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Behind them a voice said, “Most of Mustang looks like that. At least the lower elevations.”
Sam and Remi stopped and turned to see a mid-twenties man with shaggy blond hair smiling at them. He asked, “First time?”
“Yes,” Sam replied. “But not yours, I’m betting.”
“Fifth. I’m a trekking junkie, I guess you could say. Jomsom’s sort of the base camp for trekking in this region. I’m Wally.”
Sam introduced himself and Remi, and the trio continued walking toward the terminal buildings. Wally pointed to several groups of people standing along the tarmac’s edge. Most were dressed in brightly colored parkas and standing beside heavy-duty backpacks.
“Fellow trekkers?” asked Remi.
“Yep. A lot of familiar faces too. We’re part of the local economy, I guess you could say. Trekking season keeps this place alive. Can’t go anywhere here without being attached to a guide outfit.”
“And if you’d prefer not to?” asked Sam.
“There’s a company of Nepalese Army troops stationed here,” Wally replied. “It’s a bit of a racket, really, but you can’t blame them. Most of these people make less in a year than we make in a week. It’s not so bad. If you prove you know what you’re doing, most of the guides just tag along and stay out of the way.”
From a nearby group of trekkers a woman called, “Hey, Wally, we’re over here!”
He turned, gave her a wave, then asked Sam and Remi, “Where are you headed?”
“Lo Monthang.”
“Cool place. It’s downright medieval, man. A real time machine. You already got a guide?”
Sam nodded. “Our contact in Kathmandu arranged one.”
Remi asked, “How long should it take to get there? According to the map, it’s—”
“Maps!” Wally replied with a chuckle. “They’re not bad, fairly accurate on the horizontal, but the terrain here is like a piece of wadded-up newspaper that’s only been half flattened out. Everything changes. One day you could pass a spot that’s nice and flat, the next day it’s half choked by a landslide. Your guide will probably follow the Kali Gandaki River ravine most of the way—it should be mostly dry right now—so you should figure sixty miles total. At least twelve hours’ drive time.”
“Which means overnight,” Sam replied.
“Yep. Ask your guide. He’ll either have a nice tent set up or a trekkers’ hut reserved for you. You’re in for a treat. The trail that follows the Kali Gandaki ravine is the deepest in the world. On one side, you got the Annapurna mountains; the other, the Dhawalagiri. In between, eight of the twenty highest mountains in the world! The ravine trail is like a cross between Utah and Mars, man! The stupas and caves alone are—”
The woman called again, “Wally!”
He said to Sam and Remi, “Hey, I gotta go. Nice meeting you. Travel safe. And stay out of chokes after dusk.”
They shook hands all around, and Wally starting jogging toward his group.
Sam called, “Chokes?”
“Your guide will tell you!” Wally called over his shoulder.
Sam turned to Remi, “Stupas?”
“Most commonly known as a chortens here. They’re essentially reliquaries—mound-like structures containing sacred Buddhist artifacts.”
“How big?”
“They can range from the size of a garden gnome to a cathedral. One of the largest is back in Kathmandu, in fact. The Boudhanath.”
“The dome draped in all the prayer flags?”
“That’s the one. Mustang’s got a huge concentration of them, mostly of the gnome-sized variety. Some estimates put the number in the low thousands, and that’s just along the Kali Gandaki River. Up until a few years ago, Mustang was all but off-limits to tourism for fear of desecration.”
“Fargos!” a male voice called. “Fargos!”