11 April Marpha to Kalopani JB: again the usual morning routine and we were off back down the road to the Tibetan village at Chhairo. This village it seems was established by Tibetan refugees who settled from the refugee camp that was once located in Chhairo. We walked past the derelict refugee camp. Interestingly the buildings appeared to be made of concrete something we had not seen anywhere else on the circuit. After Chhairo we continued until there was...

10 April. Kagbeni to Marpha JB: Usual usual first thing with packing, breakfast and generally getting organised for the day ahead. We are getting pretty slick at it and Chris' quote from day 1 ("I might be organised by the end of the trek") does have a ring of truth to it. Harm and Chris returned to the monastery school to deliver pens, paper and other trinkets, demonstrates to the kids how we can lose with pride intact! We then left Kagbeni first for Jomsom....

09 April Muktinath to Kagbeni MI: great nights sleep for Harm and myself, the others were average. There doesn't seem to be any common reason for good or bad sleeping, the only thing being consistent is the randomness. We decided to have a more leisurely start aiming to be away by 8. A few double Americano coffees to start us off didn't help with our speed as we didn't walk out of town till 9. Harm and I holding things up with a bit a retail therapy on the wal...

08 April High Camp to Muktinath via Thorung La Well this is the big day on the Annapurna Circuit. As its drawn closer it has dominated conversations in dining rooms, with every group having differing theories on when to start and how hard it would be. Our conversations on the other hand have been dominated by who won cards and whether it was luck or skill! As Mark said yesterday we opted to start at 05.30,which given all advice was that ascending to the pass wo...

7 April Ledar to High Camp MI: Away at 7:00 this morning try and beat the rush for the 110 beds at high camp. We saw a few people leaving while we had breakfast but we were one of the first few groups on the trail. Nice steady gradiant for the first hour, where we crossed slips and a wooden bridge then a short rest and strip down, as the sun had finally hit us, at a teahouse after a short climb up from the river. The next 30 minutes we skirted around scree slo...