Pisang to Thorung Phedi

Often there is a choice between a "upper" and "lower" route, getting from Pisang to Manang (3540m) was no different, and as these low / high choice go, it boils down to how much climbing you are willing to do and if there are landslides. So already mentioned in a previous post the decisions are generally based on where the donkey trains go. This time however it really did not matter, it was just a question of if you wanted to climb to Ghyaru (3670m) or not and since it was potentially going to be a long day, it was decided to rather do the "lower" route & wake up early the next morning to run up to Upper Pisang to watch the sunset... that was at least the initial plan. Next morning at 05:30am, my sleeping bag won & unlike some very energetic folk, I skipped out on the pre-breakfast walk. Thus us sane folk, who decided to get and hour more sleep starting out on the route just as the others were stumbling back into the tea house.

So the lower route ... first town we came to was the town of Ongre, otherwise also known as Humde (3330m). Nothing much special about this town, expect it has a airport (very small, and I did not see or hear a single plane). Though it is worth to mention that we walked through our first snow, as we were leaving the Pisang Valley and entering the Ongre Valley. It was kind-a like something out of those cheesy Christmas holiday movies, where the snow is starting to melt of the pine trees. Cheesy movie or not, it was stunning and I was in my element. By the time we got to Ongre, we started wondering why the rest had not caught us, after all, we were walking DAMN slow & taking lots of photos. Turns out that the pre-breakfast walk was such a success that the participants decided that the Upper route seemed like a good a idea, oh well, we would all meet in Manang anyway.

Just before reaching Manang, we stopped in the town of Braga (3450m) and had the best Tomatoe Noodle Soup of the time, the chocolate brownies were not bad either :) Reaching Manang we stayed at a place called Gangapurna, which was not bad, after all we planned to stay here two days to acclimatise. Just as well we did, because that night the Veg Momo's & Garlic Soup I had for supper made themselves very known to me and I was not a happy camper the next day. Everyone decided to go up as a side / acclimatization (climb high, sleep low) to the nearby Ice Lake (4600m). I think I managed to walk 2 km down to the start of the trail, then turned back (almost took me and hour to get back uphill to the damn tea house ... I was not in a good way). On the flip side, everyone who went to the lake really looked a bit worse for wear when they returned, after all it's just over a 1000m climb at altitude. Next day, I was thankfully a lot better, though I did skip out on the pre-breakfast Glacier walk. Did however opt to walk back to Braga to see the Braga Gompa, which is believed to be about 500 years old.

We decided that in order to enjoy actually going over Thorung La pass (5416m), we would take a few days to get up to Thorung Phedi (last stop before the pass). So we stopped 3 nights, 1st night at Gunsang (3900m), were we staying in the cleanest tea house I saw on the whole trek (we actually saw them washing the floors), namely a place called "Marsyangdi Hotel". Not many people stop to overnight in Gunsang (hence there being only 2 tea houses), but it is definately worth it.

On from Gunsang, we stopped at Letdar (4200m), though a lot of folk (especially those who skip Gunsang), stop at the previous town of Yak Kharka (4018m). Not much to say about Letdar, except that the place we staying in (The Snowland), was pretty crap (the rest of the town was packed) and I was very thankful that the wind did not blow during the night, otherwise the room would have been freezing... also you had to get your water via the kitchen, it was pretty scary to see what was going on in there.

The last night before going over the pass, we staying in Thorung Phedi (4450m) at a very pleasant place (can't remember the name). Pretty much spent the afternoon reading, playing cards, attempting some Yoga and watched as quite a few trekkers decided to give staying at Thorung Phedi a skip and do the first 400m uphill slog to stay at "High Camp" (4800m) ... from chatting to folk afterwards and while crossing the pass, unless you are well acclimatized, it's not worth it (not to mention the apparent lack of hygiene... but I can't comment, as we did not stay there).