Where In The World Is Evan?

Day three began well, as we all woke in good moods, having had a much better night’s sleep than the day before–the lack of snow and rain helped. Over breakfast the issue of Sergio’s health resurfaced. Having promised him that we’d return after visiting the hot-springs we were a little put out that he now wanted us to make good on that promise. Impervious to our logical arguments about his spontaneous recovery the day before, he obstinately insisted on returning to Songpan. After discussing our predicament with the other trekking group, who were heading back into town themselves, the idea was floated that we could ditch Sergio with them and continue as a group of three. Unfortunately this was not to be–for safety reasons there needed to be one guide to each two trekkers, thus necessitating that one of the girls switch with Sergio, or one of us head back with him. Not being able to find any takers, we convinced Sergio to tough it out for another day. As we back-tracked down the asphalt road, the one we had come up the previous day, Sergio’s illness reared its hypochondriac head. He noticeably worsened as the girls disappeared into the distance, so much so that our guides–who could not understand a word of his incessant complaining–commented on the coincidence of his remarkable decline in health and the girls’ departure.

Soon afterwards we turned off the road and headed back up into the mountains. Passing over several rickety bamboo bridges, where it was necessary to dismount, we soon reached an incredibly steep and overgrown trail following a slow moving stream up a towering snow-capped mountain. Speculating that the guides were obviously showing their respect at our horse riding mastery by taking us up a trail that had clearly not been used in years, we marveled at our own intrepidness. Our progress and our smugness quickly tapered off, however, as we were forced to repeatedly stop while the guides took turns to re-cut the riding trail through the dense thicket of brambles and shrubbery that had closed in upon it. Using a hybrid scythe/machete they were able to make steady but slow progress. Often, however, we would be forced to stop without notice in the most precarious of positions. It was during one of these unannounced stops that disaster almost struck. Throughout the trek Jon had harbored a nagging concern that his flatulent, overweight horse–aptly named Diane, after our obnoxious former colleague–was trying to throw him off the edge of a cliff. In retrospect it’s rather ironic that it should have been my horse that actually made the attempt. Perched as far forward in my saddle as I could sit I looked with trepidation as the muddy ground beneath my horse began to give way under our combined weight. Unable to move forward or backwards, due to the presence of Olen before me, Jon behind me, and the narrowness of the path, I had nowhere to go. As my horse’s front legs slipped out from under us, I was heard to shout “Fuck!” as I quickly slipped my right foot from the stirrup and rather elegantly stepped off my horse as it plunged down the steep embankment towards the rocky stream 30 meters below us. My initial fear was soon overwhelmed by the exhilarating rush of adrenaline, but for Jon this incident just confirmed his worst fears that the horses were not to be trusted. No one else felt quite comfortable riding up the rest of the trail, so the others dismounted while one of the guides went to retrieve my thankfully uninjured horse. Olen later admitted that the first thing he looked for after he saw my horse fall was the location of his bag, which happened to be strapped to the back of Sergio’s horse.

After an exhausting climb to reach the log cabin that was to form part of our campsite for the night, we thankfully rested while lunch was prepared. After smoking quite a bit of pot and devouring our food, we left Sergio to rest further at the camp and began our ascent to the top of the mountain. Having already reached a height of approximately 4,200 meters the summit of the mountain seemed tantalisingly close. Unfortunately, our judgment was a little on the impaired side and the higher we climbed the further the top seemed to be. Every “summit” that we reached turned out to be nothing but another rocky outcrop that in turn seemed to reveal the real summit just ahead. After climbing to an estimated height of 4,500 meters we were all beginning to suffer the noticeable effects of altitude sickness. Between the tree of us we had symptoms including headaches, nausea, dizziness, disorientation, and shortness of breath. By communal decision we agreed to abandon our attempt to conquer the mountain and began to amble back down. After a few minutes Olen asked Jon and I to keep a lookout for an appropriate spot for him to pose naked on the mountain. A little taken aback by his request we questioned him as to his motives only to be confronted with a rather convincing case as to why this was a great idea–not least, I’m sure, because we were all really stoned and light-headed from altitude sickness. Having found a great scenic spot Olen stripped off his clothes and posed while I took photos with his camera. After a little cajoling Jon removed his kit, down to his boxers, and replaced Olen on the modeling rock. Not one to be left out of a good story I stripped off all my clothes and posed as well–the inevitable photo series that Olen later photo-shopped, of me standing naked at a string of famous Chinese landmarks, didn’t enter my mind at the time. It was, however, a delightfully liberating experience to stand at 4,500 meters above sea level, with the sun beating down upon your naked skin, while a cool breeze ruffles your body hair, and you look around for kilometers in every direction at a gorgeous scenery of rocky mountain peeks covered in layers of fresh snow.

After descending to our campsite we quickly ducked inside the cabin to avoid the bad weather that had been ominously moving up the valley that we had traversed earlier in the day. To stave off the sudden drop in temperature we went for what was left of the last bottle of baijiu–the majority having spilled out into my bag, due to a faulty lid. After we’d finished off the dregs, Sergio saw his chance to beat me at a game of chess. After laying down the challenge, Sergio lost the first game, but capitalised on my increasing light-headedness to win the second comfortably. With the activities of the day finally catching up with us our mood started to crash, and everyone got increasingly angry with Sergio for repeatedly shining my headlamp into people’s eyes. Olen in particular was angry, but thankfully the night ended without incident. As we packed off to bed a wild wind began to scream up through the valley, and throughout the night we were buffeted by winds so strong that the flaps on our tent ripped open and the wind came howling in.

Check out the Songpan photo gallery.