Day 11: Letdar to Thorung Phedi
Approximate Trekking Time: 1 ½ – 2 hrs.
Distance: 4.8k / 3 miles
Overnight Elevation: 4540m/14,895ft.
A short day! We woke and packed just after 6am, ready to leave Letdar! Heading out of Letdar, we passed a group of yak grazing in the pastures. Yak Kharka actually means “yak pasture” and I’d expected to see more when passing through yesterday. Their hair was shorter than I’d remembered the shaggy beasts from movies, though it’s possible they had been recently sheered, or more likely – that they were a mixed yak-cow/bull breed.
While the morning air was chilly, we were soon removing warm layers as we climbed up and around a mountain ridge trail in and out of the sun. Hiking high above the east bank of the Kone Khola, the trail made gentle ascents and descents with steady flat sections, before eventually descending to a suspension bridge crossing to the west side of the valley.
For a bit, we were still surrounded by lush green bushes and grasses – even just above 14,000ft. (4,267m). Hiking at this elevation in Colorado, we would have been above everything. Here, at the heart of Nepal’s most well known and traversed trekking circuit, mountains still towered high above us in all directions, reaching another 1-5-10,000+ ft. (300-3000+ m) toward the heavens. We were hiking among giants, though at 14,000ft., seemingly still closer to the valley floor than the snow-capped peaks in the sky.
Continuing onwards and upwards, we eventually lost the vegetation and the landscape turned rocky, dusty, and dry. The trail became a thin ridge of shattered shale and other rocks, traversing a steep landslide-prone slope.
Soon enough, Thorung Phedi (4540m/14,895ft.) came into view and we made our way past a group of horses, wandering ownerless down the trail, to the small establishment that made up “base camp”, a simple mountainside abode of 2-3 lodges. Phedi, which translates to “foot of the hill” is a common Nepalese name for settlements at the foot of long climbs.
Arriving at around 9:30am, many trekkers coming through at this hour are continuing on for another hour to Thorung High Camp Hotel, a single lodge another hour, and 1000ft. (305m), up the trail. Some opt to continue on to “High Camp” because it makes their trek up and over the Thorung La (la = pass) the next day shorter. Still others, such as ourselves, opt to stay at Thorung Pedi for a lower sleeping altitude, less worried about the extra hour of trekking time to the pass. Often trekkers that stay in Yak Kharka go to Thorung Pedi and those that stay in Letdar go to High Camp. However, even though we stayed in Letdar, we weren’t interested in sleeping at nearly 16,000ft. (4877m), so opted to stop in Thorung Pedi.
Arriving before 10am did mean a very long day of sitting around though. So we did our usual, hanging out in the dining room all day reading, writing, talking to other travelers, and warming ourselves with a large pot of black tea – hydrating and peeing the day away. Shawn even won a couple of chess matches against a Venezuelan trekker and his guide.
For lunch, I opted for the daal bhaat for the first time along the entire trek, hoping the “daal bhaat power 24 hour” t-shirts sold in Kathmandu had some truth to them and the rice and lentils would power me over the pass the next day. I think mostly I just ended up with indigestion and had to take some gas-ex to unknot my stomach. :/ So much for that.
