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| Muktinath to Kagbeni 2713m Friday 12th April Day 12 I woke up in the night with a burning sensation where my face was touching the zip of my sleeping bag. I thought I must have trapped it and cut myself, and woke Carole to ask her. I turned the head torch onto my face and she gasped with horror, and told me it was badly swollen. I was still really tired and told her it would be ok in the morning and went back to sleep. Carole lay awake and worried about how I looked. In the morning it was worse. My head seemed to have enlarged grotesquely like the Elephant Man and my eyes had all but disappeared into folds of swollen flesh, so that I could only see straight ahead, and my field of vision was much reduced. I went out of our room and found Pasang. He looked at me as if it was the first time he’d set eyes on me. “Roger?” he said with a puzzled expression. Soon the porters had all gathered round looking and pointing and talking away in Nepalese, everyone was staring at me in fascination. The Nepalese are quite open in their curiosity and stare in a manner which is a bit disconcerting to the Westerner, but let’s face it, here was something to stare at! Sukman said it was snow blindness, and he had seen the condition before with porters who had no protection for their eyes. The cure was to rub snow into the eyes. Well I wasn’t sure about that and then I remembered the UK public school camping trip, they were in the village somewhere and were sure to have a doctor with them. |
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The Elephant Man of Muktinath |
| Sukman and I went off to find them,
and I was in luck, they did have a Doctor
and he was happy to examine me. He laughed when he saw me
and told me
that he had all sorts of casualties in his group after
the pass. The combination of
thin air, very bright sun reflecting off snow and a stiff
wind had burnt everyone
to some degree, though not many as badly as me. He told
me it looked worse
than it actually was, and that I was to take Diamox, the
drug everyone uses to
prevent AMS, for the swelling, wear lots of moisturiser
and cover my face with
a scarf for the next few days. This would prevent
infection from the dust being
blown about in the Kali Gandaki. Typical, I’d
managed to get over the pass
without Diamox and now I had to take it anyway. I went back to the lodge and as I walked back to our room Clive told me that Sue was complaining about a little cold sore on her lip. I walked past their room and saw her examining it in a small mirror. “I hear you’ve got a cold sore, that must be awful,” I said. She started to reply and then looked at me, saw my face and burst out laughing. “Huw, I’m sorry,” she said, but she couldn’t stop laughing. Carole said she thought she was getting cold sores as well and at breakfast we noticed that some of the porters had sores on their lips and noses. We walked into Kagbeni and bought scarves and I followed the doctor’s instructions. We left the Hotel Dream Home, with me wearing a wide brimmed hat and scarf tied round my face and looking like ‘The Shadow.’ The walk was good, and we were soon at Kagbeni, a wonderful old village with some nice lodges, built at the meeting of the Jhong Khola and Kali Gandaki rivers. We liked the sound of one lodge we passed called ‘The Snow Lion and the Dancing Yak.’ What a great name, but we were booked to stay at the Trekker’s Asian Lodge. Not such a romantic name but it was ok and we had a good room with our own squat loo, but no hot water. My face was sore and Carole’s cold sores were starting to appear, her face was hurting from her nose down. We felt dispirited. What a pair of crocks. Postscript - October 2003: I have often wondered why I, dark skinned and easily tanned, should suffer this extreme burning, especially as other lighter skinned members of the same party had not done so, and then in October 2003 I heard a doctor talking on the radio about the dangers of using the anti-biotic ciprofloxacin. He explained that cipro greatly increases the skin's photosensitivity and in prolonged exposure to bright sunshine can cause extreme facial swelling and severe burning. I had been taking it since Jagat after my bout of severe vomiting. Cipro is known as the trekker's drug of choice - but how many of us know the side effects? |
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Thorung-la |
Sue and Carole |
..and on top |
Our group go over the pass |
