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Ghorepani to Poon Hill
My alarm went off at 4am. Today was the big day. The day for one last hike up to see the panoramic view from the Poon Hill and to finally make my way down to Nayapul and complete the Annapurna circuit trek.
I had about 6 hours of sleep so I didn’t exactly feel energised or all that excited to hike a ton of stairs to get to Poon hill but I knew it was gonna be worth it. With a few layers of trekking pants, leggings, fleece and pretty much half my backpack’s worth of clothes ON, with a head lamp already on my forehead, I headed out at around 4:30am.
I must admit that 4:30am was probably a bit excessive but I was so exhausted that I wanted to take my time and not rush myself. I just couldn’t take it. Not that morning. My legs were on fire enough as they were so if I had to rush, I would have probably gotten to the top all grumpy and majorly unimpressed 😀 And I couldn’t take the risk LOL!
As soon as I got out, a few other people started to appear on the trail. It wasn’t a popular time to start the hike but I sure wasn’t alone which was actually kinda comforting since that was my first ever solo trek in complete darkness. Fear is a crazy thing though and that morning, I had none of it … Whether there were people around or not, I couldn’t care less. Maybe you do get stronger as you get through sh** all by yourself, who knows haha
Shortly after I set off, I found myself at the Poon Hill “entrance”. It’s not so much an entrance actually as much as it is just a little cabin type thing where a guy was standing and collecting the sunrise fee of RS 100. “Godness me, I competely forgot to bring cash” – I literally didn’t have any cash on me. All I had was myself (in all my painful glory 😀 ), a camera, a phone and my keys. I couldn’t face having to go back. Every single step I had already made felt like a win and going back was just not an option.
“You stay at the Nice view hotel, no?” – the guy asked me. Sure I did but how did he know?! It was pitch black and he could barely see my face, yet he knew who I was and where I was staying. Weird and sligthly creepy, but being suspicious and secretive right now wasn’t gonna get me to the top of the hill on time if I had to go back, so I happily confirmed that I was indeed staying in that hotel and I could leave the entrance money at reception before checking out. I got myself a deal!!
And there they were! Stairs, Stairs, and more Stairs … with capital letters because after 15 days of trekking, Stairs had become my definition of an all time painful nightmare 😀
After about 40 minutes of going up, I reached Poon hill where only a handful of people had managed to get to before me, eager to glance at the first rays of light as the sun started to rise. It was pitch black, yet glimpses of mountains were peaking through the dense fog which was making the whole view mystical and intriguing. I was getting excited. “Are we gonna get any views?”, “Would the clouds lift up so we could see the very top of the Himalayas?” We couldn’t know! There was no way of even trying to guess because as I had already learnt, the Himalayas are unpredictable and that’s largely why they’re as phenomenal and majestic as they are.
People were starting to gather more and more! For the past 15 days I had not seen as many people along the entire trek, let alone in one place. I felt as though someone had pushed me back into civilisation without my consent. People travelling in groups and photographers with massive cameras were making up the majority of the crowd. What was a tranquil, mystical, peaceful viewpoint had swiftly transformed into a stage where all sorts of characters (mainly Chinese) were setting up their selfie sticks ready to strike a photo as soon as the fog lifted. I was standing to the side and wondering who was putting on a show … us for the Himalays or the Himalayas for us.
With the corner of my eye I spotted Nouh and the German guys from the previous days. Usually I would walk over and have a chat but this morning I was enjoying my moments of silence. All of a sudden, as the crowds were starting to get uneasy, disappointed that the passing of time was only bringing more cold and fog, the clouds lifted and the whole horizon filled up with preaks perfectly aligned one next to the other, just like theatre actors on the stage after a successful performance, ready to take a bow, thank the audience and receive the applause. It was spectacular!!
For a few breathtaking moments Machhapuchhre, Ghangapurna, Annapurna I, Annapurna South, and almost the entire Dhaularigi range, opened up right in front of me! The colours of the sunrise were lightening up the peaks whilst the mases of clouds were doing their dance left right, up and down, covering up the peaks in one moment, just to reveal the whole of the mountains a few seconds later.
I was a true show! A show of mountains, fog, clouds, sunrays and colours. It made perfect sense why this viewpoint had gathered so many people. It was just unbelievable! Unbelievable to observe it and believe it was real and unbelievable to describe it because it was just so surreal.
At around 6:30am, whilst people were still pressing the selfie stick buttons in all directions, it was time for me to start heading down. I had my moments of appreciation, gratitude and immense happiness that I was fortunate enough to be standing at the Poon Hill and witness the sheer beauty and grandness of the Himalayas. But now, having driven my fingers and ears to the edge of getting frozen and falling off, it was time to head head down!
And I gotta admit, it was all worth it! The 4:30am start, the stairs, the cold, the crowds, the anticipation – it was all so damn worth it!!
Ghorepani to Uleri
I went back to the hotel to pick up all my things and when everyone headed for breakfast, I headed out of Ghorepani and on my way to Uleri. It was my last day on the trek. The last day of isolation, presence, a last day to reflect on the crazy adventure that was now so close to being over. So today, more so than any other day, I wanted to be alone. I wanted to start the trek alone and cross my finish line all by myself, just like it all started 16 days ago!
Skipping breakfast was my way of guranteeing the first! I checked into the ACAP check-in point just before leaving Ghorepani and I was officially on my descent.
The trek was manageable! At first … Not too straining as it was mostly going down but still nasty enough on the knees and thighs to make it painful after the first couple of hours. Occasionally I would do a full body scan to check if I was still holding up ok. I didn’t want to face the reality that by the end of that day, I’d be down and away from the mountain. I was completely and utterly present, absorbing the sounds, filling up my eyes with views, locking in my memory the feelings and emotions that were coming and going.
And I was entirely alone! Not a single person behind or ahead of me … not a single sound to remind me of civilisation. I was solo and I was content. I had an unual smirky smile on my face as if ready to shout out loud (mainly because no one could actually hear me) that I was doing this sh** all by myself and I was rocking it 😀
This was my climax — no prejudice, pretentiousness, no bullshit, no clutter! I guess I knew it all along but in that moment, just a few hours before the end of an adventure so mad, so damn cool, yet so terrifying, challenging, rewarding and inspiring, I had realised that less is enough, I was enough.
In a crazy mixture of deep thought and utter presence, I entered a rainforesty section of the train almost entirely coverted in trees and bushes, making it dark and kinda creepy. All I could hear were the sounds of the insects and the water that was flowing down, just enough to make it all slippery and help the moss around flourish in its successful efforts to cover up the whole trail. And it sure as hell was getting there. My concentration was on full blast. One distraction from where I was stepping and I would’ve met the moss from up close for sure. I slid a few times. It was inevitable … the only question was how many times and how badly it would be! I was walking with my knees slightly bent, ready to cushion up my next slide. My backpack was dragging me back, multiplying my efforts to stay balanced each time I went wobbly and with limbs going in all directions.
Eventually I had gotten the hang of it. I could recognise the bits where I should be stepping on, I knew exactly what to do the next time that I slide, I knew which bits to avoid … I got this!
As I was trying to lift myself up, be confident and courageous as the path was getting ever so darker and creepier, a casual look to the left got my heart falling right into my feet. “Holly freaking sh**! “
A few centemeters away from the trail I was walking on, right there on the very ground, were a guy’s T-shirt, a wooden chopping board and an ax. Fresh looking blood was covering everything! The ax, the chopping board, the nearby ground.
I froze … for the longest few seconds! I wanted to run, as fast as I could … but I couldn’t. I wanted to scream but there was noone to hear me, or was there?! … I wanted to somehow just disappear from there and get the hell out of the rainforest. “What the f** is that?!” Story after strory was starting to come to mind and go away equally fast to make up room for the next even more vivid story, aiming to petrify me even more than I already was. “Did someone get killed here?” Maybe someone killed an animal, a chicken or something … but why was there a boy’s shirt on the ground?! I couldn’t make up the puzzle and in all honesty I didn’t want to. I was too scared to know the truth …
They say your palms get sweaty when you’re terrified and they sure as hell were. My heart was pounding so hard as if wanting to get out of my chest and run faster than my legs. But I couldn’t run! I tried but it was so slippery that I kept sliding. I nearly fell a couple of times and I knew that if that was the moment I actually had to fight for my life, running wasn’t gonna get me out of there. I couldn’t let myself get injured by falling down. Even the thought was paralising me! I sooooo badly wanted to get out.
“But what the hell had happened?! Maybe it was just an animal. But why here? Why in the middle of nowhere in the darkest part of the rainforest.” AAAAAAARGH GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!!! I was begging silently for someone to appear from somewhere (preferably not the “killer”), someone to come along and confirm they’ve seen this before and it’s just some twisted tradition of sacrificing animals to feed the Gods or something. But noone was around! Not a single person. More than anything in that moment though, I had to find a way to calm the hell down. Sure letting go of the thought that I might actually not make it to Nayapul was pertifying me but I had to give myself some chance of getting through this, I had to calm the hell down. I feeded my brain the story that some crazy guy had randomly decided to come kill his chicken in the middle of the woods and left everything behind. Why and how?! It didn’t matter, it couldn’t matter because I didn’t have the answers. As I was fast walking down and (hopefully) out of the rainforest I kept repeating my version of the story until I believed it enough for my body to stop shiverring and for my legs to regain their strenght to keep going.
After a few of the longest minutes I’ve ever lived, I started to calm down. The brain was successfully fed a story it had bought quicker than I hoped and if I had to fight an ax-armed man I was now ready to take him (yeah, right 😀 ). But as silly as this sounds now, it got me out, uninjured! After another 25-30 min of walking I went out of the rainforest and started to see daily hikers. I don’t remember the last time I was so genuinely happy to see another human 😀 Whatever happened from there on, I wasn’t gonna be alone and the sheer thought of that felt comforting!
My near death scare sucked up so much energy that not long after that I was starting to feel unreal exhaustion! The trail was relatively easy. There were the occasional landslide sections which were making me wary and stepping so carefully as if walking on thin ice but other than that, the path was continuing to go either flat or down! I swear if there was any going up at all, I was either gonna cry or just not bother at all and stay up there 😀 My thighs were trembling as they were and any more physical strain would have probably made them give up on me already.
Luckily, after another hour or so, I was starting to approach the first village on the way to Nayapul. I had gotten to Uleri, alive 😀
Uleri to Tikhe Dhunga
That morning Uleri was busy! It’s the village where most Poon Hill trekkers stop overnight before they tackle the last leg of the trek to Ghorepani and I was feeling the buzz the moment I arrived. Hikers were already setting off all smiley and happy and the dark creepy rainforest had given way to gorgeous valleys with lush views and local cosy houses. The village felt welcoming and for a brief moment I wished I could stay here for just another day. Or maybe I just really didn’t want this crazy trip to end, despite the morning I had just had!!
Locals here seemed busy! The narrow streets all covered in stairs were filled with people going up and down. Kids were playing around! Mums were going by their daily chores.
As I was looking at my feet so as not to trip over on one of the steps, I saw blood drops … you remember Brothers Grimm’s Hansel and Gretel and their breadcrumbs?! It felt a little bit like that 😀 I traced the blood drops, intriqued as to whether that might solve my puzzle from earlier. Slightly relieved I traced the blood drops to a local lady who was carrying a chicken by its feet. It was its blood that was dripping as she was making her way home 🙁 !! In one of her hands she had the chicken whilst the other was holding an ax, very similar to the one I had seen earlier. So many questions were coming to my mind like … how could this fine looking woman go across the village completely undisturbed holding an ax and a blood dripping chicken whilst kids of all ages were playing around. I guess that was their reality and that was just one of many early days sights they had to get used to 🙁 !!
Aside from the killed birds and the horses going passed the village that nearly went over me by (gently) pushing me off the path, Uleri felt nice! Or maybe my point of reference was still somewhere back in the dark scary rainforst and compared to that, every place was a unicorn land 😀
My stomach was starting to rumble so as much as I wanted to stick around and mingle with the locals, I was more eager to find somewhere nice to put down my backpack, sit down, enjoy being in one piece 😀 and have all the Dhal Bhat my body could physically take LOL
Tikhe Dhunga to Hile
But first … more stairs and wobbly bridges followed by even more stairs! But at least I was going down. In fact, I was still the only person who was going down. All the other trekkers I was bumping into, were headed in the other direction which meant going up and up and up. For a brief while I sympathised with them because seriously!! we’re talking about a lot of stairs but ultimately I was just happy that I had done that already and I was now picking up the fruits of the 15 days of hiking and was now having it easy haha Slightly self absorbed maybe but that day it sure was keeping me going!
Here after about 3 hours of trekking down, I finally paused for a quick break and a chat with a couple of guys who were already evidently struggling. It felt rewarding to say I was hiking to Nayapul to complete the circuit, even though I must have seemed completely nuts to these guys when I told them this was day 16 for me. They seemed ready to go back just half way through day 1 😀
Tikhe Dhunga was a slightly odd place. It had stunning views but only a handful of houses and barely any people which made it stand out from Uleri quite a bit! Yet, as I was marching down the stairs, I spotted a little place where passers by could buy a banana and some drinks. A smiley local man walked out of what was his home and we started chatting. We had an entire conversation about his life, how far he had to go to stock up with some things to sell, where he was getting the yak cheese from that he was also offering. It was actually pretty fascinating to realise how far he had to travel with his horse to bring back huge blocks of yak cheese to make a living off. He was proud of it, so much that he even invited me to his house to show it to me. Of course I accepted the offer and followed him inside where his wife was sat on in a dark room which was both their bedroom and a kitchen space. Basically everything they had was fitted inside that room. On her lap, the woman who smiled generously as soon as she saw me, had a newborn baby she was swinging from side to side. The room was … how should I put this … unwelcoming. It was dark, with no windows, not really containing much, and it was actually shockingly dirty. I kept my smile on and happily joined the man at the fridge (next to the bed), which contained almost entirely just two blocks of cheese. Yet, he was a happy man! He had his wife and baby right next to him and his “business” getting chilled in the fridge untill the next group of touritsts arrives .
He was so proud that he even wanted me to take a photo of the block of cheese. He took it out, layed it on the outside table and happily anticipated the shot I was about to take. And here’s the snap that came out!
Eventually I had to continue on my way so we said our goodbyes, he gave me directions to the next village and I was gone. For a brief moment I had forgotten how the day had started, how petrified I was earlier, how the stripes of my backpack were cutting into my shoulders and my kneecaps were trembling every time I was stepping down.
It was low season and I could totally tell that even in this part of the trek which was easily accessable most places I could stop for lunch were either shut or completely dead with not a single other customer. Luckily, after a bit of asking around I got to a place in Hile called Mamta’s home, where I finally sat down for lunch. I was so excited by the sight of the views from this place but even more so by the arrival of my Dhal Bhat. Having trekked for nearly 4 hours on an empty stomach, I was ready to slow down, refuel with some food and just enjoy … well, everything!
Just as I was making swift dives into my lentil soup and rice, the German guys managed to catch up and stopped for a quick chat. They were the first descending trekkers I had seen that day and they sure seemed to have been rushing because they hadn’t even spotted the murder scene when I brought it up. “How the hell did they go past without seeing this??! Did they go blind folded or something?!” Honestly, they hadn’t seen or heard anything, as if they were going by completely oblivious to where they were and what was happening around. Such a big damn shame …
I was so grateful, once again, that I was doing this alone! Sure I had gotten my heart completely rock heavy with fear but at least it was a hell of a good proof that I was EXPERIENCING this trek and not just going past it, fully absorbed in my bubble blindfolded to everything, good or bad!
Anyway … luckily I convinced them not to wait for me to finish up, they left and I enjoyed a few more moments of reflection before tackling the last couple of hours of the circuit.
Hile to Nayapul
From Hile to Nayapul the trek was pretty uneventful. It was easy, pretty much entirely flat … even the stairs were over and done with! But the finish line couldn’t come all that easy (evidently) so just as I was going down what were the last few stairs, a snake, black, thin and seemingly lost, got me jumping up and down like one of those headless chicken. She was right there at my feet trying to get from the step into the nearby bushes, going totally nuts by sidewinding so rapidly that it took me a few seconds to even spot her. She was the exact same type as the one I had seen previously but “lucky me”, this time she was so damn close. At that point my adrenaline was already through to the roof so she didn’t even scare me. I think I was at the point where I just expected more and more sh** to come my way so I was just intrigued by what it would be next 😀
Relieved that I managed to hop my way out of the snake’s sight without a bite, I continued on now looking even more ludicrously happy. When I stopped for a chat with an English guy who was also headed to Ghorepani, he couldn’t believe I seemed this happy after 16 days in the mountains 😀 I guess I did have a ton of reasons to look frightened, exhausted and grumpy and smiling after all that had just happened was, put simply, insane LOL
I was about an hour away from Nayapul when my motivation had plummeted and my exhaustion had totally soared. Jeeps were starting to appear as I got on a dirt road. It was the perfect moment to just get it over with and get a ride to the bus station in Nayapul. Just as the thought briefly tried to cloud my judgement, a jeep pulled over and the driver said to me “You’re nearly there, jump on. We’ll give you a ride. It’s only 5km. You don’t have to hike” – wow, the coincidence was shocking!
“The whole point is to hike it till the end though, but thank you so much for the offer anyway!!” – I said to the guy and they drove off.
I was way too stubborn and determined to take the easy way out so I trekked on. As I was going past the last few villages that followed, I took my time. I talked to the locals, asked heaps of questions (as I do 😀 ), got myself some mini bananas and I could feel I was trying to prolong the finish for as long as I could.
Eventually I asked a local lady “Is this Nayapul?”. I didn’t see a sign but Maps.me was showing it as though I was in Nayapul already. The place was messy and dirty, with chicken in cages on both sides of the road, displayed for sale. This place, unlike the others I had just passed by, didn’t seem all that friendly so I was actually hoping I wouldn’t have to cross it all.
“Yes, Yes” – the lady replied.
For a few seconds I didn’t quite realise what that meant. Then it clicked!
“OMG, I’M DOOOOOONE! I’M OFFICIALLY DOOOOOOONE!” – I literally screamed 😀 Maybe I gathered the looks, maybe I didn’t … I didn’t care. I had finished the Annapurna circuit in 16 days, with no break, no porter, no guide. I was happy, and proud and nothing else mattered!
It started to rain just as I asked for directions to the bus station. It was time to get the bus to Pokhara and finally check into a proper hotel with a nice big bed, hot shower and a toilet with an actual toilet seat 😀 I was dreaming about the simplest forms of “luxury”, a pair of shorts and flipflops and a celebratory dinner at the French Creperie which had become one of my favourite restaurants in Pokhara. Smiley, content and hungry by the thought of my upcoming buckwheat galette with oyster mushrooms, poached eggs and homemade hummus 😀 , I hopped on the bus excited and in full blindness to just how “adventurous” the bus ride itself would be!!
I genuinely thought that if the hike didn’t kill me, the bus ride easily could have LOL
THE END!!!
Daily Costs
- Room – RS 200
- Last Dal Bhat on the trek – RS 400
- Bus to Pokhara – RS 150
- Victory bananas in Birethanti – RS 50
- Dinner at the French Creperie – RS 445
Day 16 Tips
- Before you head out for the Poon Hill trek, take some cash for the entrance fee. In Sept 2019, the price was RS 100 so bring a couple hundred just to be sure.
- If you get totally and utterly terrified, DO NOT run. The trails can be slippery and you might seriously end up injuring yourself or worse not be able to run away if you actually have something/ someone you should (ideally) be running away from.
- This is the last day from the trek so stay present, enjoy it and remember every single minute of it! By the end the day you’ll be back in “reality” and I can guarantee you that you’ll wish to be back in the mountains (even if not immediately after the trek is finished) so make the most of it!
- Enjoy and stay present! Namaste 🙂
Day 16 Gallery
