This was the toughest day by far. Tsering said that the day would be long - possibly a 7hr hike. It wasn't 7 but 11. We started at 7.45AM and reached at 7.40PM - with a lunch break in between. It took the "mickey out of me" - to use Milan's words.
All was well until lunch. I think we took a break at a spot where had rested before. I can't remember now. During lunch, everyone voted/ took a call on whether they'd like to proceed or halt for the night and take it easy. Everyone wanted to proceed and so we did.
The whole day involved ploughing through snow. Snow meant that there were fewer early travelers and therefore a less cleared path. Each step meant digging in and then ploughing out. I don't remember what happened during most of the day. It was just walking and walking and walking - one foot at a time without thinking about the destination. (I'm seeing houses and houses and buildings and buildings from the plane - yuck!).
Mammut and I were together as dusk set in. Earlier in the day, I kept pace with Tsering Le and that was real fast for me. Tsering is 54 and walks better than most 20 year olds. Thakpa told me that the Ladakhis are born with bigger lungs making them natural to the mountains. All my fast paced walking added up towards the evening. It got darker and darker. Starting with the crescent moon, slowly the night sky started revealing itself out. No one behind, no one ahead. Just blackness with guidance from my LED headlamp. At some points, I worried if we had gotten past the camp site and didn't realize it. What if we had to camp at some hole in the mountain right there? What would we feed our already famished bodies? How would we survive the cold? It was about -15 to -20 degrees centigrade. How would the rest of the team find us? Why did we take those breaks on the way? I would push aside the answer-less questions and look up to the constellations that started showing up one by one. A beautiful but gentle reminder that we were very late.
Each step became more difficult than the previous one. Fatigue had completely overtaken the mind. The brain was slowing down. Oxygen levels were low. Climbing up and down the rocks seemed a deadly chore. At some points, I almost didn't care where my foot landed! One little slide and we would be in the Zanskar and to use Pankaj's words - that would be "end of story." Mammut didn't have light so we were coordinating our steps together.
Finally after several unknown dozens of minutes, I saw a flash of light from someone's headlamp. The main light and then the flash from the red LED. It was a message. I messaged back with my headlamp. What a relief! It took another half hour before we could reach the Tsomo cave, our camp site. That last half hour screwed with my senses badly. I would take five steps, heave and pause to take a breath and then another two steps. Then pause. Then another four or five before being pushed by Mammut from behind. Then another two and so on. We pushed and pushed and pushed. I could eat wood - was that hungry. Kept dreaming of lying flat in the tent once we reached the camp site.
A little later, we saw the glow of a fire. We were almost there. It was the Tsomo cave and we finally reached it 12+ hours later since we started. After sitting down at the cave, I had no energy to even move my legs. After a bit, I managed to drag myself towards Vikram who was sitting by the fire. He reached a half hour before and seemed set and comfy. It was then that I had my out-of-body experience - literally!
I first started perspiring - so I unzipped my jacket(s). Then I started feeling chills. It was weird and confusing. Someone handed me a cup of chai. Tsampa (barley powder) was going around and I put oodles of it in the tea and just gulped it down. For a full 2 minutes, I didn't know what was happening. I was in a zone. Was it high blood pressure? Was it a super drop in glucose levels? I don't know. Vikram and Ajay were attending to me. Ajay pulled out a thermal blanket (a shiny, silvery thing) and wrapped me in it. He gave me two glucose hits. I had the sense to ask for Dispirin (aspirin) and that seemed to have helped too (with what I don't know) - quite immediately. Throughout, I was in a zone - a daze - not completely clear what was happening inside or outside me.
That night in the cave, staring at the stars and constellations, snugly wrapped in my double-sleeping bag (thank you Vikram!) - I ruminated on how quickly and easily everything can come to an end. It wasn't painful or even difficult or any of that. In fact, it was somewhat druggy - you slowly slip out and possibly never come back. All the stupidities, irritations, anxieties, past-stuff really, future-stuff didn't matter. It was just the everlasting present - a huge, huge present - that's possibly a moment but has so much in that one moment that it's a complete whole.
I slept well that night.
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