Kokchurong - Day Six Goeche La Trek

05/18/2007
We woke up to nice weather and, as you can see from the picture of Cindy happy in the dining tent, ready to head down from the pass and finish up the trek. No more nights in tents. It was an easy walk back to Thangsing with lots of wildlife and flowers along the way. We really like the picture of the horse in front of the moraine leading back up to Samiti Lake. All over the campsite in Lamunie are piles of prayer stones like the one in the picture. They are inscribed with Tibetan prayers, mostly Om Mani Padme Hung (not that either of us can read the mystical looking script).

We paused for a tea break back in Thangsing where the locals were finishing up the new toilet that they were digging the pit for when we first passed through a few days back en route to Lamunie. When the minister had passed through on his trek, the toilet had been destroyed by a storm and he requested that they rebuild it. Thupten and I went over to check out their progress and they had finished digging the pit. It was supposed to be six feet deep and the other day, I watched them breaking huge under ground boulders into pieces with a chisel held in a bamboo pole and a large sledge hammer (of course wearing sandals…). I think they got sick of the boulders as it didn’t really look any deeper than last time we were here. Now they were constructing the walls out of old timbers and corrugated tin.

I asked Thupten how long this would last and he chuckled and said about two years before the pit filled up - ugggh…

Bizarre i2 Technologies Interlude: We headed down the hill from Thangsing towards the trekker’s huts at Kokchurong and a Punjabi Indian man was hiking up with a group following him. The group was a bunch of guys (no women in India are particularly into trekking) from the Indian Railway Company were heading up to Goeche La and I swear, this guy could have been the twin brother of Sanjiv Sidhu, Chairman of the Board of my ex-employer i2 Technologies. Very weird. He started telling us about how great it must be to be a rich American, yada, yada, yada and said something about working for a few months and then, having made so much money, traveling around the rest of the year.

We told him that most Americans get two or three weeks vacation a year and that life in America is very expensive but he wasn’t hearing any of that. Maybe he knows about Sanjiv’s billions….

We made it down the hill and through the creepy forest (see the picture of the tree covered in moss that looks like a witch’s face) as it threatened to start raining. You can see the clouds rolling through the valley in the picture of the trekker’s hut in Kokchurong which was something straight out of the cult horrof flick The Evil Dead. Anyone who has seen that wonderful flick should be able to picture Cindy levitating in the corner shrieking “Queen of Diamonds! Nine of Spades” or whatever the possessed girl in the movie starts chanting. Bonus Quiz: The first person to email us the name of the band that sings the quote scribbled in charcoal on the wall of the hut wins some as of yet unknown reward (see the attached pic).

The photo is not displayed in-line (since I wasn't verbose enough) but you can view all the photos or try clicking here Bonus Photo

Since we were supremely low on battery life on the Ipaq which plays our audio books, we decided to take a walk around the river, eventually deciding to try bird watching while listening to tunes on Cindy’s mp3 player. We did see some really cool birds (we are no wildlife photographers, nor do we have the patience, talent or equipment to capture them well but you can see one of the really pretty red and blue birds on the last trek day entry - Yuksom). Also, you can see how pleased Cindy was with the facilities at the Trekker’s Huts - luckily the boys soon erected our electric yellow toilet tent J

We finally made it to tea time at four and decided to listen to a chapter of our precious audio book, saving some for later tonight and tomorrow in Tsokha.

Man I wish I had bought another Ipaq battery or better yet a solar charger! Suddenly, we felt what seemed like an earthquake. Looking out the window, I saw Thupten and the guys milling around with the horses and looking towards the hut. A bit later, he walked in and said there had been an earthquake. It wasn’t huge but was definitely felt. After dinner we finished the last of our Bhutanese Special Courier Whiskey in honor of actually making it all the way to Goeche La. There were a bunch of other remnant whiskey bottles (non Bhutanese though..) left by previous tenants and used as candle holders so we added to the collection (we neglected to write on the graffiti covered walls though..). That night was fairly miserable with pouring rain and the hardest wooden floor that we have ever slept on. Cindy was counting her blessings that she survived another night and only had one to go. At least we weren’t in the tent! Tomorrow is a long hike back to Tsokha and one last night away from hot water and civilization.