“Freak Street”. I chuckled and thought that’s a name I haven’t heard in decades.
They’ve walked in along my outbound trail and share details of what awaits tomorrow. Slippery, steep and long. So what’s not new!
It’s a random assignment.
The table isn’t the typical almost shoulder to shoulder affair but more one with just the right distance to chat if you want or alternatively, cocoon.
It’s impressive, many countries, lots of trekking and even trekking as a business. They’re Dutch, it always seems strangers want to know where others come from. Maybe it’s grounds for further discussion or simply to satisfy a fleeting thought that you’re not the neighbor from next door.
Freak Street wasn’t just a place, it was a destination, the end of the Hippie trail in Kathmandu.
Long gone conceptually, cleaned up as the 80s and 90s, but it’s a momentary bond in that they and I had been there in its heyday.
I share a picture, black and white, one of many, all of people that I snapped on Freak Street. More smiles.
I’m a talker. I grew up in a family of talkers, but the accelerant has been decades in the USA. Americans are simply gregarious and friendly.
The conversation drifts the way I love it to do. Just chit chat, an exploration, a journey and hopefully no judgment. We agree Steve Jobs was a far better leader of Apple than Tim Cook. The Crown Princess definitely lacks judgement. Maybe even that Tesla could, should have been a European construct. It was fun, a relaxed and memorable moment.
This is one of the biggest cabins in the system. Only recently acquired, heavily renovated and in some respects better than a posh hotel in Oslo.
Dreams come true.
Dorms are practical, dorms are fun but I have my own private room tonight.
In of itself that’s marvelous, maybe I can roar and snore like an ocean liner without fear of retribution but the real high point is so small, so silly; a sink. My own sink obviating the need to stand shaving or cleaning my teeth surrounded by trail buddies all doing the same.
The menu is like Ford’s color choice but each dish sounds very appetizing. It’s hard to prepare and deliver what is essentially cafeteria style food to a hundred plus people.
Glaciers and the western USA don’t typically end up in a sentence. I’ve scampered around the Palisades Glacier in the Sierra Nevada mountains (California) and truly marveled at the Wheeler Peak Glacier in Nevada, that always struck me as a contradiction; a glacier in a desert state
It’s hard to miss the glacier on my right.
It’s been a long hike, it’s Saturday and it’s rained all day.
12 miles (19 km), 2,200 ft ascent (670m).
There’s a dirt road, classic 4×4 track that emerges from nowhere. The cadence is easier, not so many streams and rivers to cross but enough. Poles are my friend.
The wind heard me say “this is the best day so far”. Maybe the optimist in me was trying to impart karma into the universe and maybe the wind conjured a sound of momentary disbelief.
It was better than a great day!