Flight to Jomsom; Kagbeni 10/4

We’re in Muktinath, at 3800 meters (12,500 feet) in the Himalayas! That of course means we survived the flight to Jomsom, although at times that was in doubt. The flight yesterday finally left a little after noon — about 4 hours behind schedule. We boarded the plane with Joseph, a Sri-Lankan Brit, and Thakur, his Nepali friend & guide, and Aliza and Asaf, a couple from Israel (Aliza is actually from New York but moved to Israel), who we met in the airport. They told us to sit on the right side of the plane to get the mountain views. The airplane was a small twin-prop plane with about 8 rows of two seats. I sat behind Kirsten on the right side, and as the pilots cranked up the engines the flight attendant performed her sole task for the flight: to pass out a piece of candy (for the pressure change) and cotton (to stuff in our ears for the noise).

The winds pick up heavily in the valley between 10 and 11, which is why they usually try and get all the flights in before then. We assumed the wind must not be too bad because they had not postponed our flight. Boy were we wrong. It was all smooth flying until the final terrifying few minutes when we turned up the valley between Annapurna and Dhaulagiri. As soon as we rounded the corner, we could feel the plane getting pushed around, up & down, side-to-side; it even felt like it was fishtailing. After several minutes of this, and feeling a little gripped, we went into a steep descent toward Jomsom. I was looking out our window at the town going by when suddenly our noise is pitching up, I look forward because my stomach just sunk to my feet, and I see nothing but blue out the pilots’ window. As I’m pondering this, we start banking into a hard turn, and we can see the side of the mountains out the left (downward-facing) side of the plane! All while the plan is still getting bounced around by the wind. I was disoriented; my heart was pounding; legs are shakey; and Kirsten and I are gripping each other’s hands over the seat back. The only thing that gave me some encouragement was I could see the pilots hands working the controls in the cockpit, and he appeared completely unphased, and so I realized this must be the usual approach to the landing strip. After pulling out of this maneuver, which felt like a barrel roll, we leveled out and came in for a smooth, easy landing in Jomsom at 9,000 feet. We discussed it afterwords, and Kirsten had maintained her orientation better than me. She explained that we had basically flown past the airport and pulled a tight U-turn up against the side of the mountains in order to land in the opposite direction. She described that it seemed as though we could almost reach out and touch the mountains we were so close, and just one bad pocket of air away from slamming into them.

Well we staggered off the plane and as we stepped down on the tarmac we were greeted with a stunning view of Nilgiri North, our first real view of a Himalayan giant, and at 23,000 feet its summit was 14,000 feet above us, yet situated a mere 5 miles away! We were in the Himalayas, and this put a big ‘ol exclamation point on it. My legs were still shakey, and we all most have looked pretty funny, walking away from the plane, everyone’s heads cranked up gawking stupidly at the mountain as we wandered somewhat aimlessly in the general direction of the airplane’s propellers. Airport security had to direct us in a wide berth away from the propellers and toward the airport baggage pickup where we couldn’t do harm to ourselves.

After collecting our backpacks and checking in our ACAP permits with airport security, we stopped at a small gear store to try and find a headlamp for Kirsten. All they had were some uber cheap LED flashlights. They barely worked, but it was better than nothing, and Kirsten only paid NR 200 for it. We met the other four folks for lunch at Nil Giri View Hotel in Jomsom. Kirsten and I had dal bat for the first time on the trip. We had put it off as long as we could, figuring we would be eating a lot of it on the trek. Joseph and Thakur invited us to walk with them because they had the same trekking itinerary as us, for the first 7 days anyway. Then Aliza and Asaf tip-toed around the subject of having company on the way to Kagbeni because even though they had a porter (but no guide) their parents were terrified that they were doing the trek on their own, and they had promised them they would try to join up with other folks. Their parents actually rented a satellite phone for them to check in with! So after checking in at the ACAP checkpoint and again at the police checkpost, the six of us embarked on the trek. First stop: Kagbeni.

The hike to Kagbeni was pretty short, flat and straightforward. We followed right along the Gandaki Khola (River), sometimes short-cutting across the dry flood beds, and occasionally stepping off the trail to let a jeep or donkey go by. It wasn’t so much a trail as a dirt road, and we were surprised by this, but it was nice to finally be out in our familiar element – hiking in the mountains. The wind was pretty strong, but it was at our backs so it didn’t cause us much discomfort, however we noticed all the people passing us the other direction were covering their faces with scarves or bandanas. We reached Kagbeni around 5:30, just as the sun was starting to set. Kagbeni is a medieval Tibetan village, with cobblestone streets and stone buildings with firewood-stacked roofs. We got a room in the New Asian hotel with the other folks and met them shortly thereafter for dinner. Our room had its own bathroom and lights! A most pleasant surprise, especially the lights because Kirsten’s new flashlight was not a star performer. At dinner we had dal bat again with Tibetan flat bread. We stayed up ’til 8 chatting with everyone, including a nice couple from Belgium that were doing the entire circuit. We had a good night’s sleep, although Kirsten’s cold was getting worse, and after breakfast (Tsampa porridge for me and oat porridge for Kirsten), we bid farewell to Asaf and Aliza, then set out for the big hike to Muktinath at 8.

Kathmandu: Swayambhunath, Durbar Palace; Bus to Pokhara 10/2 – 10/3

We’re sitting at the Pokhara airport. Our flight is delayed for a couple hours because of clouds. The last two days have been as exhausting as the first two. Thursday in Kathmandu we got up and had a very nice breakfast on the roof of Helena’s, then did a little shopping. I bought an aluminum water bottle (the one thing I forgot to bring was my Nalgene bottle), and Kirsten got a neat shoulder bag for toting stuff around town so we didn’t have to carry a backpack. At the end of the morning, we walked down to Kathmandu’s Durbar Square, where the city’s kings used to rule from (durbar means “palace”).

The walk through the streets of Kathmandu was madness because it was so crowded with people, but no one was trying to sell us anything, so in that sense it was a little more relaxing, and it was amazing to see the ancient Hindu and Buddhist shrines and stupas in various states of decay randomly located throughout the old neighborhoods. Durbar Square is very old and shows it. We weren’t compelled to stay long, a little turned off by the commercial sadhus (holy men) wandering around looking for tourists to charge for blessing them with tikas (a red paste spot marked on the forehead) or taking their picture. However, we did find a nice place to sit at a terraced temple where we watched life go by through the square and appreciated the Newari pagoda temple architecture. According to LP, it was a Nepali arcitecht who exported the pagoda design to Kublai Khan in the late 13th century that inspired the eastern Asian pagoda.

After Durbar Square we walked back to the hotel and inquired about a room for the night, but they are completely booked through October. They did make a reservation for us with their contact at Hotel Tradition, however. Suddenly keen to the problem of finding lodging when we return to Kathmandu in a couple weeks, we spent the next few hours going around to hotels. All of the really highly recommended ones in Lonely Planet (LP) were booked through October, but we got rooms for the 16th and 17th at Hotel Utse, which is a really nice Tibetan hotel a block or two down a side street in Thamel.

We also ran back and forth to the KGH to check on our permits etc about three or four times, stopping for a light lunch of nan and Sprite at Le Bistro’s rooftop cafe, where my watch thermometer read 95 degrees. Finally, around 3:30, the agency guy showed up with them. We had our permits and bus & plane tickets, so the path to Jomsom was all laid out for us. Now we just had to survive all the in-country travel with no equipment, logitistics, or weather problems. At 4 o’clock we had a little time left in the day so we grabbed a taxi and went to Swayambhunath, aka the Monkey Temple, one of two famous Buddhist temples in Kathmandu that we wanted to visit. We tried to negotiate a 200 Nepali Rupie (NR) fare with the driver, but he was stubbornly firm on 250. Then he “offered” to wait for us at the temple for an hour and drive us back for another NR 500. He tried to convince us that because of the festival it would be hard to get a taxi back. When we arrived at the temple, there were plenty of taxis there, so we declined the offer. After the long, steep stair climb, we spent about half an hour at the temple. We walked around the stupa and spun the prayer wheels. Took pictures of all the monkeys milling about, walked through a Buddhist shrine, and watched a monk scrape parasites off of a puppy. When we returned to the bottom of the temple, we instantly found a taxi fare back to Thamel for NR 200.

In Kathmandu! 9/29 – 10/1

First night in Kathmandu; our plans have already changed. We arrived in the middle of the Dasain festival, which is the biggest and most important Nepali festival of the year, and the city is extra crowded. The visa line at the airport took about an hour and a half to get through, then after taking a taxi to the Kathmandu Guest House, we walked to the place where the Annapurna Conservation Area Project (ACAP) is supposed to be and found an empty office with a sign saying that it had moved, but with no indication of where to. It was now after 3 o’clock and we were fairly certain we could not get all the permits, bus and plan tickets before the end of the day, so we returned to the hotel and spoke with their travel agent about getting assistance.

Dorado Needle

8,440 Feet
NW Ridge, Grade III, 5.4
August 2-3, 2008

The hike up to Dorado Needle started off a little damp. The forecast was for clouds on Saturday, but clearing by Sunday. Nonetheless, as it sprinkled and spat on us as we packed our bags at the trailhead at 2100 feet, our confidence in the forecast waned a bit. The log crossing over the North Fork Cascade River has improved since the last time we crossed it, about 6 years ago. Unfortunately, the hike up the Eldorado Creek Trail is still steep, and on this day, it was wet and a bit loose. Fortunately, our gear has become considerably lighter in the last 6 years, and I suppose our mental endurance for these sorts of slogs has increased. The hike up through the trees to the boulder field went by fairly quickly, then it was time to pick our way up through a couple thousand feet of talus-strewn slopes. Fortunately, we were able to piece together most of the trail-like tread along the fringes of the fields. Unfortunately, about half-way up, it started to rain with some enthusiasm. We stopped to don our rain gear and had a little talk about whether anyone wanted to cut our losses and turn around on the off chance we would never get out of the clouds. I think any of us could have been pushed over the edge, but we decided to push on a little longer to see if the squall abated.
The rain did stop shortly after that, and we ended up making it to the bivy sites at about 7500 feet at the base of the east ridge of Eldorado about 8 hours after we started. A search of the area to locate two good bivy sites near each other was fruitless, so we ended up cramming our ID tents next to each other in one site after clearing it and smoothing out some bumps in the ground. Around us, as we made dinner and prepared for sleep, the cloud deck rose and fell below our elevation enough to occasionally give us views into the Forbidden cirque.
We woke up at 5am and Kirsten poked her head outside and immediately saw the glow of the sunrise illuminating a clear sky above the surrounding peaks and ridges. Energized by the knowledge that the climb would continue, we ate breakfast and packed up our gear, finally roping up and leaving camp at 7am. We cut a diagnal traverse across the Inspiration Glacier, occasionally looking behind us at climbers ascending the East Ridge of Eldorado, and thankful that no one was heading where we were, to Dorado Needle. When we reached the saddle at 8100 feet between the Inspiration and McAllister Glaciers, we stopped for a minute to take in the incredible views from between the Tepeh Towers, then descended the McAllister before the final steep, 500 foot climb up to the base of Dorado Needle, arriving at 9.
Knowing that climbers just a week earlier had reported a somewhat sketchy moat crossing to get on the route, we were a little anxious to see what it looked like when we got there. The pile of snow that had fallen into the moat, creating a bridge across was still there, so we roped up and off I went. Right off the bat there was a fairly steep move, so I reluctantly took off my mountaineering boots and put on my rock shoes. The move went easy with rock shoes on, and the rest of the way up to the ridge crest and the first belay was problem-free. After bringing Kirsten up, I climbed up a small chimney, then traversed across the knife-edge slab over to the next belay. When Kirsten reached the slab, she took a few minutes to talk herself into it, then chevalled across easily. The first move off the second belay up a step in the ridge required some reaching and stemming across, but thanks to my extra long limbs, it wasn't a problem. Next up was another traverse across an exposed, blank slab. I saw a ledge below it on the right and dropped down to the ledge and found a nice hand crack to get up above the slab on the other end. From there it was easy scrambling up to the summit block, arriving around 10:45.
Kirsten followed up and we snapped a few picks while waiting for Becky & Pete. After a while we saw Becky climbing back across the slab and yelled down to ask what was going on. Her hands and feet had become numb from sitting in the shade and being exposed to the frigid wind, and when she reached the stemmy, reachy move off the second belay, she lost confidence and backed off. Because Pete wasn't particularly concerned about summiting today, Kirsten downclimbed to Becky at the rap anchor, swapped ropes, and I belayed Becky up to me at the summit. After all of us had safely downclimbed back to the rap anchor, and Becky had accomplished the feat of crossing the blank knife-edge slab four times, we rappeled off the route. The rope tried to get stuck between a couple blocks on a bend in the route when I pulled it from the first rappel, but fortunately it freed up after giving it some strong tugs.
We arrived back at camp at about 3 o'clock and packed up with our minds focused on the Good Foods' 9 o'clock closing time. We left at 4:15, and the descent went smoothly, arriving back at the cars after 8:15. Quicly we changed into cotton clothes and threw our gear in the car, careful not to leave any open bags on the ground lest some Cascade River Road mice stow away in our gear, as happened to Becky & Pete over 4th of July. Unfortunately we didn't make it back to Marblemount until 10 or 15 minutes after 9 and Good Food was in fact closed. Our next hope for decent food was in Arlington, but when we arrived we found Taco Time was closed, so our last resort was McDonalds. It was interesting to discover that no matter how many calories we burned during the weekend, McDonalds was still unsatisfying. But as we finished the drive home, arriving at 11:30, we tried to ignore the foreign lump of processed meat in our stomachs and remember the good climb on a fun little peak in the glorious North Cascades.
Some notes about the climb: this is a really fun little climb. The rock is solid, the gear placements are good, the climbing is fun, and the setting on the McAllister Glacier is spectacular. The only drawback is the approach, which is pretty rough for an ascent of just this one peak. Ideally, it could be combined with other peaks, which was our original plan (Eldorado). However, the hike from camp to the route took longer than expected (about 2 hours), so we didn't have enough time. As far as gear, we brought several small cams -- red and green Aliens, red and black Metolius, the #.75, 1, and 2 Camalots, plus selection of nuts. I placed everything except the .75 and #2 Camalots, and there were lots of horns to sling. Basically this route feels a lot like a miniature version of the West Ridge of Forbidden.