One last trick

I mean... one last trek

After 3 days of (uneventful) rest in Leh I was ready for another adventure- with Ben (the legend) still being around this 'adventure' was bound to be a trek! so here goes... my brife report on the Marka Valley trek!

An outline-It is... Ladakh's mopst popular trek.

It takes... 1 day's walk and one mountain pass (of 4900meters) to get into the valley and one day walk and 1 pass (5260 meters) to get out of the valley.

Day 1

Route: Leh- Spitok (bus) then Spitok- Rombak (8hrs)

Lowlight: I got ill from dehydration (from the day before) so from morning through the 8 hour trek I felt like death! I had diahroeah, a fever, a headach, stomache ache etc etc etc. It was horrendus!

Highlight: Getting to the home stay, drinking mint tea and sleeping for 11 hours straight (I was in bed at 8.30)

Notes: Met a Belgium guy called Anthony who walked with us all day.

1) me and ben the legend... the scenery was... something like this

Day 2

Route:Rombak- Shingu (6 hours) over 1 pass 4900 meters

Lowlight: Bad weather- It was cloudy and cold especially going over the pass.

Highlight: When we got to the homestay there was a little crew of people and we played cards well into the night.

Notes: none

Day 3

Route: Shingu- Chaluk (7 hours)

Lowlight: got blisters (bloody nike court force trainers - who would wear them to go trekking anyway!)

Highlight: There was no one in at the home stay so we stayed with a local guy called Tashy- who was an absoloute character. It was like reliving the angmo story. He was so hospitable, so kind and despite his lack of english he was incredibly funny!

2) Mr Tashy!

Notes: Tashy told us the reason that the village was empty was because there was an important rimposhe (monk) passsing through the valley!

Day 4

Route:Chaluk to Hanker

Highlight: We found the monk... and his 650 followers! About half was thugh the day we saw a line of what looked like red ants- it turns out theat they were all monks and the monk was quite an important dude! He had an entorage of monks from all over the world, there were over 250 ponies and they had been walking for 5weeks! It was quite a sight

Lowlight: We walked with with the monks all day and when we eventually got to out destination an Australian woman came up (fom the monk crew) to us and told us that we were not really invited to take part in the festivities because we had "not got explicit permission from His Holiness". she was a bit of a snotty b***h to be honest. She was probably annoyed that she has had to pay hundreds of dollars to walk with " His Holyness" and we had found him (accidently) for free. To be honest we didn't really mind because we came to walk not hang around some monk dude but it was a bit unfriendly.

3) a (long) line of monks, which at first looked like red ants

Notes: We met an Israli guy who walked the rest of the way with us!

Day 5

Route: Hanker to Nimaling

Highlight:Was the most beautiful day of trekking, we climbed for most of the day passing several lakes, some live stock but not a single humal being. When we got to Nimaling there was no homestay but a number of tents for us to stay in. The person who ran the tents was bust seeing the lama so we stayed for free!

Lowlight: We camped at 4700 meters which was high enough to be incredibly cold one the sun set and I had a wee bit of altitude sickness.

4) a sunset at 4,700 meters!

Day 6 Route: Nimaling to Sham Sundo

Highlight: we climbed over the 5260 pass- the views were predictaly amazing and the scence of acomplishment was tremendous. We then walked down hill for the rest of the day (yeah) to a wonderful hoimestay... perfect.

5) we did it... the top of the world!

Lowlight: None... all days should be like this one!

Day 7

Route: Shamsundo- Hemis (2 hours) and Hemis to Leh (bus)

Highlight: after the 2 hour walk we were greated by a stunning monestry (the finesst in ladakh) and a puja (prayer time for the monks). There was a great atmosphere around the place, the anticipation of the arrival of the monk (who was ending his trek in Hemis) was palpable!. From Hemis it was back to Leh for a shower and some good food!

Notes: Me and Ben had been dreaming of good food (especially our favourite chicken tika) and a beer for the last 2 days of the trek. The food in the homestays was very basic and neither me nor ben had had a beer since our arrival in Ladakh (5 weeks for me and over 2 months for ben). We felt it was time to break the thurst. However, when we got to Leh we found out that it was a dry day which meant no chicken and no beer. Bloody tipical!

Note: I'll repete it again- not a single drop of alcohol had passed my lips in over a month. Anyone who knows me, Stella can Sam, will know how suprising that is! Also, we has chicken and beer the following day- it was goooooooooooooooood!

6) Puja

I know i'm really sorry... last post I promised to tell you all about me and the most famous Tibetan alive. But... you'll just have to tune in next week to read about my experience with H.H.D.L!