Day 18.. Peddling through treacle

 Day 18 started late. I was in the very nice Hotel de Purang in Muktinath, comfy and warm. I really did not want to get out of bed. My plan for the next few days was to do a bit of downhill cycling as reward for the struggle upward and I was looking forward to it. I wasn't going to push the miles.. I was going to have a shortish chilled out day.

I was still coughing and going up the staris to my room on level 2 had left me very breathless. This was not altitude. I felt a bit like I had when I had a chest infection in New Zealand... not that bad but still annoying. I'm sure all the dust from the roads and the combination of extreme cold and then occasionally warm did not help in any way. I was still pouring snot. It was not pretty.

Adding to that was my body was aching all over... like it hadn't realised there were still a couple of days of some effort to go.

So I stayed in bed for a while, having woken at 0630 annoyingly. Read my book, tried to answer all the kind words and comments on facebook and generally chilled out. Then I went down to breakfast. Out of the window whilst I waited for my sausage bacon egg and beans, I saw a huge mountain that I hadn't really noticed last night. I asked the lovely hostess which mountain... The Dhaulagiri range she said... the biggest one on the left is Dhaulagiri.

Dhaulagiri is the world's 7th highest mountain and stands at 26,795ft or just over 8000m, 1st climbed in 1960. It was an impressive mountain with a foreboding face of rock on the side I could see.

It was a joy to behold in all its might and I could see the road that I would take winding down beside it. 

At breakfast I chatted more to the hostess, asking her about the earthquake in 2015 (they were just building the hotel then and after the quake made its structure stronger). Most people in this town have jobs related to tourism but out in the countryside people are farmers, cattle mainly, but she said she also had an apple farm down in the valley.

It also turned out that her brother owned a bike shop in the village, with modern mountain bikes hat catered for the tourists that wanted to ride the trails sans kit. I said I would pop in to see him on the way out of the  town.

When eventually I packed up and left  the sun was shining and it felt quite warm... sunscreen had been applied correctly today and I had finally decided that I would cycle in my new shorts. Sentimentalism meant my old shorts were in the bottom of my seat pack! 😂

The hostess took me over the road to her brother's shop, introduced us and then left us to chat. He showed me his shop and the nice Trek bikes that were there.... all 9 speed. I can't imagine cycling in this country with a 9 speed bike but then most of these cyclists are just doing ddownhill trails and certainly. not carrying kit! 

Tsheten Gurung was a thouroughly nice chap and had gradually built up his business, Mustang Outback Adventures. He basically shows clients downhill routes and trails they can do. Upper mustang is fast becoming a mountain bike mecca and he is at the forefront of guiding and rides in the area. He was also interested in the dynamo hub I had on my bike. If I come back to Nepal with my bike, I will make sure I have a few days to spend with this guy.!

He told me a. little bit about the road ahead and said he didn't want to delay me as the winds got up after 12... I should be past Jomson by 12 he said. 

As we were talking a couple of American guys came up to me and congratulated me on going over the pass. I think I had met them a few days before and they told. me they had been wondering if I had got over and had been thinking about me. Very sweet of them.

I said goodbye to Tshering and set off rowards the blacktop. After a couple of incorrect turns I made it through the bus and jeep park that brought tourist up to Muktinath and onto the road, downhill. Beautiful.  I hadn't, stupidly, reckoned on how cold I would be. Reminded me of a descent from halfway cafe on Route 66 (where I met one of my trail angels, Faith) I plummeted down 2000ft and was frozen to the core by the time I got to the bottom. In some ways this was worse... I started at 12000ft and by the time I made it to my eventual destination, I was at 8500ft... thats a lot of descent. Even in the sunshine its a bit nippy. But I skip ahead a bit. This is Nepal... no cycling is easy here and the mountains, the road, and the cycling gods had all conspired overnight and agreed not to let me leave without a fight.!

The switchbacks down were great and not much peddling required at all. The scenery was like a desert landscape this side... very arid and sand coloured. It looked quite inhospitable a place.

Even on the blacktop, I had to pay attention as there were sections where the road became like the jeep track and the corners were tight, with oncoming traffic in the middle of the road, so care and attention had to be constant. I had to also keep stopping in the sun to warm up, though looking at the scenery was no hardship.

I got to Kagbeni, where I was warned by Tscheten the blacktop stopped and the jeep track began. I took a 90 degree left turn onto what passed for a road... the usual jeep track nightmare. And of course it wasn't all really downhill, there were some inclines. The first one of these that I hit, with its bumpy, stony, potholey surface made me realise just how little my legs had in them. I was back to my biggest chainring and struggling.  Fortunately for me and the legs, none of the inclines were really severe, nor did they last too long. But the quality, or lack of, of the road persisted making peddling downhill seem much harder than it should be. Damn the cycling gods! They were having fun today. Served me right for assuming it would be a nice ride today... little did I know that it was about to get worse!

I stopped for some lunch on the outskirts of Jomsom. The place where many trekkers end their journey by hiring a bus, a jeep or even a plane to take them down the valley. I had crossed over the river and stopped at a small place and asked for veg momos, the dumplings I had eaten and liked before. 

Whilst I was waiting a cow spent some time looking over my bike, which made me laugh.

When the momos arrived they were very nice but waay too spicy for me, plus the spice was also burning my chapped sunburnt lips which was really quite painful... I ate about half and then got back on the road. It was about 1300.

As predicted by Tscheten, the wind had picked up and was now blowing a hoolie (as they say somewhere, not sure where that came from). Of course it was a headwind. It had to be.

I went past the airstrip, thinking that all the flights out of here must be morning flights if this happened every day as it would have been a very bumpy, turbulent ride up out of Jomsom. Cycling was more preferable, I decided only to change my mind 2 seconds later when I turned a slight corner and got hit by the full gusting force of it. 

The gusts were enough to almost stop me dead it my tracks and life on the bike became a battle of wills, me against the wind. It made any downhill feel like I was peddling theough treacle and the uphill inclines almost impossible. Dirt and stones were whipped up from the road, forcing me to keep my head pointed down. At one point the dirt hit me so hard it felt like being in a hailstorm, the small stones pinging off my legs and body. My body was tired after yesterday and my mind wavered between gusts, can't go any further, just a bit more. Plan B had been Marpha for today but I had been hoping to go further... that was before this headwind... Now Marpha looked sensible as an option.

The view however made up for it. 

I was going down a widening river valley. The river below consisted of several small ones  winding their way through silt beds. On my left side, the high mountains I had been playing around in yesterday. Some of them felt familiar, like old friends, the shapes of their peaks looked like the ones I had been through. Ahead.. Dhaulagiri rose up magnificently, hidden at times by the bends in the road, only to make a surprise appearance a few bends later. Aside from the land closest to the river, where the apple orchards stood and other farms grew their produce, the rest of the land remained like a desert, sandstone cliffs rising up with scrub bushes clinging to the steep sides.

It was remarkable to me that anyone could eek a living out here, especially with the strength of the constant wind, battering all within its path. 

It was a huge struggle to maintain forward momentum. At times, I got off and walked, face covered by my buff to try and avoid inhaling all the dust, at other times, just stopping and waiting for that particular gust to subside, whilst giving my legs some respite from the constant battle. My mind vacillated between stopping at the next hotel, or pushing on... as changable as the gusts of wind.

During one stop, I found myself observing a cliff on the other side of the river. Swirling and hopping around a dead animal carcass were a load of what I presumed to be vultures. There was a group of 6 or 7 and they seemed to be fighting over dinner! They had a huge wingspan and were mightily impressive even at that distance. 

Onwards, the legs getting ever tireder. The howling wind a constant in the struggle. 

But the beauty of the valley fortified me. 

And then... blacktop again. Blessed relief for my arse!! At least I now didn't have to contend with the bad road conditions, just the gale force headwind. 

Finally Marpha came into view. According to reports a nice old town. I cylced through debating whether to stop at each hotel as they came and went. I checked maps. me. Only another 5 ish miles to my original plan A, Tukuche and the Yak and Yeti hotel, which had received good reviews. 

Cod I do another 5 miles of this... with this headwind. Yeah I could. And so on I struggled.  And then I got stopped in my tracks by the view ahead in the late afternoon sun. The river meandered below, the sides if the valley lit up by the sun, ahead Dhaulagiri... tall and proud, the peak covered by the cloud whisping over the top. 

If the winds down here were bad... what must it get like up there. How could anyone climb that with these winds?? 

But the view was just stunning and I stood astride my bike in the warmth of the afternoon sun, just staring at the beauty, surpassing much of what had gone before.

I starte d off again, downhill on the blacktop having to pedal hard against the headwind. Almost there, I told my poor legs (out loud of course) and then as an additional. comfort to them... at least its downhill! 😂

Before too long, I bumped off the blacktop into the village of Tukuche and a bit further down the bunpy road, the Yak hotel. I crawled off my bike and sorted a room. for the night. 

The hotel seemed decent, good wifi. No heating. But a nice little sun room I. cod sit and blog in, whilst watching the sun go down over Dhaulagiri. 

At one point the su set over that peak was so good that that I ran (stroke creaked) down the steps to outside just to take a sunset picture. My reward for the days struggle and continuing with plan A. 

A. nice dinner of pasta and cheese and garlic soup and hot chocolate served to warm me suffieciently. I crawled into bed under 2 blankets, with the knowledge that I could pull out my sleeping bag if that wasn't enough. 

Tomorrow, earlier start to hopefully beat the cycling gods at their own game and sneak further down the valley before the headwinds kick up again. 

Good night all x