Banjang to Kapti – via Pikey Peak – Don’t Miss It!

I was awake early and out for 6am, taking photos. The sky was blue and the sunlight was golden on the hillsides. Going up to the spirit in the sky. Thanks Norman.

It was blooming freezin though, and this long range photo shows the ranges, ridges and valleys between here and Bhutan.

This felt like a great day. The gods were with us. Nir had promised clear skies over Pikey Peak when we set off from Gorak Shep a long time ago. We had been lucky throughout with the clear conditions we had enjoyed at crucial moments.

We got ready, ate a great breakfast and set off at 6.30am. Just in time for Killerby to have a scrap. Trust him! Apparently he’s fighting over alleged jelly baby theft. I thought the circumstances justified photographing a Nepali without his permission.

And the tide begins to turn against our teamie bro.

Who shamefully surrendered at 6.35 in the morning. Mind you the kid was a nasty piece of work!

We set off. Well you would wouldn’t you? Oh Christ. Sometimes it’s hard to come up with decent, original stuff.

Climbing up Pikey Peak was somehow quite easy for me. I could see it was particularly hard for David. It’s like that though. One day is easier for one teamie and Vicky Verckie. The first turnaround to see what was behind us, rather than looking forward at the uphill steps, was quite astounding.

And the view down to our Tea House of last night was stunning, the path snaking up along the ridge which we walked down and Everest in the background just right of centre.

This is an extraordinary perspective. As we climbed higher the gargantuan proportions of the view were revealed. Sorry I couldn’t load it all on one.

It was a fabulous moment. The temperature had warmed up and being able to see Tibet, Bhutan and India as well as the southward faces of many Himalayan peaks was astonishing from such a small mountain – only 13,000 feet. Pah! I wouldn’t get out of bed for 13,000 feet. Oh, I did. Well, only once then.

This is embarrassing dad dancing, but the clip is evocative. All the world is a stage, and the stage will remain when the players have departed.

Another unfurling for SUFC!

The mountain man enjoys the sun.

The real mountain man enjoys everything.

Boy band? Maybe forty years ago for the one on the left. and fifty years ago for fat boy.

The time came for us to wrap. And with a long walk ahead of us we needed to make pace. We walked round Pikey Peak 2, the lower of the pair, and with our feet on the gas we made it to a great tea house for lunch, just three hundred metres below Pikey 2’s summit. Lunch would be 30 minutes and the tea house had a hot shower. Be rude not to!

And after lunch, with a brief discussion on whether to stay here tonight or crack on, we cracked on.

What music did Dave Smith listen to on the way down Pikey Peak, young fella me lad?

I’m not rightly sure sir. I don’t know the man or his musical tastes.

Hand out boy. Did that remind you!

It’s very much a guess sir but could it be Songs from a Room, by Leonard Cohen?

What kind of witchcraft is this boy? How can you know that without being guided by the Devil or his associates? Hand out.

And Songs from a Room, the most simple and plaintive of all Cohen’s albums, drifted along the breeze like the smoke from burning juniper in the Himalayan mornings. His absence makes me want to cry but he lives on in my memory and in his music. Thanks Leonard.

We approached a village and were diverted to the left of it by Nir.

Who had been rabbiting on for days about a yak cheese factory somewhere on the hillside, and here it was.

The man who appeared to be in charge had a little English and took half an hour to explain the process in detail. Then he took us to the store, where they wash dozens of cheeses each day in salt water. And we could buy some. In football terms Yak Cheese would be a journeyman. Solid and unremarkable. But the source, the location and the pre-industrial process added massive value. May you prosper. Me and Dav left a kilo heavier and several pounds lighter. All to a good cause.

We had spent so long here that the sun was starting to sink. Having no wish to spend the night dodging tigers and bears we cracked on at renewed pace.

All the way down was too big an ask but there was a village on a ledge part way up the valley side. We were aiming for that. Nir drifted ahead, thinking about time. We were running it close.

We followed a track for 4×4 vehicles and motor bikes that zigzagged down the mountain but the zigzags were too long and we needed to get down quick. We dropped down little paths which were muddy and very slippy and as it got darker this was only going to end one way. We won’t make the village and someone will fall. We’re all tired. Let’s do something different.

We passed a small house and Nir went up to it to talk to the owner. He eventually came back with relief on his face. The house owner had an uncle who had a tea house and we could stay there and it was only a short (10 minute) walk away.

The tea house had a barn, which accommodated all four of us together in one room for the first time. It was like the Boy Scouts. And the food was good in the house and they had some beer and local wine and we relaxed, knowing we weren’t going to be eaten by tigers.

Night night.