Annapurna Circuit

Nepal

Day 1: Bus from Kathmandu to Besisahar. Besisahar (820m) to Bhulbhule (840m) [Distance: 9km]

: Lunch stop along the river between Kathmandu and Besisahar, the starting point for a counter-clockwise trip on the Annapurna Circuit

: View through the windshield of messed up roads

: For those long distance travelers who can’t afford a formal bus ride

: Farm as seen out the bus window

: Same

: Cliffhanger! Tight pass along the road’s edge

: Hut on terraces

: After a seven-hour bus ride, I started walking with the 60-year-old Swedish guy pictured when we got caught in a downpour and took shelter under the eve of a random home.

: Anders, the aforementioned Swedish guy, looking back for a photo…

: …before continuing on his way.

Day 2: Bhulbule (840m) to Syange (1211m) [Distance: 14km]

: Early start

: “This Bud’s for youuuuuu…and you and you and you!”

: Dude I passed along the way

: Kids on their way to school

: The way through which the kids in the photo previous had to walk to school

: Parched terraces

: Locals of Bahundanda

: Squatting

: Standing

: Working

: One of the many overloaded porters on the trail, burdened by tourists who pack WAY too much shit to go trekking. The strap in his hand goes around his head. There is no other point of support. Oh…and be sure to check out his footwear.

: Starting to get some height

: Man who was chopping down a tree outside Bahundanda

: Picnic outside Bahundanda

: “Give me sweets!” Every kid on the Annapurna Circuit asked trekkers for candy

: A Bahundanda man holding up photos of his family and my Polish buddy who’d trekked through the town a year beforehand and had sent me to give to them.

: Nose ring

: Old man just outside Bahundanda

: Same old man who didn’t speak any English but had a letter written out that said he was poor and needed trekkers’ money to survive.

: Beyond Bahundanda

: Stunning

: Wonder if that’s a Pizza Hut

: Workin’ the terraces

: Hot chicks

: Baaa-a-a-a-a-a-a

: What up!?

: Old ladies puttin’ in work

Day 3: Syange (1211m) to Dharapani (1900m) [Distance: 17km]

: Kids

: “Not now chief, I’m in the fuckin’ ‘jone'”

: Is it just me or does that look like a giant stone fist with a big-ass log of shit clenched in the middle of it?

: “A man must break his back to earn his day of leisure”

: Roof-riders. Ride or die

: Rocky

: Kashgar, one of the coolest porters I met out on the trail

: Movin’ along

: Move on up

: The path was a slowly elevating staircase along the side of that rock-face there next to the river. Pretty rad

: Bridge over troubled water

: Reminds me of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

: These political ads are too funny

: Errant cattle

: The home stretch after a long-ass day

: Babe

Day 4: Dharapani (1900m) to Chame (2710m) [Distance: 16km]

: Approaching Bagerchap

: Local yokel in Bagerchap

: Close-up

: We be gettin’ high

: Tibetan prayer flags

: Get stoned

: Burst of spring

: Knitting souvenirs

: Happy kid

: Kid exploring the town

: Yours truly

: Old woodies

: Getting plowed

: It’s planting season

: Rustic

: Mountain volleyball match in Chame

Day 5: Chame (2710m) to Upper Pisang (3310m) [Distance: 15km]

: Kids in Chame

: Buddhist stupa in Chame

: Art on the stupa’s interior

: Friends Alon and Ciera posing for a photo just outside of Chame

: Chame outskirts

: The epitome of ramshackle

: ass ass ass ass ass ass

: Path carved out of the rock face there on the right

: Swedish bro, Luc, donning his new purchase next to a yak-skin cap dealer

: We weren’t out looking for a dead body or nothin like that, but for some reason this shot reminds me of the movie Stand By Me

: Into the great wide open

: Even though there’s a newer bridge about fifty feet further, we decided to take the old rickety-shit one that visibly swayed back and forth in the wind

: Tibetan Buddhist temple in Upper Pisang

: Art inside the temple

Day 6: Upper Pisang (3310m) to Manang (3540m) [Distance: 19km]

: At the lodge in Upper Pisang, this Nepali Rasta dude had been hard at work installing this new wood-burning stove

: It didn’t exactly work the way it should as pretty much all the smoke backed up into the dining room

: Painted on the rock just outside Upper Pisang probably by the dude in the two photos previous

: Avalanche across the valley from Upper Pisang

: Getting farther…

: …and farther away.

: Buddhist shrine

: Old art inside the shrine

: The guy on the bottom left of this picture was…

: …humping a load of sheet metal up the mountainside. If you don’t have a helicopter or a beast of burden, there ain’t no better way to get the shit up to where it needs to be.

: Stunning

: Villager

: Someone’s backyard

: From further away

: That’s a town over there in the bottom center of the photo on the hillside

: Same town closer up

Day 7: Manang Acclimatization Day (3540m)

: How I spent my rest day in Manang, getting used to the altitude…

: Child with a face ravaged by high altitude sunburn

: Street view of Manang

: Alon the Israeli next to Manang

: View from a monastery on the side of a mountain directly above Manang

: Frozen turquoise-colored lake just behind the town

: Stupas

: Vulture in flight

: Snack time in Manang

: A SUCK IT next to the equestrian feast

: Yeah, dat’s rite. U kno wat it iz

: While watching the birds devour the horse, three punks came up and started fuckin’ around with mother nature – one of whom I was pleased to see had been wearing a Chicago Bulls jacket

: After they chased the birds away with slingshots, they took turns shooting the horse in the face, kicking it and jumping on its half-eaten body

: Neck stomp

: Nepali Calvin Klein?

: Nepali Pringles?

: Hilarious piece of Kama Sutra art I came across in Manang that I had to purchase. Didn’t see anything like it before or after

: Bonin!

Day 8: Manang (3540m) to Thorung Phedi (4450m) [Distance: 15km]

: Women spinning prayer wheels on a stupa in Manang

: Morning prayers

: Man chillin’ just outside Manang

: Likewise

: Kid

: No Name, Same Place

: No protection from the sun

: Anders the 60-year-old Swede truckin’ harder than half the twenty-something-year-olds on the trail

: On the road to Thorung Phedi

: Mid-morning tea and the hasty sucking of a fag en route to Thorung Phedi

: Yakkity Yak, don’t talk back

: Crossing a bridge

: And here’s where it started getting a little bit messy

: The long and winding road

: Progressing

: Local man overlooking the valley from his middle-of-nowhere tea house

: Chillin’

: Truckin’

: Mountain man

: Fresh outfit

: Stupa

Day 9: Thorung Phedi (4450m) to Muktinath (3800m) via Thorung La Pass (5416m) [Distance: 16km]

: Got up around four to start making our way up and over Thorung La Pass by virtue of headlamp

: Sunrise

: Snowy

: Ciera climbing

: Anders catching his breath

: Luc climbin’ up

: Following the footprints

: “And you may ask yourself, well…how did I get here?”

: Onward

: Slope

: Nepali Lil Wayne at a tea house near Thorung La Pass

: Traversing Thorung La Pass

: A sickly South Korean dude who got altitude sickness being carried over the pass on the back of a yak

: Winter wonderland

: The final stretch

: A top of the world SUCK IT from the group

: Nepali Lil Wayne gettin’ yakked

: Smoking cigs with Indian pilgrims in Muktinath

: I “talked” with this guy for like an hour. I don’t think I understood a word he said.

: Yo!

: Man hands

: Time for smoking

: Couldn’t decide between “Plain craps w/Honey” and “Craps w/Fried Apple and Honey”

Day 10: Muktinath (3800m) to Jomsom (2720m) [Distance: 19km]

: Ruff rider just outside Muktinath

: Old-ass looking Tibetan town

: When walking out here, I didn’t see another person all day. Despite being utterly alone, I’ve never felt so in touch with everything in my entire life.

: Town

: Just me and my thoughts

: Nearing Jomsom…

: When I was a kid, my dad used to refer to power lines as “electric dudes”

: Bunch of people sitting on piles of rocks and repeatedly smacking the stones on which they sat with a hammer

: Looks like the worst job ever

Day 11: Rest Day in Jomsom (2720m)

: Old corridor in Jomsom

: Straight kickin’ it

: “Sometimes, people make a war”

Day 12: Jomsom (2720m) to Larjung (2550m) [Distance: 17km]

: Plane departing from Jomsom airport

: Overloaded

: A town called Marpha

: Home in Marpha

: Just outside Marpha

: V

: One foot in front of the other…

: Marching, marching, marching…

: Tibetan script on the side of a rock

: Walking along a seasonally dried-up river bed

: “swastika” brand shovel

: Woman

: Don’t remember the name of this town…

: …but it was one of my favorites to walk through.

: Man

: Home

: Another home

: Scary lady

: Grrrrrrr!

: Suck dat titty, yo!

: Family in Larjung

Day 13: Larjung (2550m) to Tatopani (1200m) [Distance: 26km]

: A lake filled with breast milk

: River

: Greenery

: Home

: “Mountain life is hard” – a tea shop owner along the Annapurna Circuit

: More homes

: Snow white steed

: Too many good views

: Workers

: Booty-ful

: How not to take a shit

: Don’t shit where you eat

: “Let’s shit in there!”

: Bus

: Inspecting before passing

: Drawn in real blood

: Archery practice

Day 14: Tatopani (1200m) to Ghorepani (2870m) [Distance: 17km]

: Singaporean police candidate training

: Sunrise

: Wild West lookin’ ass

: Tropical jungle lookin’ ass

: A Gurkha soldier (major badass) who was training the Singaporean police candidates posing with yours truly atop a hill he and I ran up

: Old dudes shooting the shit

: Mountain face

: No more snow

: Working the terraces

: Farm kid

: Rural splendor

: A hard knock life

: Kids

: A massive pile of shit that would’ve completely engulfed my foot had I stepped in it

: I’m getting tired…

: Prayin’ in that…

: …Kings cap.

Day 15: Ghorepani (2870m) to Birethanti (1025m) via Poon Hill (3200) [Distance: 13km]

: Sunrise on Poon Hill

: Early morning view from Poon (Tang) Hill

: Poon Hill was packed with tourists

: Nazi Commies?

: Carrying cages of chickens up the hill. No better way about it

: They had to be shitting all over his back

: Terraces on terraces on terraces in this bitch

: Humble farm

: Monkey

: Crib