Day 6: Goyem to Junbesi

Another early start, and thankfully the clouds had gone giving us nicer views to start the day. Some more Up to start as we headed up to the Lamjura pass at about 3530m, and unfortunately some more depleted forests.

On my last trip I had taken a picture of a guesthouse at the top of the Lamjura pass, and had brought a copy of it along with me. Of course when we got to the pass the old guesthouse was gone and instead there was a nicer one. I showed the picture to the owner and she said that the old teahouse had been run by her mother. I passed on the picture for her to give to her mother. The two pictures show the new and old teahouses. As you can see there is a fair difference between to the two.










From Lamjura it was down through the rhododendron forests, to a flatter area with quite a few farms, and then down into Junbesi (2,680m).

Junbesi has become quite a pleasant town, tucked snugly into the valley, with a mountain view at the far end. However it does not seem to have enough tourist traffic to support the level of building that had gone on. There were at least 8 guest houses and a couple of boarded up buildings, including a bakery that gave testament to perhaps too optimistic a prediction of tourist traffic. Still there is a large high school in town that serves what looks to be quite a good sized population in the surrounding area.

We stayed at the Sherpa Guide guest house (the blue house in the picture) which turned out to be one of our 3 favourite places on the trek. The lady who runs it is lovely, is a great cook, and best of all she makes a great apple pie. While most of the apple pies you get in the region are more like a pasty, the one she makes is actually a PIE! What a wonderful way to enjoy afternoon coffee time!