Breakfast was ordered and in came the hotel manager/ATM man looking flustered... Then relieved. "Oh Kristen and Kevin. I've found you..." he went on to explain that through a mix up, or more like a missing zero or so, that he had ran Kevin's card for only 2,200 rupees instead of 22,000 rupees. He had called "all over" looking for "The Two Americans." He was even carrying around the photocopies of our passports. I imagined him asking, "have you seen them?" No one could assist him as to our whereabouts. Unaware that we were staying at his hotel, he was sure that he was now going to be about $250 USD in the hole. Much to Kevin's dismay (he almost accidentally made money on this trip) went along with him to remedy the problem.
I'd love to say that the day was action packed, but it wasn't. Officially, we were leaving Manang, and would not be returning again during his trip. There is no other way to put it, we were ear to ear grinning at the thought of our departure. Nothing against Manang, it is a great town, but both Kevin and I were more than ready to move our trip in a positive direction (towards the land of hot showers and cheap food).
Today would be a fairly short day. Due to altitude and the risks of AMS, HACE and HAPE (altitude illness, brain edema, lung edema respectively) today would only require a maximum of four hours, all uphill. During the hours of hiking - it only took us 3- we came along a trail character. Near Gunsang, we met an old man with a whip.
Allow me to describe the scene to you... We're in an area I would call "No Man's Land." The trail we are on is like a dead end highway through high alpine desert, taking travelers only to smaller and smaller towns and eventually a high pass. The feel is slightly cowboy-ish, locals sporting leather hats Crocodile Dundee would aspire to wearing. This old man looked to be about 100 years old, my height, heavily wrinkled, five teeth.
He stopped us in our quest to look at the goods he was selling. Actually, Kevin made it through scot free. I put out my hands while protesting, "Oh no, I don.."
"Oh look! LOOK! LOOK!" he exclaimed while grabbing my hands, placing them on his hat and planting his face firmly against my chest. I lost it, this was too funny. Laughing, I realized that to an outsider it would look like I had grabbed this old man's head and was pressing his face against my boobs.
Upon arrival at Yak Kharka a woman, and I'd expect owner of the first lodge in town, welcomed us and we were given a key to a little pink cottage. With a few clicks of the lock and a push of the double doors there it was... The honey moon suite? We laughed again, was much larger than my tent so we didn't mind, plus it was extremely cheap. "Yak chili rice," Kevin had spotted a sign with food items.
"More like yak danger rice. Think I'll wait till we are up and over the pass for that one."
"Me too," Kevin agreed.
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