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Guide to the Annapurna Circuit Trek: Part Four

Guide to the Annapurna Circuit Trek: Part Four

 Posted by Claudine

Day 6: Lower Pisang to Manang

Day 6 offers a choice in trails from Lower Pisang to Manang: the flat Lower Route, which follows the river and gets you to Manang in about three hours, or the challenging Upper Route, which climbs up and down a mountainside and takes approximately twice as long.

Every one of our friends who had trekked the Annapurna Circuit highly recommended the Upper Route because the views are much better. From the beginning we planned to take the Upper Route and figured that it would be the more popular trail because of the amazing reviews, but most people we talked to in Lower Pisang ended up taking the Lower Route. Thus, when we veered right at this signpost at 6am, we had the trail to ourselves.

We knew that it would take approximately two hours to reach Ghyaru, the first town you reach after departing Lower Pisang. Ghyaru is located at the top of a steep climb, and we had steeled ourselves for an unrelenting two-hour ascent. In reality, however, the trail was much more moderate. The first hour of the hike is on flat terrain, and it is only the second hour that takes you up a steep mountainside, with the trail following dozens of short switchbacks. While we definitely felt the effects of the gain in altitude -- from 3250 to 3730 meters -- the short duration of the climb made it very manageable. We reached Ghyaru in a little less than an hour from the start of the steep switchback portion of the ascent.

And the views -- they were definitely worth it.

From Ghyaru we continued walking on a mostly flat, winding trail that hugged the mountainside. So, too, did farmers and cows.

Just as we were growing a bit tired and hungry, we rounded a bend and saw Ngawal, which we reached after about an hour and a half from Ghyaru. We were rewarded with this view and a welcome coffee and brunch break.

From Ngawal the trail began to descend, and we hiked through a desert-like landscape with glacial mountains towering above.

Under a beating sun with no tree cover, we sucked down our remaining water quickly, and I found myself extremely thirsty for a full hour until we reached a tiny village where we could fill up our bottles. I know from marathon training that you should never allow your body to actually feel very thirsty, so this was not a good sign. Therefore, we highly advise you to learn from our mistake and fill up your water in Ngawal before continuing on the second half of the long route to Manang -- better to be safe than sorry.

We spied the Lower Route below us, and eventually it intersected ours. After hiking for about two and a half hours from Ngawal, we reached the village of Bragha, where we stopped to share a slice of apple pie -- the best on the trail, according to our insistent friend ("Just do it."). We found our slice at the last establishment on the left before leaving town, and the pie, served warm, did not disappoint.

Leaving Bragha, we passed this small stupa and walked the final and short 20-minute leg to Manang.

Manang offers a few large, multi-story guesthouses, and we chose ours, the Yak Hotel, for its cozy dining room, superb views, and room with attached bath (the first and only of our trek). We settled in for the evening, looking forward to our one-day layover in Manang for the purpose of acclimatization.

Day 7: Acclimatization in Manang

All trekkers are advised to stay in Manang, located at 3540 meters, for two nights and one full day in order to safely acclimatize to the elevation. While you can and should spend much of the acclimatization day relaxing, you should do some short climbing trip in order to help with acclimatization (as the advice goes, climb high and sleep low).

There are multiple options for hikes from Manang, and they range considerably in amount of time and effort required. Because we had taken the challenging Upper Route to Manang, we opted for an easy hike: a short climb to a nearby lookout point. It took us only about 30 minutes to scramble up the mountainside, and the views of the mountains -- so close! -- were excellent.

Other options include a half-day hike to Milarepa's cave and a near full-day hike to Kecho Lake, also known as the Ice Lake.

Aside from a day hike, people typically spend their time in Manang walking up and down the small main street, soaking in the views and sun, and enjoying Lavazza espresso drinks and chocolate danishes at the German bakery attached to Hotel Yeti.

We took time to hunt down seabuckthorn juice, another local favorite recommended by a different friend. Review: good, but not life changing. Maybe we're just not juice people?

Entrepreneurs have recognized that people may grow a bit stir-crazy by early evening, and there are a couple movie houses that show films at 5pm and 7pm. Movie selections are advertised on chalkboards, but -- at least in the uncrowded low season -- it may be possible for you to negotiate your movie choice. For 200 rupees per person, you get a somewhat comfortable seat on a wooden bench covered in yak furs, a black tea, and a small bag of freshly popped popcorn. It sounded like a good deal to us, and we signed up for a showing of Into Thin Air, a horrifically bad film based on Jon Krakauer's account of the disastrous 1996 Everest expeditions. The movie is broadcast on a white screen by an A/V projector that reminded us a bit of academic lecture slideshows and corporate PowerPoint presentations. Certain bad memories not withstanding, the picture and sound quality were better than expected.

The film was good for a few laughs and a mountain vibe, and it kept us entertained until dinner, which we ate at the fresh and new-looking Instant Karma Cafe. Trekkers are generally expected to eat meals in their teahouses because paying for meals compensates for the very cheap (or sometimes even free) lodging, but knowing we had a few meals in Manang, we decided to branch out from our teahouse. Instant Karma Cafe's dal bhat was one of the best meals of our trek, and the prices were at least 25% cheaper than teahouse offerings. We highly recommend it.

Day 8: Manang to Letdar

We left Manang by 7am to begin the first of two very short trekking days. At higher altitudes trekkers are advised to ascend approximately 500 meters per day, so that means you cover shorter distances.

Although many people go from Manang to Yak Kharka on Day 8, we decided to go one town further, to Letdar. We wanted to end in Letdar because the following day we would also go one town further than the standard stopping point.

Setting out from Manang, we passed through this stone gate.

We hiked on a moderately difficult trail with stunning views.

The hills were alive, don't you think?

When we reached Yak Kharka two hours later, we spotted, for the first time on our trek, the town's namesake.

We stopped for a brief tea break with these two.

And then we continued on, walking less than an hour to reach Letdar. We arrived just in time, as clouds soon brought light hail and then everyone's favorite, wintry mix of snow and rain. Yes, snow in May.

There are only two teahouses in Letdar, and we stayed at the second, the Churi Letdar Hotel. It offered nice views in a sunny, though very drafty, dining room. We eventually spent the late afternoon and evening in the interior dining room, huddled around a stove that burned yak dung. We were so grateful for that yak dung.

At 4200 meters high in Letdar, we no longer had access to a real shower. A bucket bath -- a cold bucket bath, mind you -- would have been our only option, so we declined. Letdar was noticeably colder than previous towns (50 degrees Fahrenheit inside our room at bedtime, 45 degrees the following morning), and we bundled up for the night.

Although Letdar has fewer accommodation options than Yak Kharka, we think that Letdar is a better choice for Day 8. The setting is prettier, and you are that much closer to High Camp, if you think you might want to stay there the following day -- but more on that in our next post.

Guide to the Annapurna Circuit Trek: Part Three

Posted by Brian

Day 5: Chame to Lower Pisang

We woke up early in Chame to get a head start on all of the other trekkers staying there that night because Chame is a popular sleeping point on the trail. It's not that we do not enjoy meeting other trekkers -- in fact, one of the great joys of the trail was meeting people from all over the world as we made our way along the route, especially when we had evening hours to pass fireside in chilly teahouses. We talked to people from Australia, the Netherlands, Canada (eh!), India, Kenya, the UK, Nepal, Ireland, Czech Republic, Spain, South Korea, Argentina, Germany, Japan, Hungary, Israel, France, Malaysia, and, of course, the US. The trail was like an outdoorsy UN summit or an athletic Epcot Center of nationalities.

When walking on the trail, though, Claudine and I found we preferred a bit of solitude to playing cat and mouse with other groups. We felt fortunate to be trekking in mid-May at nearly an "off-season" time, so the crowds were very thin (and still we met people from all of those countries!). Many nights we were the only people staying in our teahouse, and some nights we were the only people staying in our particular town. From what we have heard of high season, however, such isolation and privacy are rare. During the busiest months on the trail (March, April, and -- the busiest by far -- October) we have heard that certainly teahouses and even entire towns get booked up by late afternoon. Thus, early risers may be rewarded with first pick of evening lodgings. They are also rewarded with the clearest views, as morning tends to be when the sun and mountains are out in full glory before any potential afternoon clouds roll in. It turns out our excitement awoke us before our masochistic 5 AM alarm, but any morning groans were worth it for what we saw along this stretch of the trail as we departed Chame at 6 AM.

Fellow night owls take note: the sunrise over the trees and mountains was enough to convert me into a grateful early bird, stat. But it was nice to stop for a caffeine fix and a stationary view in Bhratang about an hour and a half after departing Chame.

Continuing on, we turned a corner and confronted a massive, sheer, glacier-scraped rock face.

We also saw a helipad not unlike many we would see during the rest of the trek. If I needed a reminder to watch my step and avoid a clumsy accident that might necessitate medical evacuation, this was it.

There was no shortage of great views as we made our way to our day's stopping point.

We had a bit of confusion about our stopping destination for the night, so we will do our best to set things straight for any future trekkers reading along. At this point in the trek, the trail splits into two route options that eventually meet back up at the end of one day's hike: the Lower Pisang route and the Upper Pisang Route. We knew that the next day we wanted to trek the Upper Pisang Route (more on that and our decision tomorrow). We weren't quite sure, then, whether to stay in the town of Upper Pisang or the town of Lower Pisang, also known as Pisang in some guides (confused yet?). The answer is that you can choose to stay in either Upper or Lower Pisang no matter which route you plan to follow in the morning. As you follow the trek, you will arrive first in Lower Pisang and walk through it. It feels a bit more newly developed than Upper Pisang, which you can see just across the river from Lower Pisang and a steep walk uphill.

A view of Upper Pisang (foreground) from Lower Pisang

The trail splits when you come to the end of Lower Pisang. At that point you can stay on that side of the river and continue on the Lower Pisang route or you can cross the river and begin following it on the opposite side as you embark on the Upper Pisang route (this is also where you cross the river to then walk uphill to the town of Upper Pisang if you wish to stay there or see the view from its monastery).

The bridge at the end of Lower Pisang. Cross and continue straight to ascend to the town of Upper Pisang or cross and hang a left to follow the Upper Pisang route.

That means if you stay in the town of Lower Pisang, you will walk to this point at the end of town in the morning and make your decision on which route to follow (it's fairly well-marked by signs and a map. If you stay in the town of Upper Pisang, you have already crossed the river at the end of Lower Pisang and walked uphill. Your morning will consist of walking back downhill to that bridge and continuing on the route of your choice.

Upper Pisang offers great views, but we were pretty happy with what surrounded us in Lower Pisang and did not feel the need to add extra hill work to our afternoon (or descending hill work to our next morning). Plus, we were enticed by this teahouse in Lower Pisang that looked brand spanking new.

The Tilicho Hotel did not disappoint. As a fierce wind whipped through Lower Pisang, we staked out a table in the dining area cheerily lit by skylights above and feasted on sweeping views of the valley. We spent a number of happy hours here reading and meeting interesting trekkers like the friendly fellow Americans taking the long way home after spending a number of years teaching in South Korea. We would lose them the next morning only to be reunited through chance run-ins at the end of our trek in Pokhara and even again in our own neighborhood in Kathmandu. We didn't speak much to the young German guys who holed up in their room for most of the day. We forgave their anti-social behavior when we discovered that one was suffering from an unpleasant bout of food poisoning. Thankful for good luck and strong stomachs, we rested and prepared for the next day's Upper Pisang route, which we had heard would be one of the most difficult but gorgeous days of our trek.

Guide to the Annapurna Circuit Trek: Part Two

Guide to the Annapurna Circuit Trek: Part Two

Posted by Claudine

A Note on Porters and Guides

Although Brian's ill-fitting backpack straps had him wishing for a porter the first day of our trek, by the second day he had corrected his straps, and the pack, weighing in at about 30 pounds, seemed barely noticeable for the remainder of the trek. We both had no difficulty carrying our own gear even on the most challenging days, but that said, there are valid reasons to consider hiring a porter and/or guide.

First, hiring a porter to carry your large backpack literally removes a large burden of trekking, leaving you to carry a small daypack with a Camelbak, camera, and little else. This system provides the obvious benefit of making your walk a little easier, but it also allows you to bring things that you might otherwise not be able to fit or carry if you carry all of your gear yourself. If, for example, you want to haul your digital SLR camera on the trek, you might find this system to be very helpful. We did not have room in our packs for our digital SLR camera and relied on our small point-and-shoot instead.

Second, porters and guides can also make the trek a little easier psychologically, removing any guesswork on your part. They will plan your day for you, lead you to good guesthouses, and suggest the best menu options. We have heard that at the peak high season beds at guesthouses can be at a premium, and while everyone seems to settle into some kind of lodging for the night, a guide may have the ability to pre-reserve your room and save you from the hassle of having to worry about this. Of course, guides will also ensure that you stick to the correct trail.

Third, by hiring porters and guides you are injecting money in Nepal's economy, and we cannot quibble with that.

All of these benefits mean that hiring porters and guides is probably never a bad idea, both for you and the people you employ. That said, we do not think porters and guides are at all necessary for this particular trek. If you are reasonably fit, you can carry your own gear with no problem. If you like to keep your schedule somewhat flexible and choose where you want to stay each night, then set out on your own. We found that we appreciated the ability to control our itinerary, choosing not only our teahouses but also the towns where we stayed. And the trail was mostly so well marked that we never found ourselves wishing for a guide to show us the way.

So, give some thought to the porter and guide issue, but know that you likely cannot go wrong with whatever option you choose. If you end up desperate for a porter by Day 4, you can surely hire someone mid-trek.

Day 2: Bhulbhule to Ghermu

As I mentioned above, we relished in the ability to design our own itinerary for the first several days of the trek, and it is important to note here that you should not worry about sticking to a rigid schedule for Days 1-6, before acclimatization at higher altitudes necessitates a more specific ascension plan. For the first several days, however, you can adjust the standard itineraries published in Lonely Plant and other guides as much as you like. Your own schedule will depend largely on when you arrive in Besi Sahar or Bhulbhule. We will share with you our own itinerary, which sometimes departed from the standard schedule popularized in guide books, and we will also offer tips on how we would improve our itinerary.

We woke up early to clear skies in Bhulbhule and had our first trail breakfast that became our standard. Breakfast included:

Boiled eggs to share:

Porridge for me (though we quickly lost bananas as we gained altitude):

Muesli with hot milk for Brian:

And a strong cup of instant black Nescafe coffee for us both:

Riding our Nescafe caffeine highs, we set out for our first full day of trekking on a beautiful, grassy trail that gave us views of a snowy mountain previously shrouded by rain clouds the day before.

The trail led us through lush, terraced hillsides along a rushing river below, which we would follow (and crisscross) for much of the trek.

And it was mostly flat until a steep but short climb to Bahundanda, the lunch destination we reached after about three hours of hiking. We ate dal bhat, the traditional Nepali meal of lentils, rice, and curried vegetables, and thus began a daily tradition of eating dal bhat for both lunch and dinner every day.

We already eat dal bhat regularly at home in Kathmandu, and we happen to really like it. We also think that it is perhaps the most nutritious meal on the trail menus, offering a combination of protein and fiber from the lentils and vegetables. For people who say they tire of the trail's repetitive menus, we also recommend dal bhat for its variety -- at each teahouse you will always get a different type of dal and a different mix of fresh vegetables (we sometimes saw cooks pausing preparation to run to their gardens and pick extra provisions for us). And for any voracious eaters out there, you will be happy to know that you will be offered seconds on dal bhat. What's not to love?

From Bahundanda the trail descended again, and we walked for just under two hours to eventually reach Ghermu, our stopping point for the day. We stayed here according to the Lonely Planet schedule, and although we enjoyed the Alpine Hotel, which had the cleanest bathroom and shower of our trip, we suggest continuing past Ghermu. If you walk just fifteen more minutes, you will reach Syange, which has better views of this stunning waterfall.

Even better, we think, would be to push past Syange and walk an additional 1.5 hours to reach Jagat, which has plenty of accommodations and sets you up for a good schedule the following day.

Day 3: Ghermu to Karte

Day 3 brought arguably the least inspiring views of the trip. That said, when this view counts as "uninspiring," life is pretty good.

For the first part of the day we walked a little under five hours from Ghermu to Tal, and this hike involved a lot of scrambling up and down a steep trail that hugged the river. There were some moments when the trail became confusing, and at one point we started following a donkey caravan down the wrong path.

(Side note: when encountering donkeys, stick to the mountain side of the trail in case a wayward kick knocks you off balance! Also, while you should keep your eyes on the trail to avoid stepping in fresh donkey dung, know that it is going to happen at some point since it is everywhere).

Just before we reached Tal, a relatively large town and a standard stopping point, it started to rain. We quickly put on our pack covers and rain jackets, but we fortunately made it inside a teahouse for lunch before it started pouring. It rained hard for about an hour but cleared up soon after we finished our dal bhat. We had already planned to continue past Tal, so we were grateful that the weather cleared up again.

We hiked for an additional 1.5 hours until we reached Kharte, which is a small town with very few accommodations. Instead of staying in Kharte, we recommend continuing another 40 minutes and staying the night in Dharapani, which is bigger and nicer than Kharte. If you start out in the morning from Jagat, as we advise, you will be well positioned to reach Dharapani in good time. There are also some Tibetan teahouses along the route to Dharapani not too far beyond Karte that looked nice in case you aren't feeling Karte yet don't want to truck all the way to Dharapani that night.

It was a long day, but we were glad to have pushed beyond the standard stopping point of Tal because it set us up for a more reasonable distance the following day.

Day 4: Kharte to Chame

When planning our schedule each day, we heeded the advice of a friend who recently hiked the Circuit: walk more than 50% of your route before lunch, because once you sit down for an hour to enjoy a lunch break, tiredness is apt to set in. This advice was excellent, but it was also easy to follow because we always woke early and began hiking sometime between 6 and 7 am. Therefore, we sometimes waited for lunch until we had reached our stopping point for the day. In general, we only took real breaks after we had walked for a three hour stretch or so, at which point we might stop to drink a tea or eat an energy bar. Because our Camelbaks allowed us to drink water on the move, we found that we did not need to stop frequently on the trail.

On Day 4 we started our morning by walking about two hours from Kharte to Danaque. From Danaque we prepared ourselves for a rigorous one-hour climb up to Timang, where we stopped to have a cup of tea and take in the stunning view.

Sights on the trail were amazing in their own right. We continually encountered porters who haul heavy loads up and down the mountain trails. Even with their bare feet and cumbersome loads, though, they usually kept a faster pace than we did.

From Timang we continued hiking for about two more hours until we reached Koto, where we stopped for lunch. After lunch in Koto, we walked for only about thirty minutes until we arrived in Chame, our destination for the night.

Chame is one of the most developed towns along the Annapurna Circuit. It was the first place along the trek to advertise internet, although it was not working when we were there because there was no electricity anywhere in the town -- for a week and counting.

We stayed at the Marsyandi Mandala Hotel, which is clearly a reputable spot because it was booked full that night with trekkers. We would definitely recommend it -- the rooms are simple as always but a bit more spacious, as many occupy separate bungalows. The hotel is located next to the rushing river, and it offers excellent views of Annapurna II.

In Chame we tested our luck again with a menu item that we tried and loved in Kharte -- cornbread. In Kharte the cornbread was reminiscent of a skillet-style cornbread, just very flat. In Chame, and elsewhere on the trail, the cornbread had a soft, pancake-like texture. It's not your typical American-style cornbread, but it is good. So is the buckwheat bread. We suggest you try both!

We attempted to visit the hot springs in Chame (Brian was quite excited) but were disappointed to find that 1) they consisted of a concrete tub of sorts and 2) at least at this point in the season, mid-May, the tub was filled with about 6 inches of fetid water. A friend had warned that the springs were disappointing. Indeed.

But that didn't get us down. We cozied into our cabin in the only double bed we had along the trail for Brian's first chilly "two-blanket" night (I had a lightweight sleeping bag) and rested for the day ahead.