Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
stopped our progress. It would take a week to repair. We debated waiting for the
others, but decided to press on, walking to the other side of the slip to hire new
transport as others came through to hire our now empty truck. Only later did we
discover the scale of the problem we had left for Voytek and Doc. They arrived at
the same impasse a day later but had to guard and at the same time ferry 300 kilos
of food and equipment around each section of blocked road to a new vehicle. Two
landslides and two days later, we finally reached Joshimath. The equipment ar-
rived two days behind us and carried straight on to the village of Lata. Voytek
stood up in the back of the truck as they passed us to shout his annoyance at being
abandoned by Alex and myself.
Weather-wise, Joshimath was like late summer in Chamonix. The snowline had
dropped to cover the pines a few hundred feet above the misty village. We com-
pleted our shopping for rice, flour, dal, tea and
bidis
for the porters and now had
enough staples to last four or five weeks at base camp. We loaded it onto a bus
travelling up to Badrinath and set off to join Voytek and Lech two hours up the
road where the trail to the sanctuary began at Lata. The deep rumble from the
swift, grey waters of the Ganges could be heard anywhere in the valley up to
10,000 feet, and it filled our days and nights as we waited for the rain to cease.
For three days we camped on the side of the road beneath the village. At first
light on 5 September a weak sun appeared, dispersing the river mists, and the
porters from the village arriving under the leadership of our newly appointed
sirdar, Sher Singh, who had worked for Joe and Pete two years before. We hastily
packed our bags while sharing the responsibility of getting the porters away with
their loads. Even with just a six-day walk, we realised we were hiring many porters
just to carry food for the other porters. Voytek decided we could save money if we
hired sheep that were going to be travelling up with us to grazing sites high in the
Rishi Ganga. The strongest sheep could carry around five kilos, and they were
much cheaper than the porters who cost around five dollars a day. Shortage of
cash meant each of us had to carry full loads of twenty-five kilos and more.
Alex and I set off at the front, intending to check the porters in at our next camp
some 6,000 feet above us. As we passed through the village, an ancient crone
beckoned us toward her house. On the small balcony sat two girls in their teens.
'Changabang? Changabang?' she repeated several times, saying the word with a
variety of intonations, so that it sounded a bit like 'chang or bang?' To my
amazement, Alex nodded and said: 'Both please,' and vanished into the black hole
that was the goat shed. 'I'll catch up with you by tonight,' was all he said. He never
did tell me the full story, but he definitely had a bad head from the chang that
