I’ve been told that it takes a certain kind of madness to travel alone to the other side of the world and delve headfirst into unknown lands with little expectation of the outcome aside from the promise of a damn good adventure. I have, for a long time, counted myself amongst these, seemingly bizarre brand of people who seek comfort and sanity through, what Mark Twain would describe as “cutting away the bowlines, sailing away from the safe harbor and catching the trade winds in your sails.”
I return to Nepal with the usual mixture of trepidation and giddy excitement that rapidly grow and bubble over the course of the days and weeks leading up to departure, but also with a strong sense of unfinished business. This particular feeling is one which has been stagnating and lingering in my mind and remains one of the principal motivations for my trip. I have a somewhat complicated and emotional history with Nepal that spans much of my life, having first visited at the age of 11 on a journey of discovery that would ultimately spiral into one of the most important and defining episodes of my life. I wrote recently about the Scottish Highlands and how, in the depths of winter, they are uncompromising and harsh. Where this will remain true, the Himalayas are quite simply, another beast entirely. During my first adventure in this country I was given a fleeting glimpse into the world of harsh realities and brutal lessons that only the highest mountain range on earth can dish out. After about 10 days of dragging my small, inexperienced body up to Everest Base Camp, one of our number fell brutally ill with both High Altitude Pulmonary Edema (HAPE) and High Altitude Cerebral Edema (HACE), a savage cocktail of illnesses brought about by the inability to produce the sufficient red blood cells required to transport the necessary oxygen around the body in order to keep normal function at height. With life expectancy usually measured in hours, the only way to regain health is to lose as much altitude as possible, as quickly as possible. After learning these lessons from such a young age, I discovered quickly of the respect that one must show to these mountains if safe passage is to be assured.
My return journey, some 12 years later, has been a fixation bordering on obsession that has occupied at least a small space in my head since the day I left Nepal all those years ago. I have been biding my time whilst planning, researching and preparing to regain touch with this mysterious yet familiar land, continuing with my day to day life and undertaking other adventures when all the while, the allure of the Himalayas has been enticing me back. It has been a 9 week adventure here and one which had provided a breadth of different experiences, having been living in the jungled lowlands for a month as a volunteer in an NGO school, I was one of the few unfortunate people travelling in Nepal this year to fall ill with Dengue Fever, a fairly new virus (in Nepal) carried by the mosquitoes who dwell in the wet, fertile jungles found at low altitude. The treatment required to recover for Dengue Fever involves a lot of rest and fluids, a course of treatment I was all too keen to receive as it was only 2 weeks after falling ill that I was to attempt to walk from the small town of Besisahar to the much larger city of Pokhara along the Annapurna Circuit in a giant horse shoe route that would take in the mighty Thorong La Pass which stands at an impressive 5,400metres.
My memories from the high mountains of the Khumbu Everest region in 2007 have been eclipsed by the events that took place among them during my first foray into the Himalayas, the 15 or so photographs taken on my small point and shoot being my only source of visual reference to my time here. What I do remember however and remember vividly, is the experience. I remember looking up with a overwhelming feeling of complete awe, a sense that these mountains contain such a majesty that is so unrivaled by any other on the planet, that for one to even attempt to pay adequate justice in writing is a feat that appears quite impossible. They hold such power over all who walk among them, captivating the imagination, magnetizing climbers and trekkers from all over the world and remaining the constant inception and culmination of countless lifetimes worth of work and dreams. Every peak holds a unique story, each jagged and frozen summit, standing solitary and white against the inky blue sky bringing its own tale of hardship, suffering, exaltation and tragedy to the grand story. Some of the greatest feats of exploration, adventure and physical achievement have been carried out on the slopes and summits of these mountains, immortalized in history until they gain mythical status. It is strange therefore to see the stage on which these momentous events took place, in the flesh. I have found myself asking questions as I stand, small and absurdly insignificant in the presence of such giants. ‘Is that really the actual mountain where so many legends, both known and unknown, have lost their lives, simply to get to the top?’ The answer is usually yes, and the logic behind their efforts seems perfectly rational to me. Is this, therefore, where I am going to find myself returning to year upon year, in the search for my place, however small, in the Himalayan chronicles? Perhaps.
Capturing and documenting moments on my camera is now the driving force behind these trips, I have been grasping every opportunity to photograph not only the landscape, but also the people who inhabit the Himalayas and the unique culture that has grown with them over many years. Faces as gnarled, weathered and contoured as the peaks themselves share deep and beautiful stories of a lifetimes worth of hardship and resilience, staring deep into my lens with an unerring sense that, no matter how much we try to play our part for them, the world in which they valiantly battle through, will not be changing any time soon.
Once I had left slow village life behind and departed for the trek, I was fully aware of the challenge that lay before me. The days would be many and long, forming by far the longest walk I will ever have undertaken. Even then, assuming all went well with my stamina, eventually there would be the big question of how my body would cope with the rising altitude. The long, exhausting days of trudging through the lowlands gave me, if not an understanding, then certainly an appreciation for the hundreds of hardy individuals, donning nothing but flip flops, shorts and a t shirt, who carry vast quantities of goods including everything from grass for buffalo to plasma screen televisions for mile after mile to their various recipients. The customary brief exchange of ‘Namaste’ feels like a poor expression of the feeling of utmost respect and admiration which I hold for these people.
After days of walking in the shadow of some of the most spectacular mountains I have ever seen including Manaslu, Machapuchre (Fish Tail), Dhaulagiri and the full range of the Annapurnas, the thinning air and lack of oxygen is starting to make itself known. As I make my way slowly up towards the famous Thorong La Pass, the elusive target that has held its place firm in my mind as the physical pinnacle of my trip, my body is preparing to throw in a white flag and surrender itself to months of neglect and hardship that I have stubbornly put it through. Although I feel no symptoms of High Altitude Mountain Sickness, my breathing is becoming noticeably labored. Fast, deep breathes invite as much of the limited oxygen as possible to aid in the effort of getting my body higher up towards my goal and I am also developing a deep chesty cough that is turning heads in the evening at the various tea houses that make their welcome at the end of a long days walk. What runs through my mind, aside from the vulgarities that usually voice themselves during times of physical discomfort, is that I should have paid more attention to what my body has already been through in the recent months, I must try not to push my luck. ‘When I left Scotland,’ I say to myself, ‘I wanted a challenge…’ well, I certainly got one. Yet once the challenge was met, when I made it to The Thorong Pass, the physical disquiet that had plagued my body for so long, mercifully left and what remained was the feeling of complete accomplishment and a deep satisfaction at the achievement of reaching my personal Everest of the trip. Beneath the newly risen sun, standing next to the sign marking 5,416metres, I had done what I had so desperately wanted to do and for that moment, I was standing at the top of the world. This is one of the few moments that reminded me that taking on this landscape is not for the faint hearted.
After 7 weeks of living and working in the Himalayas and a further 2 weeks walking the Annapurna Circuit route combined with a blatant refusal to part with this country in the midst of illness and exhaustion, I am forced to conclude that this country has cast its spell well upon me and that even though I arrived here with a sense of unfinished business, for different reasons this time, that will remain the common theme of my departure.