Ganesh knocks on the door at some horrible hour. It’s time to get up for the sunrise. It was well under freezing last night. It’s ice everywhere. The sky is clear though and the hidden landscape from cloudy yesterday is now revealed. We’re surrounded by snow covered peaks and ridges, including Annapurna. We walk up to a bit of a shrine to killed climbers and hikers, which sits on the edge of a glacier. The glacier is hardly recognizable because it just looks like overturned gravel and dirt. If you look hard you can see ice. The sun peaks over the ridge and lights up the tops of the peaks. The colour at this time is stunning. There are many of us now wandering around, soaking up the views and taking photos. Maria who is from Brisbane and works for Griffith university is here. Dianne the school teacher from Canada is here too. And many others we have met on the way.
We breakfast and I’m freezing. Packing is done and we’re on our way.
A helicopter has arrived with wealthy clients to take skiing. It delivers three at a time up the slopes and after the nine are in position, it waits at the bottom for them, to take them back up. Today the weather is great for them. Yesterday the helicopter couldn’t fly because of the weather so they had to contend with walking up the slopes.
We get to MBC and Ganesh says he’s left his wallet behind. He has to dash back. Despite telling me to wait for him I pick up the packs and head down the track. I get to the point where the track meets the river and wait. Maria comes by and we sit, chat and take photos. Ganesh arrives and we’re on our way again. Much of the scenery is very familiar because we came this way yesterday. But this time we will walk through Dherali where we stayed previously and aim for Sivas, where we stayed the night before that. The going is easier because it’s mainly downhill. But the extra distance tired us out.
Increadibly we bump into Jayde on the track. She is here with her friend Tim. I thought she was going to be hiking the Annapurna circuit, not base camp. So I was very pleasantly surprised to see her.
We get to Sinuw around 5pm. It’s raining slightly.
The lodges are only here for the Trekkers. Once the trekking season is over, so is life in these trekking villages. Interestingly they are run and managed by men. Their purely here for business.
angusmccoll 