GHT trip report
13 Nov 2016 09:59 #70198
by AndrewP
Replied by AndrewP on topic GHT trip report
Tumlingtar to Pashupatinagar
Back to the lowlands and rural settlements. I chose upfront to dodge rice paddies and jungle and to go via roads where possible. Self navigation with limited Nepalese kind of forces this choice, but more importantly I was just mentally tired and wanted a brainless few days into the finish. I actually believe it might be shorter as well. The road bends are obvious and huge. But, that winding about between levels of the rice paddies adds up. and paths do also zig zag on hills just as much as the shortcuts I could take through the steep sections on the roads.
I set off from Tumlingtar in the dark, and initially refused to even take shortcuts when the road zigzagged. The zigzags show up well on my GPS, but a path into the jungle can actually go anywhere.
One of my highlights of the day was to correctly identify a village I was passing through as one I had seen on Google Earth weeks before. I knew there was a shortcut out of it, and found the track down the ridge easily enough.
This was offset in a nasty way when my second shortcut of the day failed to materialise. It just was not there, or even close. Maybe I dreamt it while looking at Google Earth, or maybe I just dorked copying the track from one tool to another. Anyway, this added an extra 20km to my planned day of 60km.
As a result, the day between Tumlingtar and Tehrathum was in terms of both distance and time my longest day, coming in at 78 km.
I spent a lot of the day high on a ridge and at one point was dehydrated enough to just about down a 2l coke. Bad move, the fizzy gas went down and caused a lot of stops later in the afternoon to come back out. Despite this, I still got in my first sub 30 minute 5km. It was down a mine shaft but am counting it regardless.
I got into Tehrathum after dark making this the only day where I both started and finished in the dark. Tehrathum is in a lovely position, perched on top of a ridge. I could see it from miles away.
Next morning, I had to escape Tehrathum, cross a 1000m deep valley and get through the forest to the road beyond. My map had a few discontinuous trails on it. But not enough. Google earth was useless here as well. I thus decided to tackle this in daylight and avoided a predawn start. Considering that the previous day was actually the longest on the trip, this may have been good anyway. For the first time in ages my knees actually felt okay the whole day.
It took a few tries to get onto the correct path on the correct ridge, but once in the right place I could easily work way down to the river. The path is pretty small and indistinct. But a road also zigzaged down so I always had a backup plan.
I had tea on the other side of the river before heading up the hill. This time I had seen the shortcuts to the road zigzags already, so found them all. The road finally splits, just at the point where my map started a straight line through the forest. I took the split with most vehicle tracks on it. Shortly afterwards I saw a path heading straight up the hill, and could luckily confirm with a local that this was indeed a shortcut. Fine, but what to do when the path itself splits? Nobody around now, so gut feel took over. After several such choices some of which may not have been ideal, I finally rejoined the road again and could now follow it into the village.
From here, a road led all the way to Ilam. It was actually lovely. It mostly follows a ridge. You get views, a breeze and lots of delightful villages to pass through. Traffic could only go so fast on the uneven road, so was not really a problem. At one point I played leapfrog with a particular jeep for over 40 minutes.
One of the villages had a ferris wheel going round and round. I was tempted to stop and take a ride, but by then I was in let's finish mode.
I stopped early that day because I could not reach Ilam before 8pm and did not feel like knocking on hotel doors to try wake hotel owners from sleep. With nothing else marked on my map, I stopped at Ranke Bazaar for the night. I chanced upon a hotel that must have the best food in town based on the number of locals who joined in for dinner. I often had the place to myself. This time they had about 30 diners. Well done to the kitchen staff for churning out that much dahl baht. But as that is the only item on the menu, I suppose it is just a matter of getting the quantity correct.
By now, I had also noticed that here, the language is very different to what I had before. Not that I could understand the previous guys, but the new one was totally impossible with weird hand gestures thrown. I was totally clueless whenever anyone tried speaking to me.
Oh, and for the first time on the trip, dogs stopped ignoring me. Nothing more than a bark though.
On the final morning, I set off at 4am. The GPS indicated 81km to go, but I hoped to sneak in a few shortcuts on the road zigzagging up the steep hills. I did the initial bit of road while it was still quiet which was great. I went faster than expected, I suppose due to some incentive.
Ilam was one of the biggest towns I saw on the entire trip. It had an entire street full of jewellery shops, and more ATM's than the rest of the trip combined. Here, I stopped for samoosas as an early lunch, although in a large town this is not as easy as I would have thought.
I then set off down the final hill. Some really slick navigation and the correct questions to locals got me onto a really great shortcut. I had finally cracked the code of just what to ask. This got me down to a low and hot altitude with a big hill just in time for the warmest time of day. Well done, Andrew, but it had been coming all along.
I got up the hill okay, mainly because taking shortcuts decreases your distance to go very rapidly. Which made feel as though I was doing something. Actual distance covered was not so great of course. I sneaked in enough shortcuts to cut those 81km down to 70km.
Somewhere on the climb, I stopped at a tea house. This one was different though in that it was linked to a local tea estate. I had really fresh tea and found out the all important titbit that tea comes from a bush and not a tree. Pretty soon afterwards I passed through a tea estate. It made for a pleasant change in scenery and as tea had helped fuel my trip, it seemed a fitting part of the finish.
At 3pm (with all available shortcuts used up) I called Nawang to give an etc of about 7 - 8 pm. This really was the first moment I had an idea of how far I still had to go, and thus my first opportunity to estimate the time remaining.
Well, the road then flattened out and I did what anyone in my position should. I ran. And ran some more. All of a sudden, it looked like I might at least see Pashupatinagar before it got dark, so I ran more.
Pashupatinagar is well hidden on the ridge so I did not see it, but I actually got into town while it was still light. I had switched on my headlamp to be visible to vehicles but not to see for myself.
I passed the hotel Nawang had checked into and suddenly had energy to run the final 500m even though it was a fairly steep uphill.
I saw a boom across the road and signs for a police checkpoint at the top of the ridge so stopped and saved all my GPS tracks, waypoints and such like. Then I saw that I was not there yet and after a few questions realised the border was still 160m away. So I set off again, this time tagging the correct end point. I had done it!
I took a leisurely walk back down the hill to a well deserved rest.
The best part to the next morning was that I could switch the alarm off and sleep in. At lunch time, Nawang and I got onto a bus for a 22 hour ride back to Kathmandu. Mountain passes, driving through the night, landslide debris and oncoming traffic being the order of the trip.
Sunrise, after leaving Tumlingtar
One of my more fun shortcuts. The open ridge made it possible to see from high up that this was actually going to go
More typical one, is this heading to a homestead of the shortcut I am looking for?
I am glad I was not here when that was all mud
The ridge towards Ilam. That is the village with the ferris wheel. Delightful place to be
Passing through the village itself
My final night. That is pretty well all I was carrying by then
One of the less likely looking shortcuts, but it went
Tea estate country
Coming into Pashupatinagar
Back to the lowlands and rural settlements. I chose upfront to dodge rice paddies and jungle and to go via roads where possible. Self navigation with limited Nepalese kind of forces this choice, but more importantly I was just mentally tired and wanted a brainless few days into the finish. I actually believe it might be shorter as well. The road bends are obvious and huge. But, that winding about between levels of the rice paddies adds up. and paths do also zig zag on hills just as much as the shortcuts I could take through the steep sections on the roads.
I set off from Tumlingtar in the dark, and initially refused to even take shortcuts when the road zigzagged. The zigzags show up well on my GPS, but a path into the jungle can actually go anywhere.
One of my highlights of the day was to correctly identify a village I was passing through as one I had seen on Google Earth weeks before. I knew there was a shortcut out of it, and found the track down the ridge easily enough.
This was offset in a nasty way when my second shortcut of the day failed to materialise. It just was not there, or even close. Maybe I dreamt it while looking at Google Earth, or maybe I just dorked copying the track from one tool to another. Anyway, this added an extra 20km to my planned day of 60km.
As a result, the day between Tumlingtar and Tehrathum was in terms of both distance and time my longest day, coming in at 78 km.
I spent a lot of the day high on a ridge and at one point was dehydrated enough to just about down a 2l coke. Bad move, the fizzy gas went down and caused a lot of stops later in the afternoon to come back out. Despite this, I still got in my first sub 30 minute 5km. It was down a mine shaft but am counting it regardless.
I got into Tehrathum after dark making this the only day where I both started and finished in the dark. Tehrathum is in a lovely position, perched on top of a ridge. I could see it from miles away.
Next morning, I had to escape Tehrathum, cross a 1000m deep valley and get through the forest to the road beyond. My map had a few discontinuous trails on it. But not enough. Google earth was useless here as well. I thus decided to tackle this in daylight and avoided a predawn start. Considering that the previous day was actually the longest on the trip, this may have been good anyway. For the first time in ages my knees actually felt okay the whole day.
It took a few tries to get onto the correct path on the correct ridge, but once in the right place I could easily work way down to the river. The path is pretty small and indistinct. But a road also zigzaged down so I always had a backup plan.
I had tea on the other side of the river before heading up the hill. This time I had seen the shortcuts to the road zigzags already, so found them all. The road finally splits, just at the point where my map started a straight line through the forest. I took the split with most vehicle tracks on it. Shortly afterwards I saw a path heading straight up the hill, and could luckily confirm with a local that this was indeed a shortcut. Fine, but what to do when the path itself splits? Nobody around now, so gut feel took over. After several such choices some of which may not have been ideal, I finally rejoined the road again and could now follow it into the village.
From here, a road led all the way to Ilam. It was actually lovely. It mostly follows a ridge. You get views, a breeze and lots of delightful villages to pass through. Traffic could only go so fast on the uneven road, so was not really a problem. At one point I played leapfrog with a particular jeep for over 40 minutes.
One of the villages had a ferris wheel going round and round. I was tempted to stop and take a ride, but by then I was in let's finish mode.
I stopped early that day because I could not reach Ilam before 8pm and did not feel like knocking on hotel doors to try wake hotel owners from sleep. With nothing else marked on my map, I stopped at Ranke Bazaar for the night. I chanced upon a hotel that must have the best food in town based on the number of locals who joined in for dinner. I often had the place to myself. This time they had about 30 diners. Well done to the kitchen staff for churning out that much dahl baht. But as that is the only item on the menu, I suppose it is just a matter of getting the quantity correct.
By now, I had also noticed that here, the language is very different to what I had before. Not that I could understand the previous guys, but the new one was totally impossible with weird hand gestures thrown. I was totally clueless whenever anyone tried speaking to me.
Oh, and for the first time on the trip, dogs stopped ignoring me. Nothing more than a bark though.
On the final morning, I set off at 4am. The GPS indicated 81km to go, but I hoped to sneak in a few shortcuts on the road zigzagging up the steep hills. I did the initial bit of road while it was still quiet which was great. I went faster than expected, I suppose due to some incentive.
Ilam was one of the biggest towns I saw on the entire trip. It had an entire street full of jewellery shops, and more ATM's than the rest of the trip combined. Here, I stopped for samoosas as an early lunch, although in a large town this is not as easy as I would have thought.
I then set off down the final hill. Some really slick navigation and the correct questions to locals got me onto a really great shortcut. I had finally cracked the code of just what to ask. This got me down to a low and hot altitude with a big hill just in time for the warmest time of day. Well done, Andrew, but it had been coming all along.
I got up the hill okay, mainly because taking shortcuts decreases your distance to go very rapidly. Which made feel as though I was doing something. Actual distance covered was not so great of course. I sneaked in enough shortcuts to cut those 81km down to 70km.
Somewhere on the climb, I stopped at a tea house. This one was different though in that it was linked to a local tea estate. I had really fresh tea and found out the all important titbit that tea comes from a bush and not a tree. Pretty soon afterwards I passed through a tea estate. It made for a pleasant change in scenery and as tea had helped fuel my trip, it seemed a fitting part of the finish.
At 3pm (with all available shortcuts used up) I called Nawang to give an etc of about 7 - 8 pm. This really was the first moment I had an idea of how far I still had to go, and thus my first opportunity to estimate the time remaining.
Well, the road then flattened out and I did what anyone in my position should. I ran. And ran some more. All of a sudden, it looked like I might at least see Pashupatinagar before it got dark, so I ran more.
Pashupatinagar is well hidden on the ridge so I did not see it, but I actually got into town while it was still light. I had switched on my headlamp to be visible to vehicles but not to see for myself.
I passed the hotel Nawang had checked into and suddenly had energy to run the final 500m even though it was a fairly steep uphill.
I saw a boom across the road and signs for a police checkpoint at the top of the ridge so stopped and saved all my GPS tracks, waypoints and such like. Then I saw that I was not there yet and after a few questions realised the border was still 160m away. So I set off again, this time tagging the correct end point. I had done it!
I took a leisurely walk back down the hill to a well deserved rest.
The best part to the next morning was that I could switch the alarm off and sleep in. At lunch time, Nawang and I got onto a bus for a 22 hour ride back to Kathmandu. Mountain passes, driving through the night, landslide debris and oncoming traffic being the order of the trip.
Sunrise, after leaving Tumlingtar
One of my more fun shortcuts. The open ridge made it possible to see from high up that this was actually going to go
More typical one, is this heading to a homestead of the shortcut I am looking for?
I am glad I was not here when that was all mud
The ridge towards Ilam. That is the village with the ferris wheel. Delightful place to be
Passing through the village itself
My final night. That is pretty well all I was carrying by then
One of the less likely looking shortcuts, but it went
Tea estate country
Coming into Pashupatinagar
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The following user(s) said Thank You: Andreas
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13 Nov 2016 10:18 #70200
by AndrewP
Replied by AndrewP on topic GHT trip report
With hindsight, the chosen route was really great. I experienced high mountain passes, remote valleys, forests, jungles, rice paddies, bamboo and all the key settlement types in Nepal ranging from remote mountain to rural hillsides to proper towns. Being my first trip to Nepal, I had not really known what to expect, but this exceeded all expectations. In a single trip, I really got to see just about everything Nepal has to offer.
If I look through the photos (probably about 2000 in total) I took along the way, I am grinning from ear to ear in all of them. This tells me a lot. Somehow, I found a way to see the positives and to enjoy myself. Each day. Strangely, I never considered quiting, not even for the briefest fraction of a second. The enjoyment out there and the genuine desire to see what surprise was tucked away around the next corner keep me going.
You could say I took a soft option by staying in lodges instead of a tent. But, that carried an element of risk and forced me to adjust a few days to be longer or shorter than I otherwise would have. As for the food, has anyone done something like this before fueled entirely on dahl baht, rice, tea and coconut cookies? All of this made for a very uncertain experience.
Once again, thanks to all the support and encouragement everyone gave.
Also thanks to Stijn for a little lesson, namely that you do not have to run a 40 hour GT if the record is 104 hours. This is especially important if you consider that the longest hike or run or cycling trip I had done before this was about 300km. I was so out of my depth, it was not funny.
Key Stats are as follows:
Distance covered: 1406 km
68440 m ascent
69943 m descent
1.8 million steps taken
Total time taken: 28 days, 13 hours and 56 minutes
Weight loss of 4kg
My shortest day was 21km, and I had 6 days of over 60km.
The day between Chharka Bhot and Kagbeni is the day I am most pleased with. Not only was it 67km long, with a significant amount of it above 4000m, but it had that "I simply have to pull it off" feel to it.
Rough summaries for each section are:
To Simikot
75,5 km, 3080m gain, 1 day
To Jupal
234,8 km, 14150m gain, 6 days
Dolpo area
184,4 km, 10230m gain, 5 days
Annapurna and Manaslu
285,3 km, 11020m gain, 6 days
To Shivalaya
278,2 km, 11500m gain, 5 days
To Tumlingtar
147,9 km, 9970m gain, 3 days
To Pashupatinagar
199,8 km, 8470m gain, 2 days 14 hours
If I look through the photos (probably about 2000 in total) I took along the way, I am grinning from ear to ear in all of them. This tells me a lot. Somehow, I found a way to see the positives and to enjoy myself. Each day. Strangely, I never considered quiting, not even for the briefest fraction of a second. The enjoyment out there and the genuine desire to see what surprise was tucked away around the next corner keep me going.
You could say I took a soft option by staying in lodges instead of a tent. But, that carried an element of risk and forced me to adjust a few days to be longer or shorter than I otherwise would have. As for the food, has anyone done something like this before fueled entirely on dahl baht, rice, tea and coconut cookies? All of this made for a very uncertain experience.
Once again, thanks to all the support and encouragement everyone gave.
Also thanks to Stijn for a little lesson, namely that you do not have to run a 40 hour GT if the record is 104 hours. This is especially important if you consider that the longest hike or run or cycling trip I had done before this was about 300km. I was so out of my depth, it was not funny.
Key Stats are as follows:
Distance covered: 1406 km
68440 m ascent
69943 m descent
1.8 million steps taken
Total time taken: 28 days, 13 hours and 56 minutes
Weight loss of 4kg
My shortest day was 21km, and I had 6 days of over 60km.
The day between Chharka Bhot and Kagbeni is the day I am most pleased with. Not only was it 67km long, with a significant amount of it above 4000m, but it had that "I simply have to pull it off" feel to it.
Rough summaries for each section are:
To Simikot
75,5 km, 3080m gain, 1 day
To Jupal
234,8 km, 14150m gain, 6 days
Dolpo area
184,4 km, 10230m gain, 5 days
Annapurna and Manaslu
285,3 km, 11020m gain, 6 days
To Shivalaya
278,2 km, 11500m gain, 5 days
To Tumlingtar
147,9 km, 9970m gain, 3 days
To Pashupatinagar
199,8 km, 8470m gain, 2 days 14 hours
The following user(s) said Thank You: elinda, Stijn, tonymarshall, Drakensbergie, saros, Andreas, KylePease, Coeta, Christinejvr
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