Day 6 Dhaulagiri Circuit - Soligari

It's official: it's unseasonably wet in this part of Nepal.  October is supposed to be the best month for trekking in Nepal.  It's post monsoon, relatively dry and the best time to see the mountains. This year the monsoon has decided to linger and at the time of writing I'm in my tent and the rain is crashing down outside.

Of course it could get better but it is worrying. Even before today, last week's rain meant that there was likely to be a lot of snow to get past as we get higher up. The current storm has just made the problem worse. Everyone is saying "what will be will be" but I must admit I struggle to be sanguine.  I'm lucky to be able to do lots of these trips but even I won't be back here again.  I want to see everything!

We get glimpses of Dhaulagiri and the views are amazing but they are glimpses only. It's also starting to get uncomfortable - the tents don't get a chance to dry out, are damp and I'm starting to get surrounded by damp, sweaty, smelly items of clothing.

At least the rain came today and not on yesterday's long walk and we had completed most it of the walk before the really heavy stuff arrived.

Day 5 Dhaulagiri Circuit - Dobang

Yet another good night's sleep with the noise of the nearby river, at times sounding like a jet engine at full throttle, proving surprisingly soporific.  The only confusion was bird song at about 2 in the morning which had me thinking that the dawn had come.  Apparently there was a big storm in the night which I missed.

Fabulous path hacked out of the cliff by the Nepalese Army

The trek today was long and tough.  Because the first day was shorter than originally planned we had to put in a long one to get back on schedule, and today was that day.

Day 4 Dhaulagiri Circuit - Naura

Yesterday's walk was all about getting used to the regime. Today's felt like the real thing. The trek has really started.

Terraces of rice near Sibang

Personally I feel good.  Had a great night's sleep last night in a tent on my own unspoilt by any lingering sense of guilt at the speed at which I had grabbed possession.

Day 3 Dhaulagiri Circuit - Sibang

It rained on and off all night and with yesterday's weather forecast I was anticipating a day in waterproofs. Although it was damp first thing it wasn't raining and the weather improved as the day went on. Three days of solid rain and it clears up on the first day's walking - definitely a reason to be cheerful.

Campsite in Darbang

Day 2 Dhaulagiri Circuit - Darbang

After another horribly wet day and two bus journeys we have arrived at our first campsite and the beginning of the trek proper.  I'm a fair weather camper and never saw the point of going out when it's raining; given that the forecast is for still more rain, I'm finding it hard to muster enthusiasm for tomorrow's trek.

It's a shame about the weather because the scenery is interesting. We are at about 1,000 metres and have been following a river in a deep but very fertile terraced valley.  The little terraces are full of rice which is in ear and perhaps just a couple of weeks away from being harvested. The trees look amazing, incredibly lush and green including some which were in flower. At this altitude it doesn't get cold and banana trees and bamboo are much in evidence.

The villages are busy and despite the rain people are out and about.  We're passing through a Hindu part of Nepal and the build up to the Diwali festival is taking place. There is clearly a lot of visiting going on with the visitors decorating themselves with sticky pink rice - great lumps of it stuck to their foreheads.

We stopped for lunch and a change of bus at Beni.  Beni, I suspect, would never qualify as a candidate for a weekend retreat but on a wet day it was a dump.  It felt dirty and grimy and not a place where you really wanted to take your hands out of your pockets, never mind linger and eat food.

At Beni we changed to a much smaller public bus which amazingly had the same number of seats as the larger bus we had enjoyed earlier in the day.  Now I'm not exactly tall but even I struggled to get my knees into the space provided and for some of my bigger comrades it was an almost impossible task.

Dhaulagiri Circuit Day 1 - to Pokara

The first two days in Nepal on the Dhaulagiri Circuit are all about getting to the start of the trek. As it happens, the weather has made it a lot harder than expected. There is a big cyclone in India and as a consequence it has rained non-stop since arriving in Kathmandu yesterday.  Internal travel in Nepal is precarious at the best of times and the weather has now messed things up completely.

Last night we stayed in the Summit Hotel, by far the best hotel I have stayed in in Kathmandu although it's quite a way out of the city centre.  The rooms are good, the food is excellent and everything is spick and span.

After a quick trip into Thamel to pick up some last minute items from the wonderful Shonas I was already for the next stage - a flight to Pokara. The rain was hammering down and in airports like Pokara if the pilots can't see the runway the planes don't fly.  The flight was cancelled and after a bit of consultation the local agent for Jagged Globe decided that we would have go by bus to Pokara. It's a 6/7 hour trip but given that the weather forecast for tomorrow is not good this seemed like a good decision.

Dhaulagiri Circuit Day 0 - to Kathmandu

Safe and comfortable at home, in the middle of last winter, I was thinking about trips for the year ahead.  Looking back my trip to Mera Peak had been a real adventure so why not have a go at something similar?   I had written an article in Adventure Travel on Mera and in the same edition there was a list of their top 100 treks. Topping the list was the trip around Dhaulagiri (the world's seventh highest mountain at 8,179 metres).  Nine months ago that was enough information - I had to go.

Dhaulagiri Circuit