Kyanjin Ri

In the morning it had completely cleared up and, in anticipation of this possibility the first thing I did when I woke up was to pull the curtain to the side and peek out. Joanne later reported I acted as if there was a fresh fall of snow outside, excitedly telling her to look, then rushing off out into the morning. I just wanted to look around and soak up the view. Kjanjin Gompa is in a beautiful location: it is surrounded by high peaks. There are a couple of 7000m peaks and lots of 6000m peaks towering over the village. I went a bit crazy with the camera again, until I decided I had taken enough photos of the same thing.

Joanne's feet had not made any miraculous recovery, so Al and I set out without her. As Kyanjin Gompa was now our base and we were coming back to the same place that evening, I was able to leave a lot of the weight behind, although I did still have the same ridiculously large bag, which contributes a significant weight itself. Al and I were climbing Kjanjin Ri, a nearly 5000m peak almost directly above the village. OK 4773m. We had asked the hotel owner to make us up a packed lunch, but we didn't really think we were going to take that long.

Big peaks

The route climbed steeply but the path remained very clear and easy. Al appeared to be taking a lot more strain, because now that I wasn't having to wait for Joanne or being weighed down by all the extras in my bag, I could keep up quite easily.

Kyanjin Gompa on the way up

As we climbed, though, we both started to struggled breathing a lot more than previously. After a while we were both needing to take short rests every few steps it seemed. The altitude was now a real problem. In the hotel, there was a map of the area, accompanied by a chart showing the relative oxygen concentration at various altitudes; at the height the village is at it was already down to 50% compared to sea level; at the top of this peak it was going to be only 44%, so it's not surprising we struggled to get a breath really. A couple of times we each felt quite light-headed and had to sit for a minute or so. But it was all worth it as the views were fantastic. On the way up to a minor peak at 4565m we got clear views of all the nearby big mountains and the glaciers extending out of their cols. The top of the ridge we could see just next to us is probably Tibet; the map indicated that we were going to be within about 4km of the border.

Me on top of the minor summit

Al on top

As we stood at the top of the minor peak it started to cloud over a bit, so we set off again hoping to see at least something from the main summit. As we approached it we could see that it was covered in prayer flags, but Al also noticed that there was a person sitting at the top. We come all this way and someone has beaten us to it! A little further on and we were able to identify the person: it was the male one of the two unfriendly Americans. He had seemed like a keen mountain type, and he was kitted out with lots of fancy looking gear. I don't know if the altitude had got to him or if it was actually the girl who had been unfriendly all along, but this time he was actually very friendly and chatted to us for quite some time at the summit.

Ice fall from a big mountain

He had left his female companion back in the village so that she could spend the day horse riding. There were quite a few horses dotted around and several of the hotels had signs up offering horseback tours. He seemed very pleased: he explained that this way she gets to do what she wants and he gets to do what he wants. Maybe they were always in the middle of an argument when they were together, so never felt like speaking to anyone else. Anyway, he seemed like a perfectly nice guy after all and helped by taking a couple of photos of me at the summit, a favour which I returned. It never completely cleared up at the top, but we got enough glimpses through the cloud to be able to put together a complete mental picture of what we were missing.

Me on top of Kyanjin Ri

Bird eating the American's food at the summit

We decided to take a different route down for the same of variety, but I think it was a mistake. We reasoned that we'd get a different view on the way down. In fact the descent route just took us down at the bottom of a valley, so there was no view at all to speak of. We'd have been better off with the same view again. Descending was trivial. The path was really easy again, and the difference between going down into increasing dense air and the opposite is very noticeable. We were back in time for lunch and, although I'd eaten my packed lunch at the top, I ordered another one, reasoning that I'd earned it and used plenty of calories.

Tibet and Tibetan prayer flags from the summit

That night I went in search of a cheaper beer to reward myself with. I didn't want to pay the Rs350 our hotel was asking for one and I managed to buy one for Rs250 from another hotel owner. Our hotel owner was quite put out and told me not to buy beer from anywhere else, because she would sell it for the same price. I was quite pleased because the one I'd bought elsewhere was a year past its best before date, and I bought one from her. Hers was also a year past its sell by date, so I decided just to stick to chang and mustang coffees. Unfortunately the chang was also past its best and down to the thick stuff at the bottom. We were promised fresh chang the following day, but the stuff we bought that day just went down the drain.

Kyanjin Gompa from above

There were loads of these on the way to Kyanjin Ri (Irises, right?)

Dodgy chang and off beer

Night scene outside the hotel

Kyanjin Gompa, Nepal