A Composite Tale

In times gone by I have attempted to write a daily blog - at the very least to do a catch up every other day. This journey has been very different. All sorts of factors got in the way of my achieving this goal - technology, ill-health, exhaustion, cold, and sometimes, simply, time. So here goes with a summarised, composite picture of the last week and half. Possibly lacking a bit of detail here and there, it will all the same hopefully give a sufficient picture to satisfy any curiosity anyone might have, or have had.

My last post was from Darjeeling, and so I pick things up the next day.

I'll intersperse the text with some photos/vids; and try to be a little discriminating and not overload the story. And the photos and the text may not always perfectly align, but hopefully you'll get a sense of it all ...

Tuesday 22nd April - Darjeeling to Yuksom (1,650 MASL)

Today we drove from Darjeeling to Yuksom. It was a fairly uneventful drive of some 5 hours (to cover a little under 30 klms).

There was a very steep switchback descent out of Darjeeling. We stopped at a tea plantation for some photos, and arrived at Sikkim border around 10:30am, having crossed the “weak” bridge. Half an hour or so there whilst permits were issued.  There are many unwritten rules when travelling in exotic countries, and one of them is "never take a photo of a man with a gun"!! Well, in this case the man with the gun was quite happy to have his photo taken, so here he is.

We stopped for lunch at the Hotel Doklam around 11:30, and into Yuksom around 3-ish. I was glad to be out of the car; it had become pretty squeezey.

We had a late afternoon walk around Yuksom, but I was starting to not feel well.

I was struck down with a bad gastric attack around midnight, the details of which I'll spare you, dear reader. But not a good start.

Wednesday 23rd April - Yuksom

Very bad night; I was pretty crook, and unable to commence the walk with the group, who left at around 8am this morning. Not good.

I had also made a thoughtless error the previous night. I had announced to Janet that "I'm a bit crook, and sleeping. No call tonight", and then switched off my phone, not thinking that such a scant message left all sorts of gaps in the imagination. Twelve hours later I received a message in which she rightly chipped me that "telling me you're a bit crook without saying more is a bit scary old boy". We resolved that with a video call that morning, but it was a good reminder of the frailties of long-distance communication.

Anyway, I felt awful and stayed in bed all day. No food.

But I did receive lots of attention from trek and hotel staff during the 24-hour period.

Late night/early morning discussions with Nawang (head guide) and Garry (tour leader) gave me only two options:

• Plan A was that I’d do a double walk tomorrow and catch the group at Tsokha. That would result in a very big day

• Plan B was that I’d abandon the trek. That was not an attractive option by any definition.

The first sounded tough, and the second dismaying.

Thursday 24th April - Yuksom to Tsokha (~3,000 MASL)

I awoke feeling good enough to tackle the double walk (that was probably mind over matter as I would have needed to be on my metaphorical death-bed to succumb to Plan B). As had been arranged, Tara (one of the deputy guides) had stayed behind to help enact Plan A. A local man arranged a porter for my kitbag All good; well, sort of.

So I headed out and uphill at 8:05.

And uphill and uphill. and some more uphill.

Part way through the day I hit what was my greatest challenge; going back no longer was an option and going forward seemed impossible. In truth, and on reflection, I don't know how I did it.

This was one of my hardest days walking ever.  Maybe the hardest. The terrain was rough. Never more than 10 metres of flat and the steps are of every imaginable size and shape, accompanied by endless mud and horse/dzo poo. (A dzo is a cross between a yak and a cow. Yaks cannot descend below 4,000 metres or thereabouts - it's too hot for them and they'll die at the lower altitudes. The dzos look a lot like yaks, and we generally refer to them as yaks, even though they're not.)

At some stage during the day the cellular network dropped out, and so it would be for the next 7 days (inclusive).

We have all become so used to have ready access to the web, that even though we recognise the benefits of it's absence, such absence is still a bit of a shock too the system. The main drawback for me is that I will be unable to talk to J for a week; something that is pretty out of the ordinary for us these days.

I staggered into camp at 5:45pm, just short of 10 hours on the path.  Probably 20klms +. The indescribable steps and the distance aside, I had also made a vertical ascent of some 1,300 metres. At sea level that isn't/doesn't sound so much, but when you start at 1,700 metres and walk for 10 hours to 3,000 metres I can tell you, that's a lot.

I arrived into camp very zombie. Shattered. Just short of being in tears.

After a welcome warm drink (I’d just finished my water, so good timing) I fell into my tent and slept until dawn (4:30 ish).

Friday 25th April - Tsokha to Petham (~3,650 MASL)

I was quite disorganised after yesterday’s shambolic entrance, but managed to get my bags packed and up and about for 6:15am breakfast. On the path at 7:15am.

Unfortunately Trevor is now quite crook. Different symptoms to me. Sadly he only had a Plan B and had to abandon his trek (I will next see him in Pelling, in about a week).

Not a hard a day as yesterday, but still very hard. Endless uphill and endless uneven muddy steps again.

But a shorter day – into camp at 11:45. Lazy day thereafter.

We’re probably at around 3,700 metres. Cold. Puffer jacket and beanie territory.

For the record, "we" is as follows (in no particular order):

• me (obviously)

• Trevor - who I had first travelled with to the Solukhumbu in 2023 as part of the Tenzing/Hillary 70th Anniversary celebrations

• Amanda from Sydney, a sort of business systems analyst who's about to start a new role with Alliance helping streamline their systems

• Kevin from Adelaide (ex Perth) - a retired chemist/academic who has a strong interest in airforce military history, especially ex PNG

• Christine from Darwin, with whom I spoke at length about Tracey and the Top End

• Garry Weare (also obviously) and his wife Margie Thomas

• Gail from Dinner Plain in the Victorian high country, who has had a wonderful set of experiences working for various AusAid projects including helping run elections in PNG

• Catherine/Cat (Gail's daughter) from Brisbane, who works as a comms specialist for Medibank

• Bruce from Rochester NY, a retired plant geneticist and academic who was amongst other things the resident rhododendron expert

• Walter from Melbourne who was a chef by profession and had risen to the dizzying heights of various Exec Chef roles and similar all around the world

• Derek from Sydney, a retired engineer

• Michael and Bettina from Sydney. He is a retired aircraft engineer with Q and she works (I think) for an accounting firm. They are inveterate world travellers

• Geoff from Toowoomba, a retired O&G

• Nawang, our indispensable head guide

I'm reasonably well travelled, and reasonably experienced in the Himalayas, but some of these people made me look like a complete novice. Some interesting stories around the lunch and dinner tables (and in the cars).

Saturday 26th April - Petham to Dzongri (~4,000 MASL)

Walk up to the high camp today, Dzongri.

In the relative scheme of things an easy day. Up early to take some mountain shots, and then left Pethang campsite at 7:15, and headed upwards. (Should record too that tummy was playing up again.)

Got to Deorali staging post after a couple of hours. Altitude approx. 4,000m

Arrived Dzongri an hour later. Not the campsite, but the “village” for want of a better description.  Cup of tea there and then the final push onto the high camp.

The high camp is a lovely spot. Spacious, surrounded by mountains, themselves hidden by clouds. I had a pretty quiet afternoon, bit of food, getting tent organised for a three night stay, bit of a walk to nearby hilltops.

Some nice views of the mountains late arvo when the clouds cleared.

Sunday 29th April - Dzongri

Up very early this morning for an attempted trek to the nearby hilltop for views of Kangchenjunga. 4am start, and a quick cuppa and out of camp by around 4:30. I only made it a third of the way up before the altitude got to me, and in any case the clouds came in early. So I got a couple of nice shots before turning around. Pretty cold too.

A bit after 9am the group headed off for another walk to a nearby lake.  Again, I didn't get too far. Took a photo at 9:18am of the valley which leads to Goecha La.

Goecha La is significant in that it was the Hon. James Campbell's goal, even though he didn't make it, as history records. There's a bit of a parallel happening here!!

Under advice I turned around and 4 of us backtracked back up to nearby chortens overlooking the campsite. Cold wind, but pleasant out of the wind.

It started to snow shortly after, and didn't really stop for the next 48 hours or so. Beautiful, but bitterly cold.; various iterations of the two which came and went over the next couple of days.

I didn't really enjoy the night’s sleep; had a bit of strife breathing at times. I was hoping that the decision would be made to head down tomorrow as a result of the snow.

Monday 28th April - Dzongri

More snow overnight. The decision has been made to stay here the night as per the original itinerary.

I would have preferred to head down, but Nawang’s advice is that we’ll be drier here: that further down it'll be wetter and crowded.

Apparently we’ll walk to an hour or so below Tsokha .

A lazy day.  Not unpleasant. Seemed to do little more than move from tent to mess tent and back again.  The routine was:

0700 breakfast

1000 morning tea

1300 lunch

1600 afternoon tea

1700 dinner.

Each lasted about an hour.  Perhaps a bit of chatting in between.  Then back to the tent, and wait for the next session.

The tent is quite warm, but then I'm fully clothed in my sleeping bag. Cold feet though.

I note that I'm very much looking forward to chatting with J in a day or so.

There's a certain irony. I wanted to come on this trip to walk the path of James Campbell, and indeed I have. His letters home of late Oct 1886 describe how, not far from here, he had to hunker down in a snowstorm which from memory lasted a couple of days and caused him to have to abandon his trek. Not that my trek has been abandoned by any means, but certainly today’s planned events have been abandoned due to the snow.

Some time during this period I came to the conclusion that this would be my last high-altitude trek. I don't breathe as well, and the cold is debilitating. This has been my 7th trip to Himalayan altitude, and about my 10th if I include some of my other perhaps less responsible escapades. I never did any of these do "prove" anything; they were just opportunities which came along. But I did want to scratch the James Campbell itch, and having done so I think I can very comfortably call it quits now. No regrets.

Tuesday 29th April - Dzongri to Tsokha

I was awake around 4am (first dawn), and after the normal morning routines we left camp at few minutes after 7.

We’d had a lot of snow again overnight, and the path alternated between crispy crunchy snow and soggy mud as the temperature rose and the feet of the lead group and the horses/dzos turned it into a quagmire.

At times stunningly beautiful and equally treacherous. Mostly it wasn’t strenuous walking as it was almost all downhill, but it did require massive concentration. I slipped twice, not over, but just a big wobble. And both times when my mind had wandered.

The vegetation is stunning. The gnarly mossy trees (12:45 pm) are Sikkim Firs, according to Dr Bruce.

Into camp just after 2pm, 7 hours in total.

Tomorrow will be a more time structured day. Wake-up at 5, breakfast at 5:45, on the track by 6:30. We need to be in Yuksom by 2:30 latest for administrative and ceremonial activities, and then in the cars to Pelling by 3:30.

Last camping day. I'm not sad about that. I reiterate yesterday’s comment that I won't be doing any more high altitude/trek/camping trips. This was pretty hard on the body, and even though this weather was unusual, the cold was just too much. Sure, offset by some stunning scenery, but, yeah, nah. That's it. And as interesting as this trip was, and especially with the James Campbell connection, it hasn’t grabbed me the way Hillary 70th trip did, and I suspect that anything in the future will be more of the same. And there’s lots of other things to do/see.

Wednesday 30th April - Tsokha to Yuksom

We were on the path again by 6:00am. There's a solid 2-hour walk down to around 2,200m (from 3,000m), followed by a 100m climb over the next 30 minutes or so, before a steady up and down walk into Yuksom at around 1,700m.

Horror walk. Down is good of course. But not when it's a constant battle with the uneven terrain. Imagine a path strewn with rocks that range from fist size to suitcase size to washing machine size, in completely random order. And imagine that those fists/suitcases/washing machines have absolutely no consistent shape to them. They aren't nice and round or square - each rock, especially the bigger ones, might have 50 or 100 facets to it. And sometimes the steps were knee height. And did I mention the mud and the poo?

Despite that I felt quite good; each step required 110% concentration, but i had a spring in my step. I was first into Yuksom, at around 12:30, a far cry from the 10 hour upward journey of a week earlier. There was a bit of confusion and I walked on to the hotel as previously instructed, and unnecessarily added another 45 minutes to my trip, but no real harm done.

After a range of gear re-arranging, and the handing out of thank-you tips to the porters, cooks and horsemen, we bundled into cars for the drive to Pelling.

At this point I'll end this composite, and all being well pick up the next few days shortly.