We eagerly leave the base camp and ascend higher. Before departure we are lined up in straight gender specific lines (just to make sure). Last recommendations and motivational speech and off we hiked. Our first few steps – when it got real – stopped some 45 minutes later. The crowd in our path told us it was lunch time, but we’ve just gotten warmed up to start walking. It took us a long time to convince the living obstacle to continue moving and arrived to next camp about an hour later to surprise the TV crew that was supposed to tape our arrival. So we arrived for the first time again. We gave the cameramen some time to get ready and walked into camp sending love and kisses to the lens. It was one o’clock, so what’s next?
We went to a nearby village, but not without being warned not to talk to locals, not to touch them and not to take their tea. But how could we stay cold to the warmth of the simple village life – so we accepted tea, so if we do, we’ll have indigestion together. There was none of that, just a memory of the sweet tea and a different style of life here in the high mountains of the Himalayas.
While the Indian part of the group kept trying to, unsuccessfully, keep up with us, we got tired of waiting on them and made two groups that still had enough opportunity to chat, laugh, sing, learn cricket and marvel at the cultural differences throughout the day stops.
We kept admiring the wild and bountiful nature of the Himalayas and wondered about the women, who are the main supply line for the local villages. For it was them, who in their worn out boots kept provisions come on their backs to the remote villages. The men were usually just sipping tea. And in our full battle mountain gear we kept going higher and higher, but that also made us slower and slower.
The day we reached the highest point of our journey will clearly stay in our memories. It was before the morning sun rose that we started going uphill in snow, step by step fighting for oxygen that was getting more and more scares, but was still enough of it around for all of us. Once we reached the peak with 4250 above the sea level, we got rewarded by great views of snow covered tops. It was a view most people only get to see on a magazine cover, but for us it was a moment of happiness, beauty, experiencing the force of nature and something special, that you’ll carry in you for the rest of your life.
Without trouble we came down to the valley and celebrated our common ups and downs with a shower we haven’t had for five days. There was no greater reward after the psycho-physical exhaustion than to get out of a nice shower to grab a cold beer and talk to people, who gave that special something to the trip to the Himalayas.
As a project leader I’d like to thank again the
Slovenian and
Indian traveling association to have made this possible and also a special thank you to the Slovenian team of mountain goats and rams, young and cheerful volunteers for all the happy, laughing and wonderfully colourful days in the Indian Himalayas.
