day 4 – nyalam

 

after a refreshing morning hot spring bath and breakfast, we reached the border and the ‘friendship bridge’ .

after a wait for a couple of hours, completed immigration. while we waited, we saw that all our bags and other materials for our trip were being carried by porters on their backs – young and old, men and women – including one with 2 kids, one in a pouch on the front and another sitting on her head – across the customs counters.

our land cruisers were waiting on the other side and groups of four were allocated to each vehicle.

our driver – Shi Lin - opened the doors for us and went missing.

as we saw most other vehicles leave, suddenly one person who was bare chested came running, and started the vehicle and started driving.

when I tried to tell him that our driver was different – he just said lunch!

we reached a Chinese restaurant in Zhangmu – a couple of kilometers from the border – and had Indian food! till then, i have only had Chinese food @ Indian restaurants!

by the time we got back from lunch, Shi Lin was back, taking us through the narrow, crowded street of Zhangmu. also noticed an improvised cart as a trailer of a motorcycle.

and a volksYagen!

Shi Lin seemed to be the most popular person in town, as he stopped or was stopped every few feet to talk to someone or exchanges some stuff – such as keys..

later we realized that Shi Lin was a kind of the leader of the convoy – always impatient if he is not the first.. and others giving him way, whenever he tried to overtake..

and he would first go to the police check posts to get the paperwork completed.

Nyalam was a few hours and a climb of about 8000 feet from Tatopani – at about 12,000 feet.

our first high altitude stop.

breathing was normal – but deep breathing, which i thought would make it easier, took effort – and made me gasp at times.

on a leisurely walk on the streets of nyalam, noticed that there was an internet phone – @ 3 Yuan per minute to call India, compared to 100 Yuan per minute to receive and 150 Yuan to make calls on a roaming India SIM!

other things we saw included some (Yak) dung pellets, local ‘bakery’ food items and also a cow on the road!

After what appeared to be restful sleep, it was just 2 hours into the night.

incessant barking of dogs for almost 2 hours kept me awake.

The place we stayed at had dormitory – read small rooms packed with as many beds as possible [ours had 4, with barely any room for our duffel bags and moving around!] – and a common toilet.

fortunately, that had water [stored in drums]. since they were few in number, decided that contra times would help and decided to finish all toilet work by 2 AM local time [2.5 hours ahead of IST].

we stayed at Nyalam for 2 nights, being also an acclimatization location.

the morning was surprisingly cool, much less cold than what i had anticipated.

i prepared myself to go for the intro trek after breakfast. I was told by one of the fellow travellers that this would be an activity where all of us would be observed and an informal assessment of which ones would be able to complete the parikrama comfortably and who would have difficulty – and those that should not even attempt!

earlier in the morning, came to know that one of the group members had some breathing trouble during the night and needed to be administered oxygen. not sure if she would be asked to return or not proceed to higher altitudes.

we did approx. 2.2 KM with a rise of about 200 m in about an hour and thirty minutes.

my head started aching slightly and at a few spots felt as if it would be better to return. but seeing the youngsters – about 9 and 12 as well as some senior members of the group make it easily, decided to keep pushing myself.

the view from the top and the snacks brought by many made the climb worth it!

i noticed many small flat stones piled up – like in the game of lagori.

i piled some as well – when i was told that it is a Tibetan custom to please our ancestors.

then the tension about getting down started.. my fear of heights was starting to play up. luckily, the descent was a different path that was not so treacherous. Oh what a feeling to reach back the main road!

a quick check by many of us with the sherpa and also our group leader – with great anticipation – whether we passed the test – gave us all smiles, as we were all told that we should be able to do the parikrama.

Another heavy lunch, with cut [Kathmandu] mangoes and hot soup in the evening..

had a quick pranayama class, conducted by one of the group members who is a trained teacher.

during a post dinner walk, we saw 3 girls playing a different game of skipping. 2 girls standing on 2 sides with strings tied to their legs, slowly rising. the third girl jumps, rather dances between the strips, avoiding the strips from touching her legs. if it touches, that girl has to go to one side and the other girl comes to the middle.

tomorrow is expected to be a long drive – to paryang, that will help us get to mansarovar the next day earlier. this was one more change to the original plan.