We started out from BesiSahar, down the trail - really a dirt road, here. I went down 60 yards, and turned on my camcorder, and recorded our start as Jeff and Kalu came down the hill. Then they went ahead, and taped ME. There were a few small rivers or streams to ford that day. There were a few muddy spots, but we made good progress. We crossed a couple streams. At the end of the road, we crossed the long suspension bridge to Bhulbhule - now, no more roads, no more vehicles. The trails were pretty good, up to Ngadi Khola, and around the next hillside. Then we got a few minutes of drizzle, so we stopped under a tea-house's shelter, just enough for a rest. The drizzle stopped.

We could see the next town, Bahundanda, but there were some steep rocky trails with steps going up, which was NOT easy by bicycle. We got up to town, and found a good teahouse which had room for us to bring our bikes inside. We didn't want them left outside for kids to fool around with. We took a shower; it rained; we had supper, and quit. (I took a walk 1/3 mile east on a nice easy ridge trail, and returned as it was getting dark.)

DAY 2.

The descent from Bahundanda was steep and rough. Not bad walking for hikers, but not easy for riders. We got in very little riding. After we descended to the river (the Marsyangdi Khola, which we would follow 8 days) we shortly started a steep tough ascent over rocky steps. I knew this would be hard and slow - and it was. At the top of the hill - we descended to Jagat. This was the same elevation as Bahundanda - we'd made no net gain. But this was not a surprise. Why did we not hire a porter for the next day? I'm not sure, but from Ngadi to Bahundanda to Jagat up to Tukhure Pokhari, (a 4-day stretch) would be a good stretch for bicyclists to hire porters. Life would be MUCH nicer.

DAY 3.

We started out of Jagat on shallow ascents, which then got good and steep. Without porters, it was tough. After a while we crossed the Marsyangdi; then went up the long steep ascent to Tal. That whole stretch has no streams, no water, and not much shade on a sunny day - so that is a good day to carry extra water. We were pretty low on water, and pretty tired, when we got to Tal. We stayed there.

DAY 4.

Above Tal, everything flattens out for a few miles before more steep ascent. We stayed at Tal - and we hired a porter for the next 2 days. Yes, there was some hard ascent past Dharapaani and Bagarchap, but not too bad, as our bikes were lighter. There were several big gravel-slides before we got to Danakyu. The trails were - tricky.

DAY 5.

We started from Danakyu and made good progress. Our porter strode ahead of us and as soon as we caught up with him, he would stand up and walk away from us again! We walked along the hug CUT in the cliff, above Braga. This trail was blasted and cut as a notch about 12 feet wide and 20 feet high, about 100' above the river and rapids, for a couple hundred yards. It's very scenic. Not TOO scary. Then JUST around the corner you can see the fantastic wall of Paungda Danda - a huge smooth rock bowl that's over a mile high and two miles wide. After one more bridge, we ascended a long tough upgrade for about a mile through woods that look very much like New Hampshire. Then - a miracle - a good long downhill ride over pleasant smooth shallow trails - as wide as a good woods road - down to Tukhure Pokhari, the site of a tiny lake and 4 teahouses (half of which were closed for the season.) We paid off our porter, who immediately started back down the hill. We had a good supper.

DAY 6.

Miracles happen again! The day started DEAD CLEAR,so we got up early and enjoyed photographing the snowy peaks almost all around us, before breakfast! It was as glorious as usual. Then we started out on easy shallow meadows - easy riding. We had no trouble getting up to Pisang.

From there it was about a mile of moderately steep up-hill - mostly easy broad roads with NO ROCKS! until we got up to the Deorali (small pass) that overlooked the small airstrip (1100 ft. long at 9500 ft.) at Hongde. Then we had another GLORIOUS mile of down hill, followed by more easy meadows. We went past Hongde (Police checkpoint) and across a couple small bridges and more great and easy riding up to Bratang. We had a good lunch in a very handsome tea-house and then walked over to the Gompa (temple) and took a tour around there. Then we boomed up into Manang and got booked into the best teahouse in town, as far as cooking was concerned. We got laundry done, and batteries charged, and we still had plenty of time to walk around town.

DAY 7.

We decided to have a rest day, for acclimatization, and for rest. I wanted to go up toward Tilicho Lake, about 17,500'. Kalu and I took off and went up to Khangsar, and then up to Thare Gompa. The monks invited all us pilgrims in for a light lunch of tsampa, a gruel-and-tea dish. The descent back to Manang was quite nice. Khalu spent an hour sewing a leather patch on his tire. This was another PERFECTLY CLEAR day, no clouds. I took an hour to walk over to the glacial lake at the foot of Gangapurna Glacier. Nice hiking, good views.

DAY 8.

Starting up from Manang, we had a good hard up-hill PUSH for a few hours. When we finally got up to a crest, we then had a pleasant half-mile down-grade to Yak Kharka (Yak Pastures).

I had been hoping to see yaks on the trail, at work, but we saw none. We did see 4 yaks near Yak Kharka, about 100 feet above the trail. As we were photographing these great hairy beasts - one of them knocked down a rock about as big as my head. It rolled down and missed my bike by a couple yards. That's OK; we had spare spokes. We kept going to Letdar. I went for an hour's hike up on the hillside above there. It got - cloudy.

DAY 9.

We worked hard, mostly pushing, up the new trail. The old trail used to go across some slide trails, crossing some HUGE gravel slides on the left bank of the Jargeng Khola. After too many avalanches, they cut a new trail on the right bank. The new trail was quite safe, and gave us quite good views across to the old trail - but it was kinda boring, and after you had climbed an EXTRA 700' - you had to descend the 700' to cross the river to get to Thorong Phedi. And the descent was very rough and steep and nasty. We had to push the bicycles down a few feet, clamp on the brakes, walk down a few feet, and repeat the process. The descent was as steep as 50% - I measured it with my clinometer. See at "What's All This Clinometer Stuff, Anyhow?' (URL = ___)

We finally got to "Phedi" - this should actually be termed as "Thorong Phedi". "Phedi" means "the Foot of the Hill". Most big passes in Nepal have a resting -place below their foot, with the name "Phedi". We pulled up to there, and had a good light lunch, at 14,600'. Then we continued up to a NEW hotel called "High Camp", up at about 16,000'. Do you know anybody else who has stayed at a hotel above 16,000'? (YES, Gorak Shep has 2 hotels at 16,900', on the route to Everest Base Camp - I've camped there.) We had a good supper and quit early to prepare for a 5:30 AM start.

DAY 10.

As mentioned in the previous section, (Weather) we got light rain at 4:01 AM, snow at 4:10, and more snow at 5, 6, and 7 AM. When the snow quit at 8, with 2 inches on the ground, we started up, nervously, not knowing how steep the snowdrifts would be.

There were no snow-drifts. After a moderate ascent, we came to the house that sold tea at 16,500', in high tourist season - but it was closed. We continued up fairly moderate slopes. After a couple more hours we got up to the High Pass, Thorong La, at 17,771', about 12:30 PM. There were prayer flags, and good photo opportunities, and we rested briefly, and paid off our porter Bim Tamang, and he started back down to the east, and we started down to the west. Quite a water-shed!

The first mile of descent was very good riding, nice and moderate. We took several good photos, and video. But I knew it would get worse, and it did. It got steep and rocky and un-ride-able. So we had to walk and push our heavy bikes down the hill. After a few hours we got to "Phedi West" a tiny ramshackle hut that was not open, selling no services. We continued down a couple miles of fairly rough trail, and approached the temples of Muktinath. We rode right past them, half a mile down to the tourist town of Ranipauwa. Got a good room, had a good supper and 1 beer EACH, after a rather strenuous day.

DAY 11.

After breakfast, we walked back up to the temples of Muktinath. We visited and respected the temples which are revered by Hindus and Buddhists, with the handsome row of 108 bulls' heads. But most of the monks had gone down to a ceremony in Ranipauwa. We saw a big procession of monks, going down there, in a religious ceremony. We left our hotel in Ranipauwa, and, after repairing a flat tire, rode downhill to Eklebhatti, a GREAT downhill ride. This was about 3500' of descent, and almost all good riding. The high wind made riding tricky, but we got down OK for lunch. Then we marched and walked and rode a little to Jomosom, across the rocky gravelly flats of the great Khali Gandaki River. We went to the bank to exchange some dollars into rupees. (That took many minutes.) We COULD have ridden down to Marpha, but we decided to stay in Jomosom (the big town where the airport is). Big party.

DAY 12.

We started down from Jomosom on pretty good trails and roads - actually some tractors do rove around town, with trailers carrying sand, rocks, or people. And we even saw a guy on a motorcycle, and a couple kids riding bicycles in town. The streets of Jomosom are paved with fairly smooth flat rocks, and the streets of Marpha are paved with VERY smooth rocks. For a few miles we made great progress, but after a while, the trail went up high on steep trails rising 100 or 200' above the river-bed. Hard work, and we slowed down a lot. After lunch we had a tricky crossing of a high side stream on a shaky plank bridge. It began to rain lightly, but we put on our ponchos and kept rolling. A couple more bridges, and we got down to Kalopaani. We considered stopping, but decided to keep going a while, down to Ghasa. It never rained hard, but it sprinkled for hours.

DAY 13.

The sun was shining, and we started down. But we had to ascend, to get to a safe place to cross a huge old slide. Then we had to cross it and descend along the slide, which was brutal and nasty and slow. After lunch, the trails were still steep up-and-down-and-up and NOT fun. We got only as far as Dana, not as far as when we were hiking! More on this later. After supper, heavy rain.

Day 14.

The next day, the trails got better. We eased down through the small tunnel leading to Tatopaani - a place of Hot Springs. We just rolled through town - we didn't need to buy anything. The trail just south of town had become very difficult, as a HUGE avalanche on the FAR bank had fallen into the river, a few years ago, causing severe erosion and avalanches on the NEAR side, and after the landslides, the trails were not very good.

I had hiked several miles down the river trail below Taatopaani, on a day hike, and I thought the trails had been pretty good. But I hadn't paid attention to the mud puddles. When walking, you could walk right along, and just tip-toe around the puddles, and barely slow down. But on bikes, we had to stop at each puddle, and horse the bike around the puddle on poor rocky steps, and it was NOT so fun.

We also came to some very rough areas of avalanche, where 50 workers were digging out to repair the trail - but also to make way for a road. The area was all chopped up, and we had to lug our panniers over some really rough hills, and go back and get our bikes. Kalu helped a LOT.

We stopped for lunch at a small tea-house, and it started to rain. When we were finished with our lunch, the rain stopped. Later, it started to sprinkle, and we stopped under the shelter of a big rock. We could see that the canyon ahead of us, with huge cliffs, was utterly blanked out in view, by cloudbursts. But shortly all the rain quit, and we proceeded. We got about as far as "Ranipauwa" (Rakhu on some maps?) and quit for the night.

DAY 15.

After a small struggle across bad trails on a slide, we made fair progress, when suddenly we hit - a ROAD!! The government was extending the road PAST Beni and we hit some fair but rough road. I eased along - the others raced ahead of me. We eased into Galeswor - a bicycle! We eased across the river and that town was called Raghughat or Rahghat? - and there were cars and trucks! Oh, civilization was coming closer!!

The road kept getting better, but it was still kind of rough. We rode down into Beni. We were planning to meet the bus there - but that was 23 hours away. We tried to phone to Kathmandu, to tell the bus company to meet us in Pokhara, but we couldn't get through. So we volunteered Kalu to stay in Beni to meet the bus driver there, and Jeff and I decided to ride to Pokhara. Just 85 kilometers. We left Beni about 8:30 AM. The first 6 miles were surprisingly rough gravel, but we eased along. Then as we passed Baglung, the road was paved, and VERY smooth. The downgrades were OK - the upgrades were not bad. After a quick lunch, we continued uphill. But I ran completely out of potassium pills, and soon I was getting leg cramps. I had to walk and push my bike. Every time I tried to ride, the agony came back! Then it began to sprinkle. I wouldn't call it miserable, but it was not exactly FUN. A couple trucks and tractor drivers asked me if I wanted a ride - but I smiled and said, no, thank you.

After a while, I tried riding again. I did not cramp up! I was very careful to ride VERY gently and slowly, but it was faster than walking! I'm convinced the rain on my legs caused them to not get cramps. We kept ascending gradually - a very good and smooth road. We stopped for a coke - the smiling host told us we were at the top! That would be nice, but he was just telling us what he thought we wanted to hear. After that, we still ascended another 40 minutes.

Just as we got to Naudanda - (Nagdanda on some maps) - the summit of the hill, at 4700', a great viewing place that (in clear weather) overlooks all of the Annapurnas - some of the clouds drifted away, and we got some tremendous views of the famous "Fish-Tail Peak" - Machhapuchhare, just 10 miles away. It was a GLORIOUS view. Then it was all downhill into Pokhara. I had used mostly my 9 bottom gears for 14 days - but now I got into my TOP 9 gears. After a couple miles of just rolling fast, we got to the beautiful shallow downgrades along the Yamdi Khola, with handsome farms, and about 7 miles of beautiful 2% downgrade on a smooth road. And a good thing, as it was getting late, and it was getting dark. We eased into Pokhara, and found our hotel, and took turns at a GOOD HOT SHOWER - !! - what a treat!! With towels! And a great supper.

Day 16.

The next morning Kalu and the bus driver showed up about 7:30, and we got back to Kathmandu just after noon.

We spent a couple days shopping, and riding around, and then it was time to go home. But that was one heck of a fine trek - even though there was a lot more pushing than riding. The riding we had, was often excellent.

WHICH IS FASTER - BICYCLING or HIKING?

This is such a challenging rough trail, that the advantages of bicycling, in terms of speed - are fairly minor. Even on the days when we had good riding, we weren't a lot faster. Getting up to Manang - it took about the same 6 days. From arriving in Manang, up to the pass, took about the same 3.5 days, as we needed to take a rest day at Manang, for good acclimatization. You need to do that, to avoid altitude sickness - cerebral edema or pulmonary edema. SURE, we could have gone up faster, but it would be very risky, and we knew better than to hurry.

DESCENDING should be easier and faster. But to get down to Tatopaani, the bikes were just about as slow. Some places, we really did go faster - and other places slower. (When we hiked, we took a couple half-days off, so we would not hurry and get too far ahead of schedule. We took off a full rest-day in Tatopaani.)

South of Tatopaani, hikers go up 6000' to Ghorapaani and Poon Hill, a great lookout across the mountains. We knew this would be an INSANE place to go by bicycle, because there were 7000 stone steps to get up to Ghorapaani, and 7100 more steps to get back DOWN (and 2200 steps more to walk to Poon Hill). So we avoided that route, and went down the trail along the Khali Gandaki. We took barely 1 day to get out from Tatopaani to Beni. We had taken 4-1/4 days to hike out from Tatopaani, but it was really only 2 + 1/3 + 1/3 + 1/6 days of hiking. So we made it around in about 13.2 days versus 20.2 on foot - but we took the shorter and easier route.

THE MAP.

Back in 2000, I found a new map by some guy Sangalli Carluccio, which proclaimed that he had ridden around The Circuit in a surprisingly low number of hours. He said he rode a lot, and carried his bike a lot, and pushed only a little. We didn't believe all of that, but we were interested, that it seemed to prove the feasibility of the trip.

When we went around, we pushed a lot more than he did. Rode less, carried less. WHY? After the trek, we studied the fine print. HE had a 9-kilogram mountain bike. Just 20 pounds. With no panniers. No wonder he carried his bike so much - it was almost trivial. He must have had a porter (or 2) every day, to carry his gear, clothes, sleeping bag, and spare bicycle parts. I had a 37-pound bike, and 33 pounds of gear, some on my back, some in the panniers.

Jeff had about 60 pounds of gear. If he only had to ride up hills, he'd be OK, but when it got steep or rocky - pushing was how we got up there. So, unless you have a super-light bike, and somebody to carry your spare tires and rims (in case you bust a light wheel on a heavy rock) you would be more likely to travel like we did - pushing our bikes. Even when we hired a porter, we did a LOT of pushing - and almost ZERO carrying. Less than 1/2%, total. I only carried my bike a little on slide trails - they were very narrow and crummy, and I would roll the front wheel along on the trail, and pick up the back of the bike by the down-tube, and hold it beside me.

ELEVATION - ASCENT and DESCENT.

When we prepared to hike around here, I computed that the MINIMUM ascent would be the the 15,400' from BesiSahar to the Pass, and 6000 ft from Tatopaani to Ghorapaani. A total of 21,400'. Obviously we would have to ascend more than that because of various uphills and downhills along the way. But my wife had a recording altimeter that recorded the total ascent each day. There were several days when we ascended THOUSANDS of feet not indicated by the mere difference between the starting and ending elevations. So the total for the hike was about 29,000'.

On this bicycle trek, we did not have to ascend the 6000' above Tatopaani. Yet we surely had to ascend about 23,000' in 14 days - and about 23,000' of descent. Good hard work.

Best regards - your comments are invited! / Robert A. Pease / rap@galaxy.nsc.com

JEFF'S COMMENTS.

I'm looking for folks to tour with me again in Alaska, biking close-up to Denali peak. This will not be as brutal as the trek around the Annapurna Circuit. We will be RIDING.

Write to me at: jeffrey_k_fisher@hotmail.com

I'm also going cycling in Colorado for one month on my own starting Aug. 15. / Jeff Fisher

OTHER WEB PAGES:

I wrote about the general problem of Dilution of Pollution:
"What's All this Dilution Stuff, Anyhow?"
- http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/ArticleID/2689/2689.html

And about the need for potassium if you have any problem with leg cramps:
"What's All this Doctoring Stuff, Anyhow?"
- http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/ArticleID/2048/2048.html

And the design of my clinometer:
"What's All this Clinometer Stuff, Anyhow?" (To be at http://www.elecdesign.com/Articles/ArticleID/xxxxx.html ,August 2)

(xxxxx to be determined soon)

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