Trek to Poon Hill (Day 2) - Tikhedhunga - Ulleri - Ghorepani

Click here for Trek to Poon Hill (Day 1): Pokhara to Tikhedhunga


Day 2 began early with a delicious breakfast set:

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, especially before a tough climb! The odd shape bread is Tibetan bread which I like!

The first part of the trek was a steep climb up a never ending flight of stone steps. I nearly died in the 2 hours of steep climb.

Along the way we met many herds of goats that were walking to Pokhara to be sold and slaughtered for the Dashain festival. I've never seen so many goats on one trek and we had to make way for them whenever we bumped into them along the trek. Unity is strength :-)

The white goat in the front looks as if though it's smiling for Angie's camera.

 

This herd of goats got stuck in this spot and their shepherd was trying to get them back onto the right path.

Some shepherds paint their goats in bright colours to identify who the goat belongs to, or which herd it comes from.

Whenever it was time to move aside for the goats to pass, we took the opportunity to rest our legs.

After 2 hours of steep climb, we reached Ulleri:

This guy whose arse I snapped had a problem with this leg, yet he had the energy to climb the rocky hills of the Annapurna region. Admirable indeed!

Lunch time was my favourite part of the trek, for obvious reasons :-) We had lunch in this cosy restaurant:

After lunch we continued our trek and after 4 hours we reached Ghorepani, which is the base for climbing to the peak of Poon Hill: 

Arch to welcome tired hikers to Ghorepani.

I think blue must have been the official colour of Ghorepani as all the houses and guesthouses are painted blue. 

We stayed at Hotel See You Lodge & Restaurant which is also painted in a nice shade of blue.

It was freezing in Ghorepani, especially at night. We huddled by the fireplace in the dining area and chatted with Sit and On from Thailand who is one of the loveliest couples I've met.

Unlike Laxmi Lodge & Restaurant where we stayed the night before, Hotel See You Lodge & Restaurant had hot water and a good hot shower at the end of a tiring day felt really good. 

Unfortunately there was a leak in the pipes and they had to cut off the hot water supply later in the evening. The next morning before climbing to Poon Hill, we didn't shower because the water was freezing. But we were not bothered because we were going to sweat like pigs anyway :-)

Next post: Trek to Poon Hill (Day 3) - Poon Hill Finally!