NEPAL 050212: A Simple Question About Our Trek – How long was it?

Hi Patient Email Readers

Well.

 Here I sit at my desk two and a half weeks after our return from Nepal, and I‘ve still not written anything to all of you about our actual trek – beyond the description of trekking vs. backpacking and its addendum about “pony caravans.”  Oh my.  

I sit and muse,

“Is it jet lag?”

“Is it getting over the trip cold?” 

. . . spring allergies in Chico?

. . . that end-of-April weekend in Ashland?

. . . a lack of good editorial help?” (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1:  The bewildered author at work with her editorial assistant.

OR has it really been trying to answer the question, “Marian, dear, how long was your trek?

Well, OK, I have to admit that answering this apparently innocuous question has hung me up.  Wondering “How can I credibly describe the ‘dimensions’ of our trek for my readers?” has disturbed my already jet lag-addled sleep, caused me to pass the produce aisle without picking up the crucial spinach, and made me miss the “WALK” signal at several intersections.

In good ol’ California, hikes are measured in miles, as in “I hiked 60 miles in three days!” However, in Nepal, because of all the ups and downs and turns that have to be traversed to get anywhere in those mountains, treks are not measured in miles or kilometers.  In fact, distance measurements are considered meaningless, so travel from one spot to the next is measured in “time to walk.”  This is variable, of course, but does take into account elevation gain and/or loss, switchbacks, and trail conditions.  

So, OK Marian, how LONG was your trek?   

Upon the suggestion of my personal reference librarian, who is very good at pointing out the obvious, I consulted the literature, specifically the Lonely Planet’s August 2009 9^th edition of Trekking in the Nepal Himalaya. (See Figure 2.)

Figure 2:  The reference librarian inspects the Lonely Planet Guide to Trekking in the Nepal Himalaya.

On page 12 of the Trekking Guide a table compares the 30 treks in the book.  The trek that Jawane and Karma chose for us to take, the “Annapurna Panorama” is described as “6 days, difficulty: easy-medium, maximum elevation: 3210 meters, hotels: excellent,” and adds that this walk is a “Good introduction to trekking” with “Outstanding views.”  My reference librarian suggested that I include a contrasting description from this table about the sort of trek most people envision when someone says, “I went trekking in Nepal.” So, I further quote -- and add notes to -- the summary of another trekking route not too far from ours in the Annapurna Region:  “Shey Gompa [a Tibetan monastery] to Jomsom [a large village on the Kali Ghandaki River], “12 days, difficulty: hard, maximum elevation: 5460 meters [18,018 feet], hotels: none,” and adding the actually tantalizing description: “Long desolate walk across the roof of Nepal.”  So our trek is classified as a sort of Himalayan walk in the park compared to the type of trek I had – and you might also have -- imagined from reading accounts of mountaineers hiking to base camps before ascending Everest or Annapurna.

More details about “our walk in the park” in Nepal can be gleaned from the Trekking Guide’s map of our trek route on pages 152-153, Figure 3. Our trek started in the village of Naya Pul [highlighted in yellow on the bottom of the map] and went clockwise around the circuit indicated with the wide orange line. The map’s contour lines are at 660-foot intervals. Between Tikedhunga and Ulleri (where the arrow from the box “Annapurna Circuit Part II Trek” touches the trail), the contour lines are close together.  This is the longest very steep part of the trail.  The Trekking Guide calls this stretch “the unrelenting Ulleri stairs” and estimates their number at 3,300.  I did not make even the slightest effort to verify this number, not did I skip a single one of those steps. There is another steep section just before arriving at Tadapani which gave the day’s walk from Ghorepani a strenuous conclusion.  In most other parts of the trail you can see that the contour lines are farther apart, and that in places the route does not cross them – where it follows along the rivers (Kholas) leaving from and returning to Naya Pul, for example.  This relatively gentle terrain and the abundant lodges with supplies of American candy bars and Coca-Cola create the trek’s difficulty rating of “easy-medium.”

Figure 3 Map of the Annapurna Panorama trek.

            Of course you will have also noted that the most treacherous part of the trek is the big white line running on a precise north-south meridian between pages 152 and 153 of the guidebook that must be crossed twice.  We were only able to traverse that yawning gap with the aid of a temporary floating bridge supplied by the Nepali Army Corps of Engineers and with the individual assistance of polite 18-year old Nepali Eagle Scouts who were earning merit badges in “Assisting the Foreign Aged.”

            When we arrived for the night at Banthanti after ascending the estimated 3,300 Ulleri stairs, we began to wonder how that compared to the number of stairs in a tall building.  Dick and Karma had been getting in shape by climbing the stairs in Chico’s tallest building, a seven story giant and estimated it had 140 stairs.  From that we estimated that the “unrelenting Ulleri stairs” were about the equivalent of a 165-story building.  “How big is that?” we wondered. At home, we Googled “world’s tallest buildings” and learned that the Burj Khalifa in Dubai has 163 floors, 2,909 stairs, is 2,723 feet tall.  The scenery along the Ulleri stairs was undoubtedly much better than the views from the Burj Khalifa; however, I am equally certain that there is much less pony, donkey, horse, water buffalo, and just plain cow poop and fewer thunderstorm puddles on that soaring building’s 2,909 stairs. On an irresistible note of apparent American chauvinism, I am unable to omit noting that the Empire State Building has 102 floors, 1,860 stairs, and is 1,250 feet tall, and to point our that if you have climbed to the top of Lady Liberty’s head, you have ascended the equivalent of 22 floors, by 354 steps, to an estimated 268 feet above her foundation. 

As a hiking Californian at home and gazing at our trek map, I could not resist getting out my ruler to estimate the approximate number of miles of “the trek” by finding out how many miles a crow – or Himalayan Vulture – would travel if it flew from Naya Pul to Ghorepani to Tadapani to Ghundruk and back to Naya Pul.  My crude estimate yielded the disturbingly insignificant result of a mere 18.9 miles “by avian air,” so I really “got it” why miles are a meaningless measure for walking/trekking/hiking in the Himalayas.  I was finally persuaded that I must turn to those “time to travel” and other measures to more closely reflect my bodily experience of this walk in the woods (and farmlands).

Our eight-day adventure on the Annapurna Panorama trek began at Naya Pul on April 6^th and ended April 13^th when we walked down the Modi Khola River to return to Naya Pul.  We had walked for seven days and had enjoyed one layover day in Ghandruk to explore the museum, Buddhist Temple, and the Annapurna Conservation Area Project’s visitor’s center – or to take naps, which was the real reason for some of us.  I also suspect that the good television reception in Ghandruk might have been an additional factor in choosing the layover site. I have to admit that watching a group of Nepalis -- that included several children of the families that lived at the hotel as well as Jawane and our helpers and porters – attentively watching “Rambo” and “Dora the Explorer” in American English without subtitles was at least as interesting as the village’s museum and other cultural attractions.

Adding up the hours for the Annapurna Panorama trek in the Trekking Guide gives 18-24 hours total for “a fairly fit male in his late 30’s carrying a medium-sized backpack.”  I thought as I read this, “Your/my actual hours may vary.”  For four moderately-to-not-very fit 64-72 year olds carrying nothing or smallish daypacks but with passions for photography, botanizing, birding, standing around in awe of the fabulous views and interesting vegetation, and frequently exclaiming, “THAT’S AMAZING!” – in reference to the huge loads porters were carrying or what the locals were doing in their terraced fields or the pony caravans, etc. -- those time-to-hike estimates need to be at least doubled.  I didn’t keep track, but I bet we hiked and walked and stood around taking pictures or looking at birds or plants or the waterfalls or streams or mountains or other trekkers or the local farmers, housekeepers, or artisans for 48 to 60 hours over 7 days.  Our shortest hiking day was about three hours and longest was around five.  

Hours of trekking takes into account both the quality of the trails and the elevation gain and loss. For each interval of each trek described, the Trekking Guide gives an estimate of the meters of elevation gain or loss or both.  On our “Nepali walk in the park” we ascended 8,085 feet and descended 8,019 feet for a total of 16,104 vertical feet gained and lost.  In this data we now have some number that make much more sense to my tender knees and well-exercised leg muscles than describing the walk as covering “18.9 miles over moderate terrain in 7 days of hiking interrupted for stops for snacks and a hot lunch with a porter and helper carrying everything I brought along.”

Well, dear reader, now you know how long – or is it how “tall”-- our trek was: 16,104 vertical feet (or 4.5 times up and 4.1 times down our Empire State Building).

Now that I have gotten this self-assignment off my chest and sent to you from my computer, I’ll get busy writing a couple of installments of “Our Trek Day-by-Day” for you. AS you have noticed, the trek descriptions written in May are posted in chronological order with the rest of the trip.