Day 12: The CLIMB to Gorepani

My breakfast was the BEST fried apple pie I have ever tasted along with homemade custard. Each meal begins with the oldest woman of the teahouse placing firewood in the clay ovens, gathering eggs, and kneading bread. EVERYTHING from scratch here!  Because meals take so long, we relax and rest - a lot. My, oh my, what a life.  Other interesting observations included a man and his son "fishing" by pounding the rocks with a sledge hammer to stun the fish, one of our porters, Prakash, befriending a buffalo on the trail, and dozens of empty pack animals on their way to gathering goods. Sorry - it was just too hard to choose one or two photos for today - so, less words, more pics :) We climbed well over 3,000 feet today and logged about 10-12 miles according to Diane's and/or Emily's phones. Funny how people don't talk about distances traveled on the Annapurna, rather distances UP and DOWN. It was definitely a challenging day and when we arrived at Gorepani, our Sherpa Dil told us we were staying in UPPER Gorepani so that last half mile was a very long and steep one! We must get up at 4 am tomorrow to climb the last thousand feet for a 360 degree view of the mountains and sunrise...apparently long climb part of view. We'll see about that tomorrow.