Trek The Unknown

We decided to leave early as we were worried there will be no accommodations available in high camp. High camp is the highest and closest camping place to Throng La pass. If you want the hardest day of the trek the be as easy as possible, try spend the night before crossing the pass at High camp.

High Camp has a accommodations for 110 persons, whoever reaches too late gets to sleep in the dining room. nobody get to be thrown out, don’t worry

Eventually instead of leaving at 7AM we left at 8:30AM. We knew we have something like 2.5-3 hour of walking till Throng Phedi (That’s the place to stay for the night before High Camp). Throng Phedi means, under the mountain or hill, which is of course under Throng La pass area, the highest place around.

We reached Throng Phedi at 9:50AM. This was a good start for the day…Walking there includes some uphill walking but a lot of it is also straight surface.

Throng Phedi was discovered to be a VERY nice place. We stopped there to get used to the height of 4450 meters.

At 10:30 we decided to go on. We understood that the hardest climb of the trek is just beyond us. The Climb is one hour long it’s slow hard to breath walk. Some people that want to acclimatize thmeselves get to Throng Phedi climb to high camp and then walk back down to Throng Phedi. Then next day they climb this again. we acclematized ourselves enough in Mananag and along the way, we stayed extra nights at some places and climbed a little every day.

Entering into high camp we found there are 2 camp sites. The 1st buildings you’ll see on your left are the old buildings. don’t waste your energy that you don’t have anyway to walk around there. Keep walking up a little more to the buildings on the left. This is the new camp.

At High Camp we took 2 rooms. it really didn’t seem the acoomodation there were too crowded.
After resting and settling out breath we decided to go for a walk around. there is a mountain right beside the camp which is 100-150 meters higher than the camp itself. There is a great view for there and it’s highly recommended.

At the Time of year we were there (end of October) the whole mountain side was covered with snow. It’s was great sliding on it using the plastic coats we had! Try not to slide accidentally to unknown places where only a helicopter can help getting you out of.

Since high camp is a almost the highest place around, if the sun is out there aren’t any mountains disturbing it’s way into the greenhouse like dinins room. It’s VERY plesent and warm (as long as the sun is shining), with big glass windows watching the whole area around.

pricing:
room for a night: 320 NR
Spaghetti: 190 NR
potato curry (recommended): 130 NR
Veg fried rice (recommended): 190 NR

Since high camp is an isolated place there is no meat in the menu, only veggie stuff.
also, There is light at the rooms (on some other guest houses on previous days there wasn’t) and an early dinner is served at 4:30 PM.

We went to sleep very early at around 6:00 PM , because our plans were to wake up at 4AM in order to cross Throng La Pass.

We Left Manang, it was Thursday morning. I had mixed feelings…after the unsuccessful previous day, I was a little disappointed from it, but on the other hand was anticipating to reach Throng La.

We Left at 8:55 in the morning and reached Yak Karka at 12:15 PM. walking from Manang to Yak Karka is easy. A little bit of an uphill trail but really not too bad. Towards Yak Karka there is an half an hour to an hour of almost straight walk, with no uphills or downhills. These are the times when we had our chance of really enjoy to views, without worrying about our next physical challenge.

We decided we will spend the night at Yak Karka. It was the beginning of November which is high season. We were afraid there won’t be any rooms left for all of us ( we were a group of 4 people). Eventually we found a guest house. It wasn’t even too hard.

Since we arrived early, it was only noon time I sat in the dinning room and learned some Chinese. I started talking to a 60 years old man from Canada. His name was wain. He said that it’s the toughest physical challenge he ever had. At some point he showed me his camera and said it’s not working, he thought he needs a new charger…I needed a few minutes to figure out that a remarkable button named “RESET” would solve the problem. He was very greatful!

I think this is the greatest magic in traveling. I love these encounters with people from all around the world. learning about their culture, home, work. It’s fascinating!

here’s some common pricing at Yak Karka:
2 Boiled eggs - 80 NR
Chapati (2 pieces) - 80 NR
Vegetable soup - 95 NR
double room - 150 NR

The next day we headed to Letdar. Letdar is just a few guest houses on the mountains. It’s not really a village. villagers from Manang built these Guest houses ( there are 4 of them, I think) for travelers. Letdar is very close to Yak Karka, 35 minutes walk…We took it easy and spent Friday and sauterday resting there.

Letdar is more expensive than Yak Karka since as you go higher all services are more expensive. just think that the food you are eating made the same way you did on the back of one of the many porters working in the area.

costs at Letdar:
2 Boiled eggs - 100 NR
chapati (2 pieces) - 100 NR
Veg spring roll - 180 NR
Spagetti with tomato souce - 190 NR
double room - 200 NR

Acclimatizing yourself is very important and one of the most useful ways is going up the heights for the day and come down for sleeping. Because of that Manang offers several day trips around it to higher sights in order to get used to the heights.

The highest option is going up to the “Ice Lake”. It’s a great day trip with amazing views (in my opinion it has the best views on the whole trip).

From Manang there are 2 ways going up to the Ice Lake. The 1st one goes out of Manang itself. It’s steeper and takes less time. The 2nd trail which is easier to walk goes out of Braga (Braka). This is the previous village on the trail and it takes around half and hour to walk back.

We choose the 2nd option. We left Manang at 7:55 AM and headed back to Braga. The trail goes right inside the village so you have to cross it. The general direction is up, so just keep going straight.

After passing the last few houses of the village the narrow goat trail turns to the right and goes along the mountain. Then it turns again to the left and climb up in a very steep climb, this will be your hardest and steepest climb of the day. It’s not too long though relatively.

The trail keeps going up but it’s not so steep any more and it has a few parts of going pretty straight.

When reaching the height of 4600 M, you suppose to see the lake. In order to see it, cross the hill on your right or go around the hill for a few minutes. Right afterwards you’ll see a lake; this is NOT the “Ice Lake”. The Ice Lake is lying another 10 minutes walk after the 1st lake.

Along the way there are signs of ACAP showing the way to the Ice Lake. At this time of the year it’s no very icy though. We reached it around 12:30 PM.

My personal opinion is that the lakes are not as beautiful as I expected, on the other hand the way going there is absolutely amazing! You get to see the opposite ridge and great views of the Annapurna range, Braga and Mananag.

On top near the lake we met a young guy which was a reporter of a local newspaper. He took some video shots of the place. We decided we want to go down the steeper way, the one going straight to Mananag. We really didn’t know where this way is. A

sking that reporter, didn’t also give us the wanted answer. Therefore we just walked back on the way we came. The reporter came with us although he said he already walked once on the steeper trail, but I guess he couldn’t find it either.

We left the lake at around 13:00 and reached Braga at 15:55 then it’s and easy walk to Mananag. We were exhausted, and reached Mananag at 16:30.

Summing it up, It’s a long and hard day of climbing (although from the signs in Manang it doesn’t’ seems so.) 1000 M. The views worth it all! Adding the importance of the good acclimatization you get from this trip, it’s just a must!