Today was a long hike from Bamboo to Jhinu. Jhinu is low down at 1,780m not far above the Modi Khola river and is famous because it has a natural hot spring. Before we started this morning, I told Julian that there would be a fun thing if we reached Jhinu this day but I didn’t tell him what it was. This was his incentive for today. There was a party of 9 or 10 Australians in our lodge last night. I think they were all from the same family and two generations. Over breakfast it became clear that they were heading for Jhinu too and for most of the morning we were leapfrogging each other as we stopped at different points to take photos. The Australians had been at Annapurna Base Camp yesterday and the view had been snowed out. I think Julian and I were very lucky to see a good sunrise this week. There was no snow at Bamboo or rain overnight but the path was still boggy and a little slippery. At times the path rose steeply and at others it dropped down. It was quite a knackering day. We had a very late lunch at Chommrong at the same guest house we stayed at 9 days ago and the last place that Julian and I had a shower or wash of any kind. The path then dropped down to Jhinu. Unfortunately the hot spring itself is another 20 minute walk down to the valley to the river itself. When we arrived, we found three baths, an information board, a donation box and a fairly stern looking elderly Nepali man who was making it very plain that donations were mandatory. The first pool seemed to be for porters and they didn’t seem to have to pay. The second two pools were about half the size of a tennis court in total and were pretty full of trekkers. The water was hot but not painfully so and Julian and I stayed for more than an hour. Our water-proof camera was put to good use; see it was a good idea! It felt so good to have a wash after 8 days and tonight we will sleep in the last of our clean clothes. We are out of the snow, the temperature isn’t to low and maybe we have two or three days left. Tonight at dinner we met Peter and Sue from England who have a good tale to tell. Peter is a dentist and a volunteer for the Gurkha Welfare Trust. After trekking for a few days, he will spend 5 days at a medical camp practising dentistry on anyone who turns up while other medical volunteers will sort out many other problems including cataracts. Peter has taken part in one of these medical camps before and at that time he extracted several hundred teeth in the five days. Julian is now playing UNO with Peter and Sue and their guide and porter. He’s playing well and already won one round. Another good day and evening.
Yeti Fan 2011 