Day 16 and 17, from Muktinath to Jomsom
Day 16 - To Kagbeni
We woke up without an alarm at 6:40 am and went downstairs for breakfast. Seb had quite the surprise when knocking the hard-boiled egg on the table to break the shell. A brown substance came out everywhere, on the table, on his warm sweater, on the floor. Slightly disgusting and terribly stinky.
When we left the hotel. the sun was already up, warming up the path but not melting the snow yet as it was still pretty cold. We walked toward the pass, to cross on the other side of the valley. We followed the old road, not used much as we just saw one jeep and one motorcycle. We had a nice view of the pass, cleared of clouds, all covered in snow. We walked through the small villages of Jhong and Putak and made our way slowly lower to the village of Kagbeni. This village was different. It had a medieval feel with the little cobblestone streets and tunnels.
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| Town of Muktinath |
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| Looking at the pass from the other side |
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| Arriving to Kagbeni |
Day 17 - To Jomsom
We walked to the village of Ekle Bhatti following the main road. We weren't sure if we wanted to do the side trek to Jomsom, but when 2 jeeps drove by us it made our decision an easy one. We did not want to walk in the dust all day having to step aside for speeding vehicles. We crossed the bridge with two motorcycles. The bridge was not quite big enough for all of us and the first motorcycle almost stayed stuck in Seb's camera. We walked across the first village, Pangling. It had the same medieval feel as Kagbeni. We kept walking, going up to Phalyak. As soon as we walked in the village, we were asked for candies or pen by children. Even a lady wanted money from us, so that sort of ruined our feeling of the place. We followed the blue arrows, but they led to another corner of the village so we had to backtrack. We walked out of the village only to realize, we could have walked just on the edge of it. It would have been much easier. Anyway, we kept going up, but we couldn't really see the track leading to the next village. We went down in the valley where the local cultivate the land, and up again on the other side to Dhargarjung. This was our favourite of the three villages as it had a picturesque feel, a real Nepali village, not filled with tourist hotels. It also felt quite Middle Age compared to what we are used to. After that village, we stopped for a snack break.
Once rested, we climbed the mountain. It was quite steep and fairly difficult. Once we arrived on top, we realized why it was called Bhatase Bhanjyang, or Windy Pass. It couldn't have been more accurate. The descent was very difficult after the few trees because of the rolling rocks. We finally made our way down to Jomsom. We walked in the village, towards the airport as we had read the first part of the village looked abandoned. We walked by the check post and though that because of the line-up we would just find a place, drop our bags and go back, but we were called in. So we had to go through our bags to find the paperwork, give it to the first person who stamped it, the second one entered info in the computer and the third one put another stamp. Then we had to stop again across the street for the Tims check post.
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| The river bed towards Jomsom |
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| Another suspension bridge |
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| Seb at the Windy Pass |
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