Annapurna Circuit Trek - Part VII

[Read the rest of the annapurna story here.]
Day 14. Tatopani to Gorepani and Poon Hill

This has got to be one of the most beautiful and tiring days of the trek. Mostly because we have been walking for two weeks now and basically we could use some rest. And some air-con. And some wifi connection. But who cares when everything is so beautiful around us!

Today we finally left the road and travelled through villages and up various fields all the way up to Gorepani and Poon Hill. We started the day early, us and the two groups of tourists left. They were carrying almost nothing, as the rest of the things were carried by their porters. Please excuse the "holier-than-thou" attitude, I guess we were all pissed by the fact that our only pair of pants had so much dust in them they could walk by themselves, whereas you could see the porter-tourists in clean clothes!


We started with a light uphill through terraced fields.




And despite the heat and the long climb, we were still able to enjoy the fantastic views. That white fang in the background is Dhualaghiri, at only 8,167 m.






Marian of course is not praying to the mountain or the ipHOne, but taking the GPS coordinates.


The valley is beautiful and the sights and sounds we see and hear distract our attention from the fact that this is one serious uphill we have to face.




We reach Gorepani around 4pm in the afternoon, totally and utterly spent. With a last push the boys go to change money whereas I go up around fifty more steps to the hotel with the best view, as recommended by lonely planet. And best they are, with fantastic sunsets over the Annapurnas.





The boys settle down to some chess while we wait for a mostly carbohydrate dinner.



We go to sleep early because in the morning we have to wake up at 4am to go see the sunrise up at Poon Hill. Tonight, Marian and I are lucky because the stove pipe runs through our room and is saving us from the cccccold outside. And it was ccccold, as you can see I am wearing my heavy duty jacket.




Day 15. Gorepani and Poon Hill to Pokhara
Today was an even harder day than yesterday. We wake early to go see the sunrise at Poon Hill. Because we are not carrying our back-packs, we literally fly the 300m to Poon Hill (3210m). We are the first to reach the hill and also most probably the first to freeze our asses off because it still takes a while until the sun rises.

The panorama with Dhaulaghiri and the Annapurnas warms our hearts.










One last look at the mountains and we head on down.




And down we go, over a series of infinite rock steps, of different height and width. I remember three things about the day.

First, this young boy saw that I wanted to take his picture and turned his sister around and gave us a fantastic smile!

Second, we ate passion fruit straight from the tree. And third, a bunch of schoolkids from Singapore recognized my marathon t-shirt and had a chat with us.

Other than that, the stairs went on and on and on and on.


Finally, we reached the village before Nayapul around 3pm +. That was when I realized that one of the people in Gorepani had told us that the last bus was at 4pm. And here began our last bid for the bus, because we really really wanted to be in Pokhara by the end of the day. We reached Nayapul around 4:10pm, but the buses were still there. However, the only places available were ON the bus, so we took a cab instead, at roughly double the price of the bus ticket, after ample and furious negotiations.

In Pokhara the next day we walked around the lake, the guys had a shave, we had coffee and fresh pastries, and did a lot of souvenir and clothes shopping.







But most importantly we had beef steak and beer, by far the best steak I ever had in my life, most probably because it was so well deserved.