Annapurna XI, snow in Manang! скачать в хорошем качестве

Annapurna XI, snow in Manang!

Sunday, 27 April 2025 Last night after dinner, Ken and I went to one of the other dining rooms in the Tilicho Hotel and got chatting to two porters, Navin and Leela. They aren't permitted to eat dinner until 9 pm. "The clients have to get served first", they said. The official rule is that they should carry no more than 25 kg up to 4,000m, and no more than 20 kg above 4,000m. The rule isn't enforced, however, so they're carrying 30~35 kg. They said the clients have them carry bottles of wine, whisky, all sorts of consumables that you can buy along the way, plus, no doubt, a wardrobe of clothes. This morning, our altitude acclimation has risen to 8,550'. What is surprising, however, is that our SpO2 has jumped to 93~94%. After breakfast, we bumped into Navin, who told us that today they were going to go to Milarepa Cave to facilitate their acclimatization. This sounded like a good plan, so Patsy and I decided we would do this too. Ken wanted to rest some more, so he stayed at the hotel. We set off at 9 am, first heading back to Bhraga to cross the Marsyangdi River, then following a Jeep road up to a Stupa and a closed tea house. From the Stupa, we continued up a trail to the Milarepa Gompa. The Gompa appeared to be deserted, but it was in very good condition. We wandered around, saw a bighorn sheep, then debated whether to climb the 400~500' to the cave that's located high on the cliff face. Just as we were debating, the wind really picked up, the temperature dropped, and it started snowing lightly. Milarepa was a Tibetan monk who lived in the 11th century. He was believed to possess black magic powers and lived on stinging nettles that turned his body green. We decided not to climb the exposed stairs to the cave high above us. Instead, we started down. It wasn't long before we met Navin and his two clients, a Czech girl and her Slovakian boyfriend, a match perhaps made in heaven but certainly not by politics. Back at the teahouse, we met an Aussie hiking up with his full backpack. At the bottom, we met a young couple from French Polynesia, Joy & Kim. We didn't think they knew what they were getting into, but we warned them. We made it back to the hotel just before it started to snow in earnest. It was a veritable thunderstorm. We figured we'd better buy some microspikes, so we went back to one of the stores we'd checked out yesterday. There was no price on the microspikes, but the assistant tried to charge us 2,200 NPR. "Yesterday we were told they cost 1,700", I complained. He disappeared, and 5 minutes later, another guy came and said they were 1,500. We bought 3 pairs. Back at the hotel again, we got chatting to Sydney from B.C., Canada. She's a nurse, traveling with "Intrepid Adventures". She said almost everyone in their group, including her, was taking Diamox. Her SpO2 is 96%, she said. That's the benefit of Diamox, artificial acclimatization. However, we're not taking it, preferring natural acclimatization instead. After we all took showers, I had yak bolognese for dinner. It was very good, although I could probably have eaten 50% more. Patsy had a veggie burger, and Ken had veggie lasagne. Monday, 28 April 2025 It was overcast when we awoke this morning. Our acclimation has risen to 9,200' and my SpO2 is 93%. We went for a very leisurely breakfast, staying until everyone else had left. There was the "Intrepid Adventures" group and a large group of Brits. Lopsang, the owner and manager, told us he has three categories of rooms priced at 800, 2,000, and 4,000 rupees. We got the highest category of room. The prices increase 50% in October, the high season, he told us, when they also see a lot of mountain biking groups. It's cold today, and at 10 am the hotel is almost empty of guests. We're enjoying the peace and quiet, and steeling ourselves for moving on tomorrow. Ken still has a bit of a cough and congestion, but he's doing a lot better than when we arrived in Manang four days ago. We spent all morning strategizing, debating whether to take the side trip to Tilicho Tal (lake) or head straight to the Pass. The problem is that the weather has changed, taking a turn to winter weather with significant snowfall yesterday afternoon. A particularly large dump of snow is expected in a week, next Monday. If we make the side trip to Tilicho Lake, everything will be covered in snow, so it won't even look like a lake. Then we might not be able to go over the Pass for another week, if then. Much as we've enjoyed hanging out in Manang, five nights is enough. We decided to head straight to the Pass. If worst comes to worst, we'll have to head back to Manang and make our way from there to Pokhara. We paid our Tilicho Hotel bill except for tonight's dinner and tomorrow's breakfast. I figured we're going to run out of rupees, so I went to the bank next door and withdrew 20,000 NPR, the maximum in one transaction. The ATM fee was 650 NPR, but Wells Fargo reimburses us for these fees.