Bhutan Day 6

Today is supposed to be super easy but in reality it is straight down for just over 2 hours.  That means my quads were absolutely burning and you had to be very careful where you stepped.

A view from our campsite being packed up and us mostly ready to go.

That's me on the final day promoting my brother Taylor's company TssRadio.  I've taken his shirts to Mongolia, the Beijing Olmypics, Bhutan and other places.  A well traveled company.  Check him out at tss-radio.com.

Our full group including the guides, cooks, horesmen, etc.  Notice the woman on the left a couple of feet out from the group.  That is the tour company owner and she was nice but wasn't great, I guess she realized it and didn't want to be in the photo.

Getting a little running water to clean our hands officially was nice.  

 The women, not quite ready to pass the finish line just yet.  So I guess they took a few minutes of reflection.

Upon completion we were greeted by a previous guide of ours who had some Pepsi and a box that said "Druk Pizza."  How awesome was this going to be?  Well it wasn't pizza in fact so our dreams got shattered as it was a non-flavorful, but probably high calorie, cake.

 Ahh the Super Strong Druk 11,000 beer for lunch!

We spent a bit of time checking out the city of Thimpu before driving back to Paro (which is the town our trek started from).  The hotel when we finally got there was really cool and located high in the mountain, more like a lodge than anything else.

These next photos are from the city of Thimpu as we were pleased to be back in civilization I guess.

 There are no stoplights in the city, so it is all done by police men waving on cars.

On the way back to Paro we noticed an awesome rainbow so we had to stop.

Ahh what I wouldn't give for a shower and a quick nap on a bed!  Well that wasn't to be unfortunately.  I unpacked my stuff as we would be here two nights, so enough time to air out the clothes that had gained a nice foul smell in the mountains.

When I went to take a shower all that came out of the faucet was a stream of muddy water!  I ran it for a bit hoping it just needed to work through the system.  Well it didn't.  Turns out they were doing maintenance on the pipes and it would be another hour or so until it got fixed.  They did move my room since now the entire bathroom was muddy.

Finally right before dinner they got the water working, so I took a quick shower and then it was off for some food.

After dinner we were to go to a local farmhouse for the unique opportunity to take a hot stone bath.  This was supposed to be excellent for the joints and muscles after the days of trekking.  In order to give you an understanding of the scenario there were individual holes built into the ground and framed out with wood.  Each one was barely wide enough for a body width and probably 2 feet deep.  In terms of length it wasn't long enough to allow me to stretch my legs completely.  The water in these boxes was simply filled with water from a hose.  Then right outside the bath house they had a massive fire going and in the fire were these large, very smooth, round rocks.  Each weighed 20-30kgs (45-65lbs).  They would transport them into an area near your feet that was walled off and the water heated up.  After a few rocks were in and the water was hot we were allowed to each get in our hole.  Holy crap was it hot!  Literally it felt like the skin was melting off my shins!  If you moved too much or too fast it simply caused all the water to move and everything felt hotter.  I lasted about 25 minutes in this tub before I could handle it no more.  But I got out feeling very refreshed.

In the farmhouse having tea before heading to the stone bath.

 Yup those rocks are gonna be hot, hot, HOT!

 Not a great photo but it will give you the idea...

Bhutan Day 5

Back to the Bhutan updates after a few week delay, sorry about that.

Day 5 was relatively simple although we climbed to one of our highest elevations at about 4,100m (13,451ft).  Much of the trek was slightly just slight up and downs over a very rocky terrain, so again had to be very careful where you stepped on some of those loose rocks.  Knowing me it was a perfect chance to sprain an ankle.  We've noticed the terrain has been very different day to day.  Some nicer roads (not paved of course) at the start, some mud, some forest and some rock.

I awoke plenty early this morning and took some great photos of the morning before the clouds came in...

This is one of my favorites.  That is the Bhutan snow capped Himalayas in the background.  Nobody else captured a photo of them as the clouds started rolling in quickly and covered the impressive mountains.

One of our horses just grabbing some energy before the start of the day.  All the horses were basically allowed to roam free during the nights.

 More of the Himalayan's in the background.

We left our camp around 10am day 5 and got to the final camp around 3:30PM.  It was rather weird as we were not exhausted from that day's trek and had descended to lower elevations so that weather was warmer.  In reality upon getting to camp we were restless and didn't know what to do.  We all rested for a bit, unpacked and drank some coffee.

Here is Nina and Gustaf grabbing some lunch during the trek with fantastic 360 degree views from where we were.

One of the few full group photos I got.  We choose this location as it just had so much depth with all the different ranges going continuously in the background.

 There it is the city of our destination, Thimpu.

 The flags celebrating the final pass and really the end of anything difficult.

 A temple with monk students playing soccer and the city of Thimpu in the valley below.

We met these monks on our descent.  They had hiked down 3 hours to buy a saw and a few other supplies (including a Coke we noticed) before trekking all the way back up to do their chores.

 Our camp was actually right next to another temple on the side of the embankment.

The city of Thimpu is the largest in Bhutan with a population of only about 70,000.  Tomorrow we finish with a 2-3 hour down hill hike into the city and the trek will be over.  Tonight one final dinner and night in the tents.  As a side note my tent has been placed sloping heavily downward and to one side, should make for an interesting nights sleep!

Packers Season Tickets

As I'm in the states for a few days and getting to spend the first part of it with my mom, I've been able to go through some mail.  Well good news folks, I'm moving up in my quest for Green Bay Packers season tickets!

It might take a few decades though as I'm number 62,322 in line...

Factory lunch

Interrupting the fun of Bhutan to go get back to work!  Back in October my boss from NY was here and we have had an insanely packed schedule.  Over the weekend to Taiwan, getting back Sunday night late. Then Monday a pick up at 6AM to go back to the airport to visit an outdoor supplier who is located between SH and Beijing.

At the airport I went to the rest room and upon getting done went to pull up the zipper on my jeans.  Well the zipper broke with the tines literally pulling away from the jeans (nice crappy Chinese quality huh?).  Now my zipper is broke and I'm about to start my day with a flight.  So I did the only thing possible which was to untuck my shirt and wrap my fleece jacket around my waist, making me look like an over grown teenager.  So keep in mind as you read the rest of the story that this is all done with the barn door being open!

Upon getting to the factory we find out that the local government office is excited to have us there as they want to further develop their economic zone.  So we are "invited" (read: forced!) to go to a meeting at their offices and then to lunch, where we are warned that heavy duty drinking is in store for us!

Upon entering the gov't office there is an electronic sign saying "Welcome Richloom Fabrics."  My first thought was uh-uh we are in for trouble.  Well it got better as they put us in a conference room that had over 30 chairs and we literally had name badges as to where to sit.  The name badge had my first, middle and last name on it.  This means that the gov't party has looked us up, checked out my visa, understands I live in China, etc.

 The meeting lasted about 20 minutes, all in Chinese before they took us to lunch.  Below you will see the photo of the table and the massive lazy susan.  I've been to a lot of nice Chinese places but this was one of the best settings.  In fact the lazy susan actually was motorized and therefore was constantly turning slowly.  First time I had ever seen that. 

 The funniest part was that the whole time we were eating in this nice big room and the waitresses were serving food was that a couple of additional servers were walking all around with fly swatters trying to kill the flies!

Meanwhile my fly is still wide open but hopefully covered up by my shirt most of the time.  It was only a few minutes into lunch when they tried to bring out the Baiju (Chinese fire breathing whiskey if you ask me!).  We turned that down and finally agreed on beer.  Well these turned out to be professional drinkers, priding themselves and getting us to drink as much as possible.  Each time walking around the table to greet us, cheers with us and then do the Gambei (bottom's up) cheers!

All in all a memorable experience.  

Bhutan - Day 4

Day 4 was supposed to be an "easier" day and even shorter.  Well it didn't turn out that way for sure.

We left camp and embarked on a 90minute descent into the valley.  It was more technical than the day before but going downhill made it quite fun.  Then began the uphill portion which appeared from a visual inspection to be insane and go on and on forever!  We were to climb to over 4,100m (13,450ft).  A few minutes into the ascent a light rain started.  The guide said it would be light and wouldn't last long.  So we climbed to an area in the woods that was protected a bit and decided we would have tea/coffee and follow that with lunch.  Well we had the tea/coffee and then out of no-place the rain suddenly turned into hail!  We decided to skip the lunch and get to our camp which was about 2.5 hours away.

 A nice simple downhill was a good way to start things out...

 It was here where we crossed a small creek early in the morning that our feet began to get just a bit wet, which would not be fun as the day went on.

 Our guide, Pema, getting a little rest on the side of the horse before our coffee break.

 Here is where we stopped for the planned lunch.

 And here you see the hail getting a bit stronger as a few of the folks decided to get on the horses to go a little bit faster.

 Yeah it's hailing a bit harder isn't it?

 By this point we were all freezing cold and soaking wet from head to toe.  While we had some rain gear we probably weren't prepared (nor were our guides) for the onslaught of snow/hail.

While there were complaints about the weather that day, I personally thought the day was a blast!  The snow/hail created a whole different complication and technical aspect to the climb.  While it was cold, the ground never got slick so it didn't seem too dangerous.  Although it did for the tour company owner.  She was totally unprepared for the weather and was already a slow hiker.  She finished probably an hour after us and only after one of the guides went to find her and make sure she safely got to our camp.

Finally at camp we see the hail has left a fair amount of snow on the ground.  You can see another campground in the back right of the photo.   Unfortunately when we got there we were only shortly behind our guides so they only had the ability to get the dining tent up and everything was thrown in to keep it dry.  So all five of us jumped in this small place, scurried around looking for dry clothes...hopefully.

 After about an hour the hail had stopped and we were warming up.  Lunch was served (although it was about 4PM) and from there we were feeling better.  There was concern about our boots and clothes we had worn.  It was going to be impossible for them to dry by morning and we still had two days of trekking to go.

The night before we learned that bonfires are strictly not allowed in the mountains because of fear of forest fires.  Bhutan doesn't have helicopters to help fight the forest fires so basically when there is one (and they are common due to lightening) then all the locals climb into the mountains to fight them.

However we had convinced the guides the night before that this evening we should find a way to have a fire.  Their answer was they would "try" to accommodate our request.  Thankfully they came through.  As you see below in the photo one of the people used the fire to warm the feet.  We also used it to dry our clothes as best we could.

 Nothing like some wine and whiskey to warm us up after the hike.

 Nearing sunset the weather had chilled and it became beautiful...but still chilled.

 Below is a Bhutan custom called "Beetlenut".  The beetlenut is chewed to give the body warmth, although in Taiwan they also eat beetlenut as a stimulant often used to keep truck drivers awake for a long time.

We all decided to try and figured since we were still chilled this would be the perfect time.  As you see you have the bettlenut on the left, a white paste on the leaf and then the leaf itself.  The paste is actually crushed limestone and the leaf comes from a subtropical environment in Bhutan.  You put it in your mouth, chew it up, occasionally spit the excess liquid that forms and chew it all as long as you can.  It's rather biter and when the nut breaks up it breaks into tons of pieces in my mouth.  The spit that is produced is bright red.  All five of us gave it a try with some chewing it to completion.

After the long, cold and wet day, we totally loved the bonfire and hung out until the wood was gone before heading to bed.