NEPAL--The Dhaulagiri Trek Continues

The Dhaulagiri Ordeal -- Day Eight
Laura woke without having slept much, and we began this day in low spirits. Laura could hardly keep her eyes open while walking, and the other groups passed us for good, forever, the Austrians, the Swiss Italians, the laconic French, would make the pass and round Dhaulagiri without us. The Nepalese bridges began, if bridges they could be called, and we clung to Wongdee as we crossed them. Exhausted and sick, though her fever had broke, Laura moved slow. After one rickety bridge inches above the roaring river, we had to climb up a moving, muddy trail, and Wongdee laughed, "easier than Annapurna" he said, and we used bamboo saplings to scale up the ruined trail. Landslides and more landslides, the mountains around us were being torn apart and desposited into the river the below, and we walked gingerly as the chaotic, cruel forces of natures did their dance of erosion. Laura quipped that without that marvelous plant bamboo, the journey would be impossible, but she said this with heavy-lidded eyes. In short, she was finished. Or so Wongdee and I thought. Later she told me that she was counting down the minutes until our lunch break at noon, and when noon had come and gone without reaching our lunch camp site, she finally told us to leave her, let her sleep, and then she promptly sat down among the rocks of a giant dry river bed (they weren't the softest of rocks), and fell asleep.

I walked about for a moment, not knowing what to do. I then gave up all hope of rounding Dhaulagiri, my great adventure was over, and I steeled myself against the disappointment. I told Wongdee we should camp as soon as possible, let Laura sleep that day and all the next, and then walk back to Beni. He agreed, and went ahead to get Dawa. Originially, he had thought we would stop at what was called the Forest camp, a half a day from Italy Base Camp, sometimes called the American Base Camp. Other groups, less hearty than the Austrians, Swiss Italians, and the French, were doing just that, so that their ascent would be slower. The books advise not to climb more than 300 meters a day, but of course, those brave mountaineers that we had dogged for eight days were not listening to books, but to their own muscles and bravery. We however, never made it to the Forest Camp. Dawa and the rest of our company came back, and we camped in the jungle, not far from where Laura had collapsed to sleep. When I walked back to get Laura, a porter was looking at her nervously, but I calmed him, woke her, and we went on to where Wongdee was setting up our impromptu, half-day camp. So we had our short day after all! Laura slept the rest of the afternoon, I did laundry, and our campsite was fine, except for the toilet tent which was stuck back in the heart of the jungle with no paths to it. We fought our way to it when there was light, but in the darkness, we resorted to the "natural toilet" as the Nepalese did. Which of course meant the trail served a duel purpose, both trail and toilet. But then, the trail had many, many duties. It was trail and campsite, as we proved that day. It was trail and river, as it was many times in that jungle, it could also be trail and kitchen, as the porters stopped to cook right on the trail itself. And then, do not forget, it was also, too frequently for it to be anything like Annapurna, trail and landslide, more the latter than the former.

Though I had given up hope of going any further, Laura set both me and Wongdee straight. She maintained that we needed a rest day, that after her half-day off she felt immensely better (damn that Chinese Propaganda Radio), and that we should give it the old college try, and not turn around until it was certain we were beat. That night we were just above three thousand meters (just under 10,000 feet), and had climbed a good way up the days before. When asked if we could continue, Wongdee said, "Why not" with his usual flip.

The OHSA approved Nepalese bridge.

The Dhaulagiri Ordeal -- Day Nine
We left our jungle camp and the trail, at one point, disappeared all together. We had to scale down the mountain using roots, bamboo saplings, and trees, and we laughed that in Laura's condition the day before, it would have been impossible for her! We finally reached the edge of the jungle, went across another vast empty river bed that was probably full of water in the rainy season or when the snows of Dhaulagiri melted, and we stopped for lunch there, an hour after passing through the Forest camp, a very pretty place to stop. I stopped to take a picture of our party, then, preparing lunch: Wongdee, our leader, Dawa the magnificient, Priam Rye, ever ready with smiles and tea, Chareen in all his youth, Babaram now just Mr. Single, Ram Krishna, and the two brothers, Sukaman and Ganzaman, sullen but strong. While taking that picture, I noticed a gash on Ram Krishna's foot, pussing and oozing and swollen. We immediately cleaned it, put antibiotic cream on it, and shook our heads. He had done it the day before we had left, if only we had noticed it then, the wound would not have been half so ghastly with infection. We instructed him on how to care for it, but he was embarrassed, and Wongdee later said
that the average porter do not care about minor cuts. "It's just normal," they toss off, and continue walking through the pools of germs and dung, like normal.

After lunch, we began the climb up, but then, wait, around a bend, the trees break, and we see Dhaulagiri at last, once again. In the jungle it had been hidden, but now, shining like the third eye of Shiva, it rises, impossibly high, rises and keeps rising, a snow sentinel looking down upon us. We take pictures, we laugh, our spirits are high. Such beauty, such magnificient beauty. That afternoon, Wongdee runs ahead, and Laura and I walk slow through pygmy bamboo, the trail is easy, and we hope the worst is behind us. Our hopes prove untrue, however. Rounding a corner, the trees disappear, and only the strongest of glass and brush can survive, as high as we are. Italy Base Camp is 3700 meters, 12,136 feet, and the wind is harsh, and when the clouds descend, as they do in the afternoon, the clouds descend right on top of the ground. I have stood before at 10,000 feet looking up at mountains 14,000 feet high, but there is a big difference when you stand at 10,000
feet and the mountains soar above 24,000 feet high, above 8,000 meters. We wearily, but gratefully trudged up the barren slope to the camp, I say barren, but what life there was compared to the dreadful glacier we would soon be attacking. There were no more villages or locals beyond Italy Base Camp, only trekers, porters & guides, because nothing would grow above this point.

At the Italy Base Camp, much to Babaram's delight, there was a chang house, the roof tacked on with the heaviest of rocks, and there we met up with another French team, the previous one we met had long since deserted us. This kind French group invited us into their tent, and we sat on chairs, real chairs, at a real table, and drank tea and ate French delicacies, enjoying our victory. We had not turned back, and tomorrow was a well earned rest day. Suddenly, we heard a roar, and looking up, saw an avalanche, across the valley, tons of snow and ice fell with an apocalyptic thunder, and we were there to witness it all.
Though it must have been tons and tons of snow, it looked like a little trickle from where we sat. It was clear across the valley, miles away.

Never will I forget that sunset, it was the most beautiful sunset I have never seen, as the sun, like the other sunsets, was lost behind the towering peaks long before the actual light left the world. I sat on the tarp, looking up at those mountains, and thinking how lucky we were that day. Usually, the afternoon brought an impenetrable shroud of clouds, but not that day and night, it was all clear, as our future seemed, all clear except for only the littlest fluff of clouds. Sitting on the tarp, with the sun coloring the Dhaulagiri a white too dazzling to look upon, and then slowly a blood red, as the sun fell, and soon one side was dark, the other light, but the shadows slowly slid down to consume all. I wanted to remember that sunset forever, and my mind seemed like such a poor instrument to use to do so. If only my camera were not so useless, if only I had video camera, but then again, that would not capture, and I felt disconsolate, realizing that the memory would only fad over time, and that the vivid colors and shapes had the fragility of spider webs and happiness.

We ate dinner, Laura's headaches began, and we started to monitor them, as headaches were a sign of high altitude sickness, which tourists & local porters die of every year in Nepal. She had had a severe headache before, in Leadville, Colorado, which is about 10,000 feet above sea level. Such a serious headache we labeled a ten, and such a headache was drive us back to Beni, back down the monkey trails we had crawled up and down over, and we did not want that at all. No headache was a 0, and so measured Laura's health with numbers. That night she had a solid five, and Advil did nothing for it. She was also coughing worse, the breath in her chest rattling like a skeleton's bones. But the next day was a rest day, and we hoped that a day of rest might revitalize her uncertain health & help acclimatize to the altitude.

When I asked Wongdee if we might make the pass, he said, "Why not?" optimistically, tuned in solidly to Chinese Propaganda Radio. There were too many reasons that I chose not to answer him.

The first view of Dhaulagiri close up

View from Italy Base Camp. Dhaulagiri just goes straight up!

Another view from Italy Base Camp.

The Chang house at Italy Base Camp

More, more, more, onto Day 10