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Once again last night I slept four hours, woke up to go to the bathroom, and then was not able to get back to sleep due to irregular breathing. After lying awake for an hour and half, I took half a Diamox tablet. I think I fell asleep not too long afterwards, so maybe it helped. Kapil's knock on my door at 3:00 am came way too early, but I got up, packed, and was eating breakfast by 3:30. It was surprising warm outside, so I didn't wear my heaviest clothes starting out. Clouds had rolled in during the night, but enough moonlight made it through that we could hike without headlamps. The trail to High Camp was 45 minutes of steep climbing, and was exhausted by the time we reached High Camp, even with several rest breaks on the way. It also got much colder. At Phedi, I think it had been around 40 degrees, but by High Camp I think it was around 20 degrees.
We pushed on past High Camp continuing the more gradual but fairly continuous climb towards Thorong La Pass. As the sun came up, the snow capped peaks were illuminated in bright yellows and
oranges. We reached a tea house and I needed to use the bathroom. The toilet was the foulest thing I have ever seen. It was a small outhouse like building that should have had a pit toilet in it, but instead the floor was just a pile of semi dried human feces. Disgusting, but I held my nose and used it.
We reached Thorung La pass around 7:30. There were some signs and a huge pile of prayer flags to mark the spot. Heather was already there, having left Phedi 45 minutes after we did, but passing us somewhere along the way. I swear she must be half mountain goat. Her pack was, however, about half the size of my pack and I feel pretty good about making it to the pass in 3.5 hours. While I feel a little silly about packing such a large pack, it wasn't really that heavy, maybe 45 pounds, and it added to my sense of accomplishment in having carried it over the pass.
After snapping some pictures, Kapil and I started heading down. While the beginning of the ascent to the pass had been a steep climb, most of the descent
to Muktinath was a steep down hill. What a pounding my feet and knees took, even using trekking poles! The weather became drier as we descended the lee side of the pass. We took a couple of breaks to snack and change to cooler clothes on the way down. At one point, I spotted a pheasant running along the ground and managed to get a picture before it ran off. We passed Heather at a tea house at the base of the steep descent where she was having a snack of tea and Tibetan bread. As much as I wanted to stop, we pushed on to Muktinath, the thought of reaching the hotel and getting a good lunch spurring me on. By the time we reached Muktinath, I was beat. My feet ached incessantly, my leg muscles were wasted, and my knees were sore. We passed a monastery on the way into Muktinath, but I had no interest in visiting it at that time and Kapil said that we could come back later. We arrived at the Hotel Muktinath around 11:30, about 4 hours after leaving the pass. All told, I had put in nearly 8 hours of heavy duty
hiking and it wasn't even noon yet!
After changing out of my boots into more comfortable shoes, I went to the restaurant and tucked into a fabulous chicken biriyani. It was my first meat, other than canned tuna, since starting the trek. After lunch, I took an hour and a half long nap and then had a wonderfully hot shower. What with the food, nap, shower, and 4 ibuprofen, I was feeling pretty good again, so Kapil and I headed up towards the monastery. Along the way, I was diverted by some beautiful, hand-woven scarves. The woman who made them was sitting working with her loom. I just intended to look as anything I buy now I have to carry on my back, but she was very persuasive and after some haggling on price, I agreed to purchase the scarves after returning from the monastery.
The walk to the monastery took about 10 minutes. Along the way, we stopped to pick up some 2x4-like rough sawn lumber being given out by some nuns from the monastery. Carrying the lumber to the monastery was our contribution to the monastery for our visit. We ran into Heather who, having already
carried some lumber to the monastery and visited the temples inside, picked up 3 more pieces to carry up to the monastery as she had nothing better to do. I relieved of one of them as I was only carrying one and I didn't want to look like too much of a weenie.
The monastery was a sprawling complex of over thirty temples. This was another occasion where I was very glad to have Kapil along to explain what I was seeing. The first temple we visited contained statues of several Hindu dieties as well as a couple of natural gas seeps that fueled ever-burning flames. According to Kapil, geologists have speculated based on the seeps in the temple that there may be large natural gas deposits in the Muktinath area. We then visited the famous Muktinath temple. Muktinath was one of three god brothers, the others being Badrinath and Kedrinath. Temples to the other two brothers were originally in Nepal as well, but were part of the territories lost by the Nepalese in their conflict with the British and incorporated into India. Many Hindus come from India to visit the Muktinath temple. Behind the temple were 108 faucets
shaped as cow heads. The faithful will gather a little water from each of the faucets and use it to bathe. It is believed that water coming from springs in the monastery will eventually reach the Ganges, so bathing in the water at the Muktinath temple relieves the obligation of faithful Hindus to bathe in the main stem of the Ganges river. Given how polluted the Ganges is, I'd much rather bathe at Muktinath temple too. We next saw the outside of a temple dedicated to the tiger-man incarnation of Vishnu. We also saw a monument that contained one of the legs of Vishnu. Visitors to the monastery could get tikka powder for the forheads from the monument.
So many people visit the Muktinath temple that it has its own helicopter landing pad for the pilgrims that take the helicopter flight to Muktinath from Pokhara. We saw at least 4 helicopter flights per day land while we were in Muktinath. During the festival of Dasai, it is believed that all three brother gods reside in the Muktinath temple, and consequently the number of visitors to Muktinath soars. My little hotel will have upwards of 500 guests during the festival!
Where do they put them all? The Hotel Muktinath does not look large enough.
While most of the temples are dedicated to Hindu dieties, there are also Buddhist chorten and prayer flags everywhere, and Buddhist monks and nuns work in the monastery. According to Kapil, Muktinath and Swayammbunath (the monkey temple) are the two temples/monasteries where this kind of religious mixing occurs in a temple/monastery setting.
On our way out of the monastery, we ran into Katrine, Andre, Lee, Seo, Gautan, and Pasang. I was relieved to see that they had made it across the pass okay as Katrine, Li, and Seo had not been feeling well in Phedi before ascending to High Camp. Though all were well now, I was very disturbed to learn that at High Camp, Seo's headache had worsened and he had vomited a couple of times. These are the signs of High Altitude Cerebral Edema which can be fatal. Seo should have been given medication and descended to Phedi immediately. I don't know if he received any drugs, but even if he had, he should have been brought down to Phedi anyway as descent is the only sure fire treatment for altitude sickness.
He was very lucky that it did not progress further.
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