Trek Garibas-Sandakphu – the ducks paddle across the small lake

17. April 2025

 

 

India has the same time everywhere, although it is more orientated towards the west. In the east, for example, the sun rises (and sets) very early. As a result, you often wake up quite early. This time there was also an unpleasant noise when I woke up: The sound of rain! Grmpf. It had stopped again by breakfast, but it still wasn’t nice – it was grey and foggy.

 

 

 

We then set off and mostly trudged uphill on the road or a disused side road. I didn’t like that. Nothing to see, no nice path under my feet – and I didn’t get to see a red panda either! We stopped for tea in between.

 

 

There we met a man with a very big camera – he was only after the red panda. He had been travelling for 3 days and had seen 3 red pandas. Not bad at all. So if you’re only after them, you have a very good chance of spotting them. I thought Diamir might actually quite like that. Problem: where to sleep? Everything is just too ugly to really want to stay there. Is it better organised from Nepal?

 

At least the rain left us alone and I took a few pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

We reached Kalipokhari by midday. In english, this means ‘dark lake’. There was a lake, but it was more grey than dark. We were at around 3,000 metres – I didn’t expect to see any ducks here, but there were some!

 

 

 

Kalipokhari is on the Nepalese side and therefore had a nicer place to eat again. The chowmein also tasted very good. I got to know the Scots a bit. They live quite scattered and took the opportunity to at least travel together. Our conversation quickly turned to politics – and that it’s nice to read a little less news.

 

It rained again and during a dry break we set off again.

 

 

If people hadn’t painted a few things brightly, everything would have been grey in grey.

 

 

 

Even the dog doesn’t want to go outside in this rubbish weather. The next time it rained, we were at an abandoned house where we could shelter and Asish prepared my backpack for the rain.

 

 

 

Problem: it just wouldn’t stop raining and it was still quite heavy, so it was clear that we were going to get pretty wet somehow. I was also getting a bit cold and this stupid road to the top – I didn’t like it any more! Luckily I had some money with me and no ambition, so Asish successfully set off in search of a car. I was so happy! It was still raining quite heavily and I felt like I was coming down with a cold.

 

 

So it was quite interesting to be able to jolt around a track on 4 wheels. The car fought its way up at 10 km/h with a very skilful driver. Asish knew the driver: he used to be a ‘chocolate boy’. I assumed he was someone who begged the tourists for chocolate, but not at all: a chocolate boy is an extremely attractive bachelor who all the girls chase after! He actually looked handsome and charming. He had won a wife and they have two cute children. He also works as a nature guide and finds animals such as the red panda and other unusual birds. I had already seen a few pretty birds anyway – a little paradise for this. Asish was also always on the lookout and had a great camera with lots of zoom. I found a nice website for it here: https://roundglasssustain.com/photo-stories/birds-singalila-national-park

 

Then we were in Sandakphu and I started to get upset. About the dinginess and inadequate conditions (cigarette butts in the loo, beer mats in the room, brushing your teeth only in the restaurant at the dirty washbasin with empty soap dispensers standing around, meal announcements from 19:00 – there was nothing before 20:00, loudspeaker music blaring) and carelessness and ugliness and everything. And then I got stubborn. I didn’t want any more dinner (I still had a muesli bar) and no more breakfast (not until 7.30am; I still had a second muesli bar) and also no more to Phalut, which is probably the most beautiful route on the one hand, but on the other hand the weather was so bad that I suspected I wouldn’t enjoy even the most beautiful route. All this road walking and stuff – I was fed up with the trek.

 

 

I arranged to meet Asish at 5.45 a.m. and start at 6.00 a.m. And then I buried myself in my bed next to the loud cooing of pigeons, people running around and music blaring from downstairs, grumbled to myself and fell asleep.

 

Would my mood be better the next day? Would my moodiness subside?