A Trekking Failure of Epic Proportions.

My 6 day solo trek through the Markha Valley spiralled into a whirlpool of failure within hours of hitting the trail.

"This bag's kind of heavy" I thought to myself after the first 15 minutes of walking.

Stok trekking point is the lonely bridge where my taxi driver dropped me off, it was about a 6-8 hour trek from the village of Rumbuk which was my first homestay point on the trek.

The key point in homestay trekking is actually making it to the village containing the homestay, otherwise you're sleeping under the Himalayan stars with out a tent. You don't carry a tent because in these altitudes every gram counts; I foolishly looked at the free space in my 60 litre backpack as an opportunity to bring more comforts. Things like 750 grams of Nutella, 2 kg's of trailmix, a 1 kg thermos, and not that the weight matters but a pair of friggin flip flops. Who brings flip flops on a Himalayan trek?

Long story short I never made it to Rumbuk, I reached about 4600m and became a breathless mule with a 20 kilo rucksack strapped to his back. I can actually ballpark my altitude because I could see the summit of the pass I was supposed to reach. I tried with all my might to crawl up the gravel slope where it would've been all downhill to the village but failed in dramatic  fashion- on my knees cursing myself and the mountain I was on.

All the while this was happening it was raining, hailing, and snowing in that order. Each one progressing to the next as I neared the 4800m pass. But I don't blame the weather, I blame myself for packing too much and biting off more than I could chew for my first high altitude trek. After repeated attempts of reaching the pass I gave up and tried to sleep in a filthy, cow dung littered, Shepperd's hut.

I spent 1 hour huddled in a sleeping bag with blizzard like winds blowing into my shelter, I eventually regained my wits and decided to kibosh the whole trek; there was simply no way I could trek 6 days with the amount of stuff I brought. I ran down as fast as I safely could to where I began my trek 8 hours prior, just in time before the sky turned dark.

Needless to say the next morning I was feeling a bit defeated... embarrassed even. So I did what any man would do to heal his broken ego.

I rented a Royal Enfield.