Tourists love tigers

On the last day of the hike, Sasha asked if we were sorry that the hike was ending. I cheerfully answered that no - he was, and that’s good, now we need to set the next goal. And so, on the way to Pokhara, I realized - I want to go back! Gaining 1200 meters and losing 1000 along endless steps, brushing your teeth in the company of a giant furry moth, looking at the “fish tail”, painfully sharp in the first morning rays, crossing icy rivers, wandering through a saucer field, peering into the distorted perspective of Tent Peak (somewhere there Chinese climbers set up their advanced camp)… The Himalayas are addictive. This is the place that clears your head. They help you understand what you are made of and what you can do.

The journey begins

All the recommendations were read, the equipment was collected, there was silence in the refrigerator, and on October 3rd we headed to the airport. We met part of the group back in Sheremetyevo - Yulia and Zhenya from Vologda and Vika from Kazan flew with us on the same plane. Together we had to sit through a 9-hour layover at Sharjah airport. It was surprisingly easy: everyone turned out to be pleasant and interesting interlocutors.

On Kirill's advice, we immediately took a seat in a carpeted room. But they made a tactical mistake - they hid in the corner section. Don't do it! Besides us, the corner attracted very specific comrades. Comrades slept under and behind the seats. Sometimes several people at once. Sometimes they even managed to squeeze between the chair and the handrail.

The names of cities flashed on the board. Some were familiar from the geography course, some from Exupéry’s books, but most of them I heard for the first time.

The final call here is precisely a “call”: a special person runs out into the waiting room and shouts “Agadir!” in a shrill, guttural voice. Until you get the result. In response to the scream, several crawlers roll out from under the bench, grab hand luggage (towel, shoes) and, not yet really waking up, run wherever they are shown.

The food court has McDonald's, Meth café, Indian and Chinese restaurants, a halal snack bar and a coffee shop. In general, we had something to occupy ourselves besides reading and talking. Overall, the blessed Sharjah airport is livable. It's possible, but not necessary. At 8 o'clock in the morning we plunged into the belly of a Boeing flying to Kathmandu...

I looked out of the plane window. To the left and right, as far as the eye could see, there were white downy expanses without beginning or end. The plane had already begun its descent in front of Kathmandu airport, and I was hoping to see what Nepal was like from the air. The clouds swirled, but one remained motionless. And then I realized that this was not a cloud. I looked at the Himalayas. The Himalayan ridge rises 6-8 thousand meters - this is above the cloud level. It’s very easy to talk about it, read it in a geography textbook, but it’s a completely different matter to look at it with your own eyes. I understand why people tend to place gods on mountain tops: it is impossible to imagine what our reality is there, behind the clouds. Still, thousands of people climb the jagged, cold slopes. I should go there too, but closer to Kathmandu and 4 thousand meters lower.

Kathmandu

This is what any major Soviet airport might have looked like in the 1970s. Without computers, with a lot of similar workers, with poor ventilation, but with wooden trim. Everyone immediately lines up at the registration desks. While we are standing, we can send a messenger to the tables by the windows to get registration cards. They must be filled out according to foreigners. passports. You will need 2 3x4 photos. The visa is issued directly during registration. It costs $25.

While we are standing there, you can change $10 at the exchange office for a taxi and small expenses. And look at your fellow travelers. Here are three young Americans, with baubles and dreadlocks. Here are a couple of lean Germans with legs like ostriches. Here is a Spanish family of trekking enthusiasts: everyone has light backpacks, even the three-year-old toddler.

Here we learned for the first time the principle of non-violence: during registration, a cockroach crawled onto the table and wiggled its mustache very positively. The customs officer laughed and brushed it off with his hand. Didn't smear, didn't slam. Who knows what you will become in your next life?..

And then the first mess happened. The luggage did not arrive. Giant string bags with blankets, tube TVs and backpacks of passengers from the Czech Republic and Poland crawled sadly on the tape. Passengers played Nepalese Roulette: the one who saw something similar to his luggage in these piles climbed straight onto the belt and threw the bale onto the floor. This was followed by either a joyful cry (it worked) or a disappointed sniffle (it didn’t). The “wrong thing” remained lying on the floor. The fact that the passengers did not throw away for the arrival of the next flight was dumped by the gloomy airport employees.

After waiting until the flight from the Philippines arrived, we realized that our backpacks were somewhere in the flight. Just in case, we rummaged through the chomolangmas of unidentified luggage. We filed a claim. We found out that the next Airarabia flight arrives at 23:00, and there is a chance that our luggage will arrive there. At least, I really wanted to hope so, because the next one arrived in the morning of the next day, when, according to the schedule of the hike, we were already supposed to go to Pokhara.

In doubt, we got into a taxi and went to the hotel. Taxi cost to the tourist quarter of Thamel: 800 rupees - a lot (the cost of a minibus for 6 people), 200 rupees - a great success. You should aim for 300-400 rupees.

The first day was spent understanding the rules of behavior on the route, getting acquainted with that part of the group that was already there, having lunch and waiting for the luggage to arrive. We decided to pass the time by walking through the tourist shops of the Thamel quarter. All major brands are represented, but you should look for branded items only in branded stores (there are less than a dozen of them; in non-branded stores you can come across outright counterfeits). They contain current collections, that is, what the manufacturer actually released this year. This may sound strange, but buying an item from this year’s collection in Moscow is a big problem: buyers wait for sales, buy up previous collections and sell them under the guise of fresh ones - for “fresh” prices. Therefore, it is worth going through the branded stores of the same Marmot, Salewa and North Face, at least for cultural and educational purposes. But if you want to get dressed, put on your shoes and wrap yourself in a sleeping bag with a comfortable temperature of -30 degrees, there are very right places for this.

At the same time, I got used to the Nepalese specifics. A typical Kathmandu street is a trench the width of a fallen refrigerator. Two small cars are trying to squeeze into it at the same time. Since the street is a shopping street, yak wool sweaters, T-shirts, hats are hanging onto the road from the first floors of the houses - all with Angry birds (there is some kind of cult of “Angry Birds” in the country), maps, patches, sellers... The seller of each shop will wish you namaste and in the couple of seconds it takes you to pass by, he will try to sell you everything he has. In parallel, several cyclists and, possibly, a motorcyclist will try to squeeze between the cars, you and the seller.

On a small folding table lie the remains of a rooster. His living brother is immediately tied by the leg. Next to him, children build a pyramid of sand and dust and eat one piece of candy for all of them. The owner of the house took the garbage that had accumulated from yesterday onto the road, set it on fire, and now proudly inspects the surroundings, in the smoke and dust, like Kutuzov during Borodin.

The wires are not removed. When the old ones stop “conducting,” new ones are wound on top of them. Original Kathmanda is so original!

We were lucky - our luggage actually arrived at 23:00. Happy, we grabbed our backpacks and rushed to the hotel to get some sleep before heading to Pokhara. The journey has truly begun.

To the White Stupa

The journey to Pokhara takes 8 hours. If a marathon of running, swimming and cycling is called "Iron Man", then an eight-hour marathon on a bus can be called "Iron Ass". Sleeping is scary. Bye. You quickly forget that the country drives on the right. If you manage to sit in the first seats, then when you wake up, you see a truck rushing towards you at full speed. It becomes uneasy. That's why we don't sleep and look out the window. Along the roadsides there are houses made of cardboard and sticks, children, animals, brisk trade.

The billboards in the city almost all feature Indian actors. There are fewer Europeans, but they also exist. The main thing is that everyone is white-skinned. But almost everyone who moves along the street on foot is very dark.

A local feature is the advertising that is painted on the walls. San Miguel beer is especially popular.

A little about movement. The most popular recognizable car brands are Indian Tata and Mahindra. Trucks and buses are covered with signs with inscriptions in Sanskrit, garlands, flowers, drawings of blue-skinned deities... When braking, the pads do not even creak, but crunch. Some city buses and cars look as if they are moving only because the driver believes that they should move and really wants it to. Beeping precedes, explains and excuses any maneuver.

In short, driving like this, on such transport and on such roads, without believing in rebirth, is simply unrealistic. Therefore, the main religion of Nepal is Buddhism. He is here to drive and help you live.

Finally we arrive at the place. Pokhara is a much cleaner, quieter and smaller town. It stands on the shore of Lake Fewa. The main part of the routes to Annapurna starts from here, so there are a lot of tourists. The embankment (Lakeside) serves as the local promenade and Thamel: the main eateries and shops are concentrated here. This is no longer relevant to us, so we leave our things at the hotel and go to stretch our legs.

The local population either initially sees the world as colorful, or tries to paint it in all possible colors. Having rented several eye-catchingly bright boats at the pier of Lake Fewa, we sail to the island. There is a temple of Varaha (one of the incarnations of Vishnu), but it is notable not only for the temple, but also for a flock of lazy pigeons and even lazier fat carp. However, their laziness does not extend to food. Food can be bought on the same island, from a seller of rattles, fans and postcards with views of the lake.

While the insatiable carp finish their prey, we again load into the boats and sail to the other side of the lake. We moor and begin the first climb. No backpacks, but also no trekking poles. The limbs are indignant at first, but quickly adapt.

The White Peace Stupa was built by Buddhist monks of one of the Japanese Buddhist schools. Construction was not easy for them, and it’s not just a matter of funding - it was just generous. During the construction of the stupa, one of the monks was killed. In this way, the extremists wanted to frighten the Buddhists and prevent them from completing their work. This did not help - the stupa was completed, and at its base the brothers installed a bust of the deceased.

We take off our shoes, climb to the very top, and then with the most pious thoughts we descend through the levels of the stupa, always clockwise! If everything is done correctly, wishes will come true, and happiness, peace and prosperity will come to life. Even if not everything is done correctly, Buddhism is extremely peaceful: something will still be good.

While going down, we met a buffalo calf. And a little later - with his mother. She was probably afraid that we would teach her son bad things, so she fussed around stupidly. At the same time, a vertical jungle begins immediately outside the track, and falling into it means securing yourself a giant slalom with obstacles.

Nevertheless, we safely descended to the boats. We swam on boats to the pier. From the pier we got to the restaurant, where we had a heroic dinner, and then made a decisive dash to the hotel.

Staircase of a Thousand Steps

In the morning, a smaller bus was waiting for us near the hotel. The brakes were also grinding, the driver was just as cheerful, more and more original trucks were driving towards us, so for the entire two hours we diligently looked out the windows and tried not to look at the windshield. There are fewer settlements, more nature. Through the window you can constantly see Nepal's longest river — the Karnali. She either hides in a deep gorge, or roars somewhere nearby.

But here comes Nayapul. From the highest point - the roof of either the bus stop, or simply the central building - a rooster greets us. Next - with your feet. It's about an hour's walk to the checkpoint. The road is dusty, along the sides there is again a row of identical shops selling identical goods. So we are very happy when they end. And they end in front of the bridge. The group registers, officially sets out on the route - and here the real Big Journey begins.

Here we started moving in the same way that we continued along the entire route: Kirill walked first, the second instructor Sasha walked last. Both had a walkie-talkie, and on average there was a communication session every half hour. But in the first days this was not so important: the group had not yet expanded, no one was in a hurry, everyone was waiting for everyone.

The very first day gave us a gift in the form of a “ladder of a thousand steps.” In fact, there are approximately 1750 steps. It turned out to be very easy to walk: the steps are made of smooth, flat stones, the height of the steps is from 10 to 30 (rarely) centimeters. Every 100-200 meters of the climb there is an island for resting - an elevation with wide sides on which you can put a backpack.

In parallel with us, several groups and countless numbers of single and double tourists are climbing. Similar groups and local residents descend towards us, accompanied by goats, cows and donkeys with luggage. Chickens and children graze peacefully.

One of the most important conditions for a calm ascent (after even breathing, of course) is to come to terms with the fact that goats, cows, buffaloes and chickens shit everywhere. After this, exhale, inhale and boldly place your foot in any place that seems comfortable.

Kirill constantly repeated that we needed to gain altitude gradually, as slowly as possible. So everyone has time to look around properly. Attentiveness immediately brings results - a strange fruit is found, similar to a tiny watermelon. Alas, what was found inside was white-green, not bright red, flesh.

Our first stop was overhanging the mountain. After lunch the clouds began to rise, and it was difficult for us to appreciate the surroundings, except to try to understand how many thousands of meters there were in the neighboring hill. The five-thousanders appeared only in the morning - and with them Machapuchare beckoned with the fish tail.

After a warm shower and a hearty dinner, singing and playing Monopoly begin in the wardroom.

Several yoga freaks have expressed a desire to start their mornings with sun salutations. Well, the sun really returned the greeting and was favorable to us. At the same time, the daughter of the owner of the house came out to bask in the sun with a baby and a laptop, spread the whole thing on a blanket and began communicating on Skype, alternately turning the monitor to the mountains, then to us, then to the child.

The first height and the precious road

The Himalayas are surprising in that all the lights that you see after the sun sets will be burning in lodges - small hotels and homesteads located strictly along the route. 100 meters up and down – that’s all. Black, huge uninhabited forests. Night, by the way, comes instantly: at 17:00 it is still light, at 17:15 the sun sets behind the nearest mountain, at 17:40 - impenetrable, inky darkness. Huge stars are visible in the low sky.

If we usually arrive at our overnight stay at about 3 o’clock in the afternoon, we reached Ghorepani much earlier. And we went to acclimatize on Poon Hill (3210 m). The climb is easy; there is a paved road leading up. There is no one at the top, the observation tower sticks out alone, the mountain is gradually covered with clouds, it becomes dank. We whine in different voices that acclimatization is cold and boring, but Kirill is adamant, and we continue to get used to it. When the cloud creeps right onto the observation tower, it becomes completely unbearable, and we begin to slowly descend.

In the evening we recharge ourselves with apple pie and make plans for the morning: at 5 o’clock a ceremonial exit to the top is planned to watch the sunrise on the same Poon Hill.

The next morning you won't know the way. In complete darkness, a multinational crowd wanders upstairs. Why are there so many people in small Ghorepani? How many people are already at the top?

On the way up, I lose sight of Kirill and Dima and completely inappropriately remember the film “The Expendables 2”. I try to run up the slope, overtaking the slowly wandering Germans. In vain. I shouldn't have done it. Since I'm not a war veteran or even actor Liam Hemsworth, my heart started pounding very quickly. I had to lose five minutes just to catch my breath.

But how the peak has changed! Firstly, people in bright clothes turned it into a tourist anthill. The earliest ones have already taken places along the perimeter of the tower. The slightly less fortunate crowded the stairs to the top. The rest prefer to drink hot tea and look at the beauty from below. Secondly, and most importantly! – the clouds cleared. The Nilgiri, Dhaulagiri and all three Annapurna sisters are now visible from Poon Hill. This is an incredible sight. When the first ray of sun appears from behind the foothills, a collective gasp of admiration escapes from the crowd at the top of Poon Hill. Cameras are buzzing. The viscous golden light becomes more and more intense, it turns red, shimmers - and now that very moment for which we drove ourselves up at dawn - the top of Dhaulagiri lights up scarlet!

It's easy to make new friends in a multilingual chaos. We exchange a few words with a Dutch-Danish couple: the girl says that they have been living in Ghorepani for more than a week, they come here every morning, but this is the first time they have seen such a stir.

Having looked at the pink and white mountains to our hearts’ content, we go down to breakfast.

Today we are walking along some magical road - every stone glitters with golden crumbs. When I noticed this glitter for the first time, a thought flashed through my head: someone dropped and trampled on the eye shadow. Since my head works in the background during pedestrian crossings, the second thought caught up with me about five minutes later - who and why are there shadows here? This is not the first and certainly not the last time I have to regret not having time to stop and take a picture of it. But I will remember.

Alas, even the shine underfoot does not save you from endless steps. But the stairs still end up at Mountain View Lodge. This is the first flat ground since we left Pokhara. The terrace on which the lodge stands looks like a small golf course: two horses conscientiously eat up the grass, and a giant matriarch chicken walks behind them. Damn, I can't find her photo!

Before bed I run into Dima. He makes a scary face and complains that his room with Kirill and Sasha smells like socks. It’s an everyday matter, of course, but not a real one. After this conversation, Dima went to the room, climbed into his sleeping bag and was already beginning to pass out when he heard the Sound. The sound was so strange that it was difficult to compare it with something from this world. According to Dima, an Alien could sneeze with such a sound. Dima tensed. Sasha (after all, this is a man with nerves of iron!) explained: some animal had crawled under his bed. Time passed. Ominous groaning, clicking, scratching could be heard from under the bed... In the end, the guys couldn’t stand it and shined a flashlight there. It turned out that the same matriarch hen had climbed into the large bag in which part of the group put their sleeping bags. And she got there. Twice.

The housewife took away the eggs and put the chicken under house arrest - in a basket. Along with the chicken, a strange smell left the room.

There should have been a photo of a chicken in a basket, but there won’t be one - we were already moving out, and there was no time for filming. Here's a skull for you. He guarded plantations of either rice or another cereal very similar to it.

Travel companions

The Around Annapurna route is quite easy. Unless you're trying to set a speed record, anyone can do it - with the possible exception of people with severe arthritis or musculoskeletal problems. Therefore, we met completely different people along the route.

Mountain View Lodge pleased us with a meeting with two elderly hippies. An absolutely charming German couple over 60 years old. She wears scarlet lipstick, a flared skirt and leather stitched boots, he wears almost cowboy boots. In the morning, these gentlemen danced selflessly to the Parov Stelar Band from their phone. Later we met them on the route and always greeted them.

But today we see Japanese and Chinese all day long. If you see a person on the road wearing bright pink tights, a green skirt and holding a wooden stick in his hands, he is 100% Japanese. Most often, a person is wearing thermal underwear, a sweater, a light jacket, and his face is smeared with sunscreen and wrapped in some kind of scarf. I would have collapsed with heatstroke in about five minutes in this entire outfit. But they don’t mind, they go. Scary people. How did we defeat them at Port Arthur?

It is worth mentioning separately about politeness on the route. Nobody throws anything at their feet. Nobody leaves trash anywhere. When meeting the local population and other trekkers, it is customary to say hello - you can use the international hi, but better - the Indian-Nepalese “namaste”. Gradually, a code of politeness is developed: do not “oil” those who are getting up and are very tired.

Nepalese children are the champions in “nastics”. I can’t guarantee that they don’t agree among themselves who will stretch out their “namaste-ee” longer and more amusingly (and not just like that, but with howls), in order to then listen to how funny we will answer them.

District center

By the way, about food. It is rare that a local kitchen has a full-fledged stove - most often it is a gas burner. Sometimes two. Under these conditions, Nepalese manage to show the wonders of cooking. Apple pie! Danish cinnamon rolls! Buns! Apple roll (cheburek with apples - or what is space in general, with melted Snickers or Mars chocolate)!.. No, this cannot be put into words. We just fell upon the restaurant where these miracles are baked. Then we had lunch here, rested, and collapsed again. But while some members of the group were making strategic decisions (take two buns to have enough for dinner, or three to also have for breakfast?), a certain Dane wedged in between us. With a speed that would make a diving eagle jealous, he bought a Danish bun, sank his teeth into it, snatched it off and, apparently without chewing, swallowed its ruddy side - and ran downstairs.

While relaxing in Chomrong, we looked at the blue roof of the lodge where we were to spend the night. The road to it seemed flat and not at all like another staircase of 100,500 thousand steps.

But it turned out to be her. In addition, we were caught in the rain at the very bottom. He accompanied the entire ascent. Having finally dealt with the flights of stairs and gentle sections, the first messengers literally ran into Sinuva. The tail walked slowly, calmly, even majestically. With arms outstretched and faces exposed to the drops (which, one must think, greatly frightened the fellow travelers).

An innovation on the route is a gas shower. The gas chamber is a room two by two meters, with a regular shower, heated by the sun, and a gas water heater, which is located next to you. Actually, the main task of a person washing himself is to have time to wash himself and not get sunburned. But, as Galya said, “I don’t know how much willpower you need to have to turn off the hot water.”

Yes, a huge plus of the Himalayan trek is the opportunity to wash in warm water before going to bed. Socks that live their own lives can only appear with the great desire of their owner.

The second advantage is multinationality. Before dinner, all residents of the lodge come to the “dining room”, sit down at a common table and begin to communicate in any available languages. Sinuva was inhabited by a Russian-Ukrainian group, a Chinese woman with a guide, a girl from Finland and her companion from New Zealand, an American of Russian origin with a companion who spoke “vinaigrette” quite well and knew who Cheburashka was, and two Polish-Swiss who communicated with the Americans in French.

There was also a double birthday in Sinuwa - super megawoman Ira and instructor Sasha were congratulated. For this occasion, the owners baked a gingerbread-shaped cake. We sang songs, drank 50 grams of illegal alcohol, drowning it in liters of masala tea, and at 7 pm we went to the side.

It's gradually getting colder. The next day we spend the night in the Himalayas. The water supply here is represented by a thin pipe from which icy water flows from the peaks. How close they are can be judged by the fact that the water supply is frozen. The departure to base camp was scheduled for the morning. It was before breakfast, we warmed up as best we could. I even had to dance the ice-enka, lambada and macarena. I also danced, but I won’t show you any photos.

From Machapuchare to Annapurna

How ironic: to climb to Annapurna Base Camp (ABC), we must pass through Machapuchhre Base Camp (MBC), but climbing is prohibited on Machapuchare itself. The only attempt to climb it was made in 1957, but the climbers were made to promise that they would not set foot on the summit itself. And so it happened - they had to stop 50 meters before her. After this, the king of Nepal announced that the mountain was sacred, Shiva lived on it, and in general it was Shambhala. This means people don’t need to go there.

On the way to MBC we pass by the Hinku Cave. A venerable old man lived for some time in the sacred cave. I expected more modesty from the elder: instead of the monastery, we found ourselves on a stage, in a cinema and concert hall... But the elder still endured certain hardships: an incredibly nasty wind was blowing near the cave, and it was also damp there.

Having crossed two or three bridges, we emerge into real alpine meadows.

At MBC I started to feel overwhelmed. I probably caught some cold air on the way up, but then I didn’t attach much importance to it. When Kirill handed out tablets “for mountain sickness” (diuretic), I proudly refused them - it will go away on its own.

The climb to Annapurna Base Camp seemed very strange. Slow, long, gentle, without stairs or steps. The air is already thin: it becomes more difficult to move your legs. Everything seems small and close. And then you realize that those bright dots over there are people. This means that the height of the pebble to the left of the road is 5-6 meters. Everything is comparable. It’s just... a person is invisible on this scale. The helicopter, flying low, looked like a bright red children's toy.

Nevertheless, we did it! 4130 meters, no connection, only rocks, sun and snow.

ABC

About 50 meters above the camp a clearing as flat as a saucer is discovered. On it and around it there are a mass of small cairns with memorial plaques. Someone made words out of stones (Rena, love, etc.). Suddenly I find myself irritated. This is something that hasn’t happened since the very beginning of the track! It’s just... It’s so ridiculous: to come up here, to realize that there’s still so much hanging over you, to realize how small you are and how huge they - the mountains - are... And after that, all a person can say is “Vitya + Katya = love”? Is this why he stomped upstairs for two weeks?

I place a pebble on the pyramid of one of my favorite climbers, Basque Inaki Ochoa. The most experienced athlete and all-time friend died in 2008 at Annapurna. I turn around and take this photo. It’s like an illustration to Lovecraft: little people with funny legs, wearing funny hats, are photographing something - and then the clouds clear up for a second and reveal the side of some relict monster, a monster that is now sleeping, then quite unexpectedly can wake up, and then... But the curtain of clouds converges again, and the monster drowns in a milky haze, leaving the little people alone with their thoughts and problems. With “Vitya” and “Masha”, lined with stones at an altitude of approximately 4300 meters.

I didn't get to the very top. First, the skin on my face tightened. Then goosebumps began to visibly run through her. Then - this was the reason for the stop - the tremor spread to the arms and legs, and the head began to spin.

Going down turned out to be more difficult than going up: all the ground underfoot was covered with dry grass. Behind the bumps you can’t see where you put your foot. A couple of times I realized that there was a hole under my foot.

A pika's home was discovered under a nearby lodge. We met one of these comrades as we approached the camp. At first they froze when they saw something 15-20 centimeters long. The animal tried to squeeze its fat body into the hole - but there they made it clear that the shelter was full, and it was necessary to hide in the folds of the terrain. The animal itself had enough folds, and it decided not to run away anywhere. It turned out that the pika was completely unafraid - or, on the contrary, it was experienced and knew that there was nothing to be afraid of. We shamelessly took pictures of her, almost right next to her, talked in full voice... Nothing penetrated her.

In the morning, after dark, almost the entire group went out on the most daring sortie - to watch the dawn over the base camp. In 30-40 minutes, we slowly climbed to about 4300 meters, chose a convenient site - and began to wait. The sun illuminated the valley, but Machapuchare stood as a black spot, blocking Annapurna. But finally, the rays crossed the ridge...

Going down turned out to be more difficult than going up: the ice connecting the stone crumbles melted, and puddles and loose powder formed under our feet - in general, what we all love so much.

All that remained was to begin the descent. The main goal of the campaign was achieved. We did it. It was necessary to give way to those who had a saucer clearing and the dawn over the camp was still ahead.

The way back

After ABC we literally ran downhill. In a day we covered a distance that would have taken us two days to cover on the way there. It was not tiring - on the contrary, we finally moved at our usual pace and arrived at our overnight stop not indecently early, but on time - at 5-6 o'clock.

Overall the road was going downhill. The only difficulty was that we remembered how and where it was easy for us to descend, we imagined what we would have to go through to get to Chomrong buns. Dry alpine meadows were behind us, we again entered the rainforest, with palm-sized butterflies, bizarre birds and strange flowers. All around us everything was again babbling, singing and chirring deafeningly. Once again it was possible to say “namaste” to fellow travelers without a twinge of conscience. The campaign was inexorably ending.

But there was still time to take photos of the hand-drawn maps (each lodge has them). The main principle of the map maker is to draw as many exotic animals as possible. Barking deer? Yes please! Himalayan bear? Right next to the snow leopard! And tigers, more tigers - tourists love tigers.

The second joke is the size of the key fobs. It increased as we gained altitude. If in Kathmandu the keychain was the length of a finger, then in Sinuwa it was a wooden fish longer than the palm. We joked that at base camp they would give us a door along with a key. But, as it turned out, it was a vile slander: both the key and its carrier in ABC were even smaller than in Himalaya.

On the last day of the hike, Sasha asked if we were sorry that the hike was ending. I cheerfully answered that no - he was, and that’s good, now we need to set the next goal. And so, on the way to Pokhara, I realized - I want to go back! Gaining 1200 meters and losing 1000 along endless steps, brushing your teeth in the company of a giant furry moth, looking at the “fish tail”, painfully sharp in the first morning rays, crossing icy rivers, wandering through a saucer field, peering into the distorted perspective of Tent Peak (somewhere there Chinese climbers set up their advanced camp)… The Himalayas are addictive. This is the place that clears your head. They help you understand what you are made of and what you can do.

Sweet tasty extras!

Dependence of the price of plain cooked rice on altitude (the price of rice in the menu of each lodge where we stayed was taken):

To reach base camp and really enjoy the process, it's worth being prepared. It is enough to do squats in the mornings and evenings, starting, for example, with 10 squats and gradually increasing their number. At first I added one squat every week. When I realized that it was too easy, I began to add 1 every 3 days. Shortly before the hike - immediately +5 or +10. The main thing here is not to strain yourself, but to adapt your knees to what lies ahead.

In addition to squats, my program included:

• running – 1 hour 3-4 times a week;
• swimming – 2 times a week.