Annapurna Circuit Day 13

Muktinath is the best accommodating village we’ve stayed in.  It is much larger and one of the first towns that actually has vehicular transportation. We are staying in a guesthouse called Bob Marley guesthouse. It feels more like a lodge. Here fresh hot water showers are more than adequate compared to our lukewarm bucket showers in the village guesthouses. The chef is from Italy so there’s even some international reputation in the lodge.

We take some time to chill and enjoy some western food. Each of the tables has a coal burning heating stove under it making the place extremely comfortable. So far we have been avoiding the meat on this trek heeding the advice I’ve read online about how it can ruin your trek with bad stomach problems.

And thus far we have all been a okay. To be honest this is probably one of the first places I’d feel comfortable about eating meat. None the less I have stuck to an all veggie diet so I continue my vegetarian eating habits.

Joe on the other hand has decided to eat some chicken for dinner. We all jokingly caution him about it and he brags about it as his plate comes in. After dinner everything is all good. We end up kicking it with other trekkers until fairly late and then crash for the evening. The next morning Joe walks into our room looking green. Apparently he woke up in the middle of night with the worse case of the runs.

That morning, Joe, Nate, and Christine all want to take a bus the rest of the way down to Pokhara. I really wanted to finish the rest of the trek on foot but really didn’t want to do it myself. So I cave and follow them to the jeep station. On the way down I see a bunch of chickens out foraging around. Upon second inspection I see that they are grazing on donkey shit. “Chickens eat donkey shit” I thought, “Joe eats Chicken”. And by the transitive property of eating, “Joe eats Donkey Shit”. Well no wonder he got sick. Lesson learned, do not eat chicken, aka donkey shit, in Nepal.

The jeep ride was far from comfortable but I was able to get the local discount so I can’t complain. We switch vehicles a few times and then end up in a Landrover Discovery type vehicle for the rest of the trip. At one point we make a pit stop near some hot springs and run into the big group of Irish people and their guide. A lot of the trekkers take a much needed dip in the hot springs after walking for so long. There are quite a lot of trekking groups here. At this point I really wish I would have finished the trek. I guess I’ll have to come back next time do it in its entirety with the Annapurna Basecamp trek included. We took a few moments to catch up before heading back down the rocky slopes. Soon Pokhara comes into view which is a welcome sight to all the places we’ve been staying at.

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