Photo of Chris on the final steep part of the trek from Taluka to Sankri. Just above there was a road crew clearing a rockslide and fixing the roadway.
Yveline, Raja and I met for yoga in the yard before breakfast. Sun salutations facing the sunrise... this was a very sweet moment as we prepared to leave the mountains and head into the cities. We did a range of poses including some arm-balances... Raja is strong and also has a good background for yoga... Yveline, although new to yoga, is a jazz dancer with great flexibility and strenth... so we had a fun and dynamic practice.
After breakfast and quick packing of bags, we left the Taluka Mountain House and trekked the short (5km) distance to the end of the road that passes Sankri. We walked along with a few kids who were taking a cow to Sankri... they were between 10 -5 years old... but knew exactly what they were doing, each taking turns at driving the animal.
We met the first of the two jeep drivers and loaded our gear. This was where we tipped the porters for both the trek in and the trek out. They seemed pretty grateful for tips of about 600 rupees for each of the treks (around $15).... there were 19 porters going in, and 10 coming out (having used enough food/fuel to cut the loads by 50%).
The drive to Purola was relaxing enough. I called home as soon as we got to the first STD phone, not having been in contact for the past two weeks. I got a bit of vertigo from the winding switchbacks on the way out... this went on for a few hours until Purola. Raja had made plans for us to stay at the Mountain House there; but we argued with him for a while about that... we did not want to stay there. He was accomodating and did try to find a taxi to take us further down, ideally we wanted to get to Haridwar that day (a drive of an additional 8 hours) rather that 'waste' a day in Purola. One restriction is that the vehicles cannot cross state boundaries without a permit... and our driver from Sankri wasn't authorized. No other drivers were willing to leave for Haridwar that late in the day... so it was Purola for that night after all.
We made the best of this. The mountain house was by no means as dismal as the town below it... we actually had a breeze and the air quality was pretty good... the noise level pretty low.
We saw some kids playing Cricket on the ROOF of their apartment building (no flat ground in that section)... it was something that would have scared any parent in our part of the world out of their wits... they would run right to the edge for the ball and then stop...
After a good dinner (prepared in the local kitchen) we met for the final time with our Sherpas. They came in for our little 'Thank You" ceremony. Each of the four climbers personalized the thank you to one of the sherpas... and we handed them little packets with tips (ranging from $50 to $130). I tipped Tindoop, our lead sherpa and my new benchmark for mountaineering savvy and strength.
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