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Well it seems that Friday the 13th really is a day of bad luck - the remainder of the party is in quite a bit of trouble: the flight for the remainder of the people has been cancelled; so they'll
have to travel to Skardu by bus. For the 8 (+ Shafiq) in Skardu the day was quite nice. I take back all the bad things I said about Skardu yesterday. We walked through and beyond the messy bit and then walked through a really nice, green bit with lots of trees and less traffic - very pleasant. About 40 minutes into the walk a jeep track starts and this is followed till the lake itself. The lake is really beautiful. Clear blue water - it is the water supply for Skardu. The lake is surrounded by some pretty high hills. The path to Satpara goes beyond and on to Deosai. Ali Pracha, Shafiq, Sajjad and I did some boating on the lake. Later, Faiza, Rabia, Wassif, Jeff and Khizer also did some boating. All the while I couldn't help thinking how nice it would be to get chance to scuba dive in the lake. The water is crystal clear and has a blue-green colour to it - for whatever reason. Way back was easy, although I found going downhill quite tedious. Going: 2hours 15 minutes; coming back: 1 hour 45 minutes. Very nice day indeed. Hassan Karrar and Yasir Khokar have arrived - they are alive! I have acquired a hat courtesy of Wassif - mattress shouldn't be hard to acquire. I was silly enough to leave both back in Islamabad. It is 8:36 pm - haven't had dinner yet - going in a bit. Post dinner: Hassan Karrar related his story - amazing stuff. I have
been put in a state of awe by what these two related to us. Hassan K called
Shimshal an adventurer's playground - sounds good and I am on for Shimshal
next year. Rabia collapsed - exhaustion? We have dinner at some a place
5 minutes down the road from the Indus - some of us are regulars here
and so the owner is really friendly. Great chappal kebab! "Take" - was introduced to the term first hand LP! Anyhow, had had a fear of the guy Zakria instilled in me. From his history: certainly he seems like quite a scary fellow. But we shall see (as I did call him a "Ms" once and he is a "he"... so, apparently I could be in a lot of trouble). Have had dinner - usual except that along with the daal and chappal kebab there was some chicken. The other half of our party still hasn't arrived and won't do so till some time tomorrow morning - feel quite bad for them: having to endure such a long and painful journey. Hope I can maintain this journal! Anyhow: I am still alive! I have not been slaughtered yet - although I am expecting it at any moment! Today - huge road journey to Thongal, not Ashkole. Not a bad place - very windy when we got here. Set up our tents etc. There is a lot of sand here. The journey here was quite spectacular - I hate "oh the scenery is so fabulous" type statements but I really don't know what else to say - it is quite simply out of this world. The jeep ride itself was tedious and for the most part painful. Desert at high altitude - the Karakorams are barren. I am getting better acquainted with a bunch of these senior LUMS students and they are generally a nice bunch. The weather: cold. I felt cold and had to put on the fleece. Tent set up - tent mates: Sajjad, Hassan Javed - will be quite cramped - am contemplating sleeping in the mess tent. Sajjad has an all white standard Army kit - the abominable snowman! Tomorrow is a big day - we go to the first camp after Ashkole. Have a heavy bag and I hope I can manage. Also I wonder what sort of weather we will have. Anyhow I woke up at about 5:00 am and dozed off again and was woken up by Rabia. Note: bearing in mind the time of year and altitude (3000m, in Thongal), using the sleeping bag as a blanket is very comfortable - also for really sound sleep make sure you have travelled about 10 hrs on really bad jeep tracks cramped in a jeep with out seats with 9 other people! Set out at about 7:40 am - kind of late. Got to Ashkole at 9:00 am and got "registered". Registration is voluntarily done, I don't see how that guy at the registration place would have enforced what he was supposed to. Having got to Ashkole so late it is no surprise that it took 5 hours 40 minutes to get to Korophon which was not our intended destination (which is apparently another 3 hours further and is called Jhola). But anyhow we reached this place Korophon at a reasonable time and have set up camp - now everybody is just sitting around waiting for dinner. Korophon is a bit of a "Juma Bazaar" - there are a couple of other trekking parties camped here along with us. Weather today has alternated between sunny and overcast - at camp that is. The trek was mostly overcast. Most of the day's trek was nice - we followed the Braldu river up the valley. Crossed a very precarious looking bridge called the Biafo Footbridge (got a couple of pictures). After the bridge there was, in my opinion, a really tedious sandy-stony plateau bit - nothing to look at, just really tedious. We could have gone to the next campsite, however the tail was too far behind for that to happen. Possibly one of the reasons we were so slow is because a lot of us break too often. I feel that once you build up a rhythm - breathing, walking - you shouldn't stop and break - keep moving and break for water after an hour or so. Bright moon, but after it went down, you could see the stars very clearly.
I followed the movements of some satellites for a while. I volunteered to do tail with Sajjad - I don't think I shall do it again! We covered about two stages, actually one and a half. We started at Korophon and passed Jhola and ended up somewhere between Jhola and Payu. According to Hassan it is supposed to be a 6 - 9 hour trek. It took the tail 8 hours 15 minutes to a point before camping spot. The actual camping spot was, at my own pace (Sajjad and I broke away from the tail after that point) it took about 45 minutes. The place we were to originally camp is called Shamstok, however there was another party there already, so we decided to move to the other camping spot. Being the tail was not exactly fun. Faiza, Saddaf and Maheen were tailing. Faiza and Maheen picked up, but Saddaf was a little slow. We stopped every 15 minutes or so - water break or an ascent would require a break. Saddaf was complaining of a knee pain. Today (19th July) again almost the exact same bunch of people were tailing - Saddaf was having a pretty hard time. We have lightened her load. I suppose she will pick up as she gets used to the trek. Apart from my complaining (!!) - tail is fun in its own way, quite relaxed and you get to see the surrounding area better. But it is difficult to walk at someone else's pace so it can be kind of tiring. Yesterday's (18th July) campsite was easily the nicest we have had. The sky was very clear last night. I attempted to stargaze for a while but I found that a spider was eager to share the experience! Anyhow, today (19th July) I didn't take tail today - it was good to walk at my own pace. Took me 4 hours and 15 minutes with a 20 minute break included. We had to cross a stream somewhere in the middle - I managed without having to take my boots off and still avoided getting wet - very proud of myself! Getting to Payu was a relief as it got astonishingly hot. The final approach to Payu is very unpleasant - or at least it was at the time I did it. It was getting close to mid day, so it was really hot and also I hate to say it but the terrain on the final approach to Payu was very reminiscent of the Margalla Hills! It is blasphemous to have said that but I guess I wasn't in a good mood on that last bit. Payu is OK. I don't like it much. A couple of other groups are also here - kind of crowded. There is a stream running through it. I don't know how clean the water is but I guess it doesn't really matter when you consider how filthy you are! At the Indus motel they advertised an incinerator at Payu. I saw it but it didn't seem in working condition. Shame. Our trekking party has generated a lot of rubbish and I don't know how adequately we have been dealing with it. pollution is a pretty big factor up here - there is lots of it, at all camp sites thus far. I am a bit tired, and feel really filthy! I need to get a few pictures of Payu. Hassan Karrar has a very impressive camera set up - big camera with big lenses and stuff. Very cool! It is about 4:30 pm and has cooled down considerably. People are messing about, playing cards - generally quite relaxed. Usually trekking parties take an extra rest day before pushing on to the glacier. But we will be on the glacier tomorrow. I have never really done any walking on a glacier before. Should be interesting. Zakria Khan has decided not to kill me. In fact, it turns out everyone was in on this big joke, Zakria was meant scare me a bit. He broke the news to me today - so I suppose I will live on this trek after all (or will I)! |