Ghasa to Tatopani: Into hot water

Leaving the Mustang district and entering Myagdi in the early morning, we marveled at the lush verdant landscape filled with the sounds of insects and birds. Ghasa is situated on a narrow chasm and is the last town in Mustang .

We had very little sleep last night as the Mustang Hotel filled up with a busload of 30 people all on a pilgrimage to Muktinath and this was the rest point for the night. They arrived late and we thought the hotel was hosting a loud party, then they left early, making a huge racket before the crack of dawn with the result of us getting only a couple of hours of sleep. 

As we walked down the street we were astounded to see the beautiful dog who had been following us yesterday. She was sitting on the side of the road next to a local man who squatted beside her, stoking her back and she had a very content look on her face.... we were so happy and relieved to see this.

There was heavy road construction which was blocking off passage along the actual road. According to the map app (map.me) we are using, there was a side trail downhill from the road which we decided to take instead. However, once we got down there, the trail was partially obscured by a rock slide caused by the roadworks. We scrambled over the rocks and realized that the rock slide had also obscured the fork we needed to take leading back to the road. As we backtracked, the bulldozer on the road above us started dumping rock debris down the slope onto the spot we had been standing on 3-5 minutes earlier. This was very scary as huge rocks and lots of loose dirt came hurtling down, too close for comfort, but Dreadknot remained level headed, told me to wait in a safe zone while he scoped out how to get onto the right path. He then came back to guide me over boulders and with a bit more rock scrambling and a good amount of adrenaline pumping we were safe and back on track.

The rest of the morning we spent walking on the road that was in use despite the fact that was still in the development stage. There was the choice of an off road trekking trail across the river which we were glad we didn’t take as we could see that it had been obliterated by a large natural landslide. There is also so much talk about whether this new road is a good thing or not, but quite honestly whatever is best for the Nepalese people is the only concern. There are plenty of alternative trekking trails and trekkers are simply visitors who are here for a very short period of time. The construction of this road is a massive undertaking and extremely interesting to observe how it’s been done as it hugs the mountainside on the cliff line for much of the way.

We passed “the deepest gorge in the world” and a magnificent waterfall and then crossed over a suspension bridge after lunch to walk along the trekking route to Tatopani, our destination of the day. During one of our rest stops inscribed on a poster was our message for the day, “Life is a promise, fulfill it”.

Tatopani ( which means “hot water”), is a lovely little village alongside the river with natural hot springs . As we walked through the village looking for a place to stay we saw many of the trekkers we had met before which was fun, and had to stop in at the Bob Marley restaurant for a drink.

The air is so much warmer down here and it was so pleasant eating dinner at a table outside in the balmy evening with Ohad, a trekker from Israel we had been crossing paths with ever since the early days of the trail in Jagat, after watching the locals getting very into their game of archery.

We are preparing ourselves for another long climb up through the rhododendron and oak forest to Ghorapani Pass, which means “horse water”, regaining 1,660m/5,450ft) 

From Tatopani with love.