Day 7 of ABC Trek ABC (13,549ft) to Bamboo (7,710ft), 16km / 10 miles
10/27/25
Today we head all the way back to Bamboo, some 16km. We woke before dawn yet again to try to catch the sunrise and followed who we thought was Raj up to the ridge along with everyone else on the summit, but it turns out we followed TEMU RAJ – blue coat, beanie, glasses…..but most definitely not Raj. We owned up to our mistake later on, but I did think it was strange that he didn’t say good morning!
Unfortunately clouds rolled in and we were able to see the sun itself rise, so we headed back to the room to pack up and have some breakfast.
My sis was actually feeling effects from the altitude – headache, lightheaded, nausea, so we were eager to start heading back down.
My bowels are no longer holding me at gunpoint, unlike the last 2 days. From ABC to MBC, we joined the long line of people also making their way down, witnessing a helicopter take flight just as we were descending. When they’re not carrying people needing to be medically evacuated, trekkers can hire a heli to take them back to Pokhara after making it to base camp as a quick, easy, and scenic trip back to town.
As a shock to no one, it was so much easier going down than going up, and we made it to MBC in an hour and 15 minutes.
From MBC to Deurali, it was quite a bit steeper, but still not terrible, and we made it in just about 3 hours.
Here we made a choice – it was 11:20am, but we thought it best to descend the 1000+ stairs down to Himalaya and break for lunch there rather than having it now.
So on we went – it took 2 hours of slow, careful descent to reach Himalaya, past the waterfall that we somehow navigated around in the dark, watching objectively dumb trekkers rock hop across the turbulent waters rather than taking the bridge 20 feet away, and up past the Buddha cave.
Finally I started having an appetite again and enjoyed the most delicious sandwich and hot chocolate of my life.
After lunch in Himalaya, we wound our way through the wet rocky jungle on the way to Dovan. The mud, rocks, and roots remind me of home in the Adirondacks. For two hours we descended to Dovan.
Once there, we didn’t stop but kept going, trying to make it to Bamboo by 5pm. Here there were yet more stairs, and we again ran into our Aussi friends. From then on we stuck together, again sharing stories from our travels and laughing. Time went by much faster and at 5:05pm we rolled into Bamboo, set up our room, and took our first hot showers in days, cleaning a few socks while we were at it.
Just one more full day of trekking remains.
ADK Trail Tales 