Day 5: Trek to a yurt camp

It was early when I felt my stomach begin to gurgle. Was it the horse rice? Did some cow based bacteria manage to bypass my meticulous water purification techniques? Was my weak western digestive system already having a negative reaction to Kyrgyzstan? Everyone lay peacefully and I cautiously crept over the resting bodies, conscious to not shine my headtorch in people's faces. I headed to the squat toilet, but the smell on approach was alone too much for me to handle so I headed over to my livestock friends where I found a bush toilet. I staggered back to the guesthouse clutching my stomach, where a few members of the group reported they were suffering too. "Riding the diarrhoea train too eh Amy", Darren called out in a beautifully down to earth Aussie style. We were all cautious with food at breakfast and passed around packets of Immodium like they were sweets.

Today we would travel to a remote yurt camp with our nomadic family. The boys would ride horses with our kit bags strapped to them, their sisters and mum would serve us food and their dad would construct our yurts. The horseman were extremely young, but loaded up their horses with gear like veterans and rode off confidently into the distance. The route today was around 12km, gaining altitude gently to reach around 3000m.

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The horsemen

We walked slowly, with frequent toilet stops behind rocks. We passed mountain pastures where herds of cattle and horses grazed and as we gained height the vegetation became more sparse. Further into the morning, glacier capped peaks of the distant majestic mountains revealed themselves, reminding me that Yukhin peak was waiting. It was evident that we'd gained altitude due to the cooler air and raised heart rare, but I was adapting well.

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On arrival to the yurt camp, most of us opted for a nap. We were delighted that the toilet was of slightly better quality than our previous stay, bit still not an ideal location to handle bowel discomforts. The yurts were spacious and cosy, with pillows and mattresses and duvets. The camp was peaceful, next to a gentle flowing river and surrounded by mountains. I spent some time washing in the river and purifying my drinking water before we ate horse pasta. Roman watched Pirates of the Caribbean in Russian loudly on his phone and Darren interrupted him to request a briefing before bed. He reacted in a way a teenage boy would if you told him to turn off his PlayStation. The briefing was the usual factual statements but with the added insight of "tomorrow very hard", which was a beautifully settling statement to end the day on. We headed to our yurt sleepover, joking that we should "Make decision" as to which mattress to sleep on. I fell asleep to the sound of the trickling stream, with mild apprehension for the "very hard" day ahead, but happy that I'd bonded well with my travel companions and we'd face the adversity together.

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