Kagbeni and Mustang

After crossing Thorong La, we stayed the night in the marginal town of Muktinath. Since this town had the only road we encountered in the last two weeks of walking, Chhongba wanted to hire a jeep to take us down to Kagbeni. But we rebelled. We wanted to walk. It rained and snowed a bit. Here is Milt leaving town in style.

We walked downhill to a very nice view through the snow of the village of Jharkot and the mountain that is Dhaulagiri. Dhaulagiri is the seventh highest mountain in the world at 26,795 ft.

As we descended to Kagbeni we had great views across the almost-dried up stream, the Gandhaki, into the very dry area that is Mustang.

Then Kagbeni came into view. It was surprisingly fertile. In the 20-photo panorama below you can see the Gandhaki coming in from the left and the much larger Kali Gandaki River at the top.

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Here is another view of Kagbeni with the Kali Gandaki river valley in the background.  Kagbeni is one the oldest villages in the Himalayas.

We stopped at a small restaurant for tea, coffee, and baked sweets. The sherpas took considerable interest in the young woman preparing and serving food.

We toured the village before heading to Eklebhatti for a late lunch and then on to Jomson for two nights.