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Sadly, the weather did not clear in the morning, and so there was no sunrise climb of Poon Hill. I had caught a glipmse of Annapurna South the evening before during a brief clearing, so I had some idea of what I was missing. I had really wanted to see Annapurna I since it was the first 8,000 meter peak that was summited, as well as Machhapuchhare because of its holy, unclimbed status and "fish tail" shape, but I had seen so many views of gorgeous peaks when we were in Manang and Muktinath that I was not too disappointed.
It was overcast, cool, and humid when we started out descent to Tikhedhungga, but not raining. Tikhedhungga's elevation is 1480 meters, so we had about 1300 meters elevation to lose during the hike. This meant a lot of down, a good chunk of it very steep and one stone steps. We would hike down a stone's arranged in a stair case for half an hour straight, have a brief section dirt trail, then back to the stone steps. It must have taken a very long time to lay all those stone steps. All told, I would estimate that 3 hours
of the 4 hour hike was on stone steps. The steps were quite polished in places, and the ever present donkey dung added to their slickness. I rolled my right ankle pretty well slipping on one of the steps, but fortunately the ankle was fine. But my quads and knees were having a rough time with the descent. We rested, my legs would quiver with exhaustion and my knee caps were getting quite irritated. I was glad it was only a four hour hike.
We were hiking through lush, green, rhododendron forests. The rhododendrons were tree sized, their crowns towering over head. I don't think I had ever seen rhododendron trees this high, even in the rhododentdron forests of the Appalachians. The trees we were hiking past had trunks a couple feet in diameter in some cases. The rhododendrons bloom in March and April, so we only saw a very few blooms. The trail must be spectacular when the rhododendrons are in full bloom.
With Nepal's steep terrain and heavy monsoon rains, landslides are a frequent, and sometimes deadly, problem. Today we passed a memorial to the approximately 30 people killed in a landslide several years back. Locals
are not the only ones to suffer from the landslides. Before crossing the Thorung La Pass, we went through a town where a large landslide had destroyed several lodges, killing both locals and trekkers alike. On my previous trip to Nepal, our progress north had been halted at Ramche due to a massive landslide.
We arrived at Tikhedhungga in the early afternoon, stumbled into the Laksmi Guest house, and who did we see in the dining room but Matt, Bernard, Gregorie, and Melanie! I had not seen Melanie and Gregorie since before Pisang when we had briefly run into them at a rest stop.
After dropping my pack in my room and changing into non-sweaty clothes, I returned to the dining area where the beer was just starting to flow. Gregorie and Melanie were kind enough to allow me to use my largely forgotten French when talking to them. Gregorie's English was also limited, so we conversed back and forth switching between English and French as necessary. I have to admit, though, that his English was better than my French. I was surprised and pleased, however, about how much I actually remembered given that it had been about
17 years since I had last studied French. It was amazing that I could still think in French and didn't have to translate what I heard to English in my head in order to understand it.
We sat all afternoon, drinking and chatting about a range of topics; world politics, our respective travel plans, renewable energy, and our home countries. Before long it was time for dinner. Then after dinner, Bernard and Matt started buying Kukure Rum and Coke for everyone to drink. The guides joined in as well. Since it was the last night on the trek, the guides, even Kapil, let down their hair a bit and indulged in some drinking and smoking. The lodge owner put on some Nepali music and before long, the guide's were up and dancing. Matt's guide, Hari, seemed especially fond of dance, rarely sitting down. Kapil and Bernard's guide Raj also joined in. After a bit of Nepali-only dancing, the guides started pulling the clients onto the floor. I was the first to get pulled into the dancing, and I gave it my best effort, which I'm sure looked pretty amusing. All the clients gave it a go, including some Swedes
and another American that happened to be in the dinning room at the same time. It was a fun evening, and I went to bed fairly toasted.
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