Phaplu at the end of paved road and with small airstrip is one of the entry points to the Khumbu (Everest) region. Most people fly to Lukla further up Dudh Koshi (river) to shorten their walk to EBC or Gokyo, but supplies and luggage is often carried by porters and mules from Phaplu or Nunthala.
We are on the move. First, it was an easy and relaxing walk on mountain road along broad valley to small village Ringmu. We were passed by only 3 or 4 jeeps carrying porters with their load heading to Nunthala. The jeep road under construction ended there when we visited. We met only 4 hikers with backpacks. In Ringmu we joined popular trail from Jiri (marked with orange circles, other trails we walked were not marked, but navigation was easy). Then we hiked up on paved steep trail over Taksindu La (pass, 3066 masl) to Taksindu. It was as far as we could walk on the first day, although the original plan was to push on to Nunthala. Somehow we could not stick to the original plan to walk a few extra kms to Chiwong the day before, even though we arrived in Phaplu surprisingly early. And now we were half a day behind our plan. We stayed at nicely renovated Taksindu Resort Lodge. We visited Taksindu Gompa (monastery) and watched a bit the evening puja, and then walked around again in the morning.
Taksindu Gompa
Taksindu Gompa
The following day we rolled down to Dudh Koshi = leg-tiring 1400 m drop in altitude, and after crossing the river and walking up the hill for a while, we parked for the night at Gorkhali Lodge in Jubing. On the way, we stopped in Nunthala for lunch and to break long descent. Jubing is a nice village with green fields and flowers, good dal bhat with unusual local veggies at the lodge. We walked 23 km the first two days.
