One of the clearest indications that you’ve left the West and entered a developing Asian country is the unpredictability of domestic flights, Nepal in particular. To those whose glass is half empty, this undoubtedly causes escalated blood pressure, heated discussions with airline staff, and no end of frustration. To the rest, it’s the perfect excuse to set up a friendly wager on the day’s outcome.
“I’ll bet you a thousand rupees we don’t fly today.”
“Throw in a bowl of daal baat and I’ll take that bet.”
Oh, the opportunity to make a Nepali fortune goes on for days as you make repeated trips to the airport, only to be told the weather is unfavorable at your destination yet again and why don’t you please try tomorrow. Our whitewater group, headed for the Tamur Kosi, had heard the same story three days running when we decided to bail on the Tamur and head out to the Marsyangdi instead. This suited me just fine as a flight that left just after ours was supposed to take off on the second day was reported missing in the Himalayas. These mountains seem to hunger for small planes and I didn’t figure on being breakfast. We boarded a bus, a far more dangerous way to travel, careening around ledges without guardrails enjoying a view of numerous buses resting bottom-up in the ravines below.
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Nepali Whitewater |
The Marsyangdi put-in lies on the road towards Manang at the trailhead of the Annapurna Sanctuary. Water surges down off these goliaths raging with snow melt turning the water into a teal milkshake. With the rapids named “Frog in a Blender” and “Gerbil in the Plumbing” we’d survived on the Bhote Kosi, this river would be a snap. Yeah. Never underestimate nature.
Our first morning finds us before the sun feels its way into the canyon. The river flows at 200,000 cubic ft/second and by the time we’re positioned mid-stream for our first descent, I no longer feel my legs below the knees; this is going to be fantastic. The kayakers descend first; we follow. Not even five minutes into it, nature calls me on my arrogance and things go terribly wrong.
The raft and its eight paddlers slam into a rock and get sucked sideways. Expecting a spin around, we’re jolted as we lodge on another rock pinned perpendicular to the river. As the rock grabs the raft we semi-flip, dumping six in a flying mangle of legs and feet in a kind of zero-gravity Twister game. The guide and I are alone on the raft hanging diagonally between the top and bottom of the hydraulic, getting a severe beating from the water as it desperately tries to flood us from the top and thunder in from the bottom. Fear tells me to bail NOW but I am frozen in indecision. I’m riding a bucking bronco and quite pleased to find that I am not swimming like those downriver when we realize there is an arm gripping the down tube and disappearing into the boiling water. We pull the tallest of our group on board and he instinctively makes for the highest point of the boat, throwing off our balance and we take on water.
Kayakers on shore and others on the cliff above are yelling mixed directions at us. Nothing is working. Our guide is yelling too and the look on his face and unhappiness in his voice alarm me. I didn’t have time to panic. At that moment, we are dumptrucked into the angry hole and the hydraulic commences education. A sharp intake of breath as the icy water swallows me keeps me in oxygen. I’m being tumbled so fast and in so many directions, I don’t know where up is. I’m thrown up for air and sucked back into the hole, a washing machine full of ice and rocks. I’m kicked out after what seems like an eternity. I still can’t determine up from down until I feel light hit my face and gasp before being dragged into another hole. I surf several slimy rocks like this and miss the kayaker’s ring.
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The Marsyangdi wages war |
I finally surface and see a giant rock slide scarring the cliffside ahead, realizing I had better move and move fast if I don’t want to swim all the way to India. Several more intimate encounters with submerged rocks and I crawl onto shore and collapse onto silt. The sky is so beautiful I want to stare at it forever. When I finally sit up, I am on the wrong side of the river. Everyone else is on the other side!
I have developed a mortal fear of water and search the shore for a passage out. Nothing. I raft up to but walk around the next rapids. I am so overcome with and disgusted by my fear that I decide to hike out of the canyon alone and earn the day. I don’t want to slink into camp having wimped out entirely. The crew reluctantly leaves me alone to fight for my self-respect as the light in the gorge fades. I have my paddle, three life jackets and my helmet as I make my way up an easy slope.
Thirty minutes later the wall turns to slick mud and paints my front side a greasy brown. I descend and try another route which dead ends at a 25-foot vertical granite slab after an hour of climbing, tauntingly just below the trail. The sun is fading out at a rapid clip as I half run-half tumble down the bank to find another route. Nothing looks promising and I have no time for another false start. There is nothing in this canyon, no houses, no cattle, no sign of humanity save for the ones I sent off two hours before in another possible show of arrogance. Ugh! When will I learn?
NO! No, I am going to get out of this gash in the earth and I will do it under my own power, more so because I have no choice than because of any skills learned in Scouts. Focus! Whew! Instead of taking the first gap, I walk back and forth and try to follow the lines upwards. After fifteen minutes I choose one tucked inside an outcropping. I pull myself up by branches, wedge my Teva-ed feet into crevices, push past spiderwebs and dodge rockfalls. For forty-five minutes I don’t look up or down. Avoiding self-doubt.
When I come to a slight bulge of wet clay near the top, fury overtakes me and I dig holes jamming my arms and feet inside and moving up faster than they can collapse. I am singing “I Will Survive” at the top of my lungs to keep out the idiocy of my self-imposed situation when my eyes peer out over the trail and my ears hear the sound of cow hooves stamping. To the left I see a Nepali woman in shock at the sight of a Western face over the cliff’s edge streaked with sweat and mud bellowing out a God-awful tune. I scramble laughing and near-crying to my feet, jumping up and down hollering and yahooing. Fear crosses her face and I would have run over to her and kissed her if I didn’t think she’d have sic-ed her cows on me. I am elated and with no sign of the returning crew yet, march back to camp half dancing and singing and carrying on like a lunatic.
I picked up fear on the water, left some blood on the rocks and earned the deepest sleep I have ever had under the shadows of Manaslu.
