grand Total:	$413.81

Note that the cost of lodging is subsidized by the expensive food – this is the typical tea house trekking expectation

1 comment

Marty P says:

May 7, 2023 at 4:59 am

That’s all fascinating and quite an impressive adventure, especially when the skies were clear! I can’t believe how much great food and drink there is along the trek and also how many climates seem to be present. I’m glad there was no storm disaster like in 2014.