Please note that since I walked the Annapurna Circuit in 1998, things have changed a lot. There are roads to Muktinath to the west of the pass, and to Bagarchap in the east, and by all accounts this has changed the nature of the trek completely. I've left my writing untouched, for the sake of nostalgia if nothing else, but if you intend to walk the circuit yourself, you should be aware that it will be very different to the trek I describe here. And probably not in a good way...
Receiving puja in Muktinath
The west side of the Circuit is a completely different experience. The track leading down from the pass, the Jomsom Trek, has high quality hotels, comparatively incredible food, a warm climate and fairly easy downhill walking. I felt like I'd arrived in paradise: I had trekked the eastern path, I had struggled over the pass, and when I hit the other side I reverted to character. I didn't so much walk the track as travel it.
From the pilgrim town of Muktinath (where we spent two days), through Kagbeni (one day), Marpha (two days), Kalopani (one day) and Tatopani (two days) we loafed around, ate too much, drank the pleasantly priced beer and totally failed to take the walk seriously, considering the length of the challenge. My writer's block, which had set in along with the AMS in Manang, completely failed to lift and I spent hours sitting around reading, relaxing and thinking. It was a holiday. It was luxurious. It was fattening. But it was ultimately relatively boring, and I found myself, not for the first time, wishing I was in India, back where the madness is mundane, the insanity inbred and the lunacy legendary. How strange.
The Himalayan town of Tharkot perches on the edge of the most precarious-looking ridge you've ever seen
But Nepal's landscapes more than make up for any lack of incredulity. From the dizzy heights of the pass to the sheer valleys of the east side, the mountains never ceased to amaze me, with their wispy cloud vents, snow-blue peaks and sharp contrasts with the sky. But statistics, of which there are millions in Nepal, can be misleading in making the mountains sound out of this world. For example on Sunday 19th April I read the following in my guidebook: 'It's at around this point, the bend in the river between Kalopani and Larjung, that you're at the bottom of the world's deepest valley. The two highest peaks in the area, Dhaulagiri (8167m/26794 ft) and Annapurna I (8091m/26545 ft) are 35km (22 miles) apart on either side of the valley. You're standing at an altitude of about 2540m/8333 ft, which is 5.5km or 3.5 miles below the summit of Dhaulagiri.' This sounds much more interesting than it really is: the reality is a wide valley with a couple of distant peaks on each side. Deep doesn't mean steep.
And then there is the dubious help offered by the various hotels around. Take this quotation from the Kalopani Guest House Menu:
The cute kids of Kagbeni
FROM GUEST HOUSE DAIRY
Kalopani is a beautiful place to be spent for short trek. This place is popularly known for spectacular Sunset view over Mt. Annapurna I & Nilgiri. You can enjoy with the changing colour of the Himalay's. From here you can make 2.5 hours. Titi lake for splendid view of Mt. Dhaulagiri. For the peasant lovers you can visit the Dhungang Area. Kalopani Jungle has lost of wild life. For resting a day, you can visit the Bhudurtsho lake wich can cost 5 hours. From here you can organize Dhaulagiri Ice fall trek as well Dhaulagiri & Annapurna Base Camp. For more detail please contact the management.
Thank you!
Grammar is evidently an optional extra when you're writing in a second language (though I can't be too critical, seeing as that's the philosophy I use with French, and it works fine for me).
A fertile river valley near Kagbeni
At least the hotels on the west side had good standards of food, which more than made up for the less inspiring scenery. In Tal, on the east side, we had discovered bugs in the tomato ketchup bottle; when we complained to the lady owner, she examined the bugs and said, 'It's OK, these clean bugs from ceiling, not dirty bugs from floor.'
On the west side, we got our food in sizzling platters. It mirrored the east-west divide rather well, I thought, as I trundled on to the end of the track in Beni before boarding the bus to Pokhara.
