Annapurna Circuit

It is day 17 of my trek and I have taken a rest day in Jomsom.
For the past 16 days, my feet have led me through snow-capped mountains, desert valleys, fir and pine forests covered in snow (winter wonderlands!) and gorgeous old stone villages. I have passed countless mani wheels and mani walls, crossed many crazy rocking suspension bridges over tumultuous rivers, seen frozen waterfalls, yaks grazing, blue glaciers suspended over mountain-tops, and slid down scree slopes, snow and mud paths.
In villages along the way I have played guitar against the mountain backdrop, eaten dahl bhat, apple pie, chocolate walnut cake (divine!), vegie burger and vegie lasgania (sic) and bathed from buckets of hot water in freezing cold bathrooms with the wind blowing through open windows. I have witnessed a spontaneous sleeping bag stuffing competition, participated in a rather heated snow fight, watched the film 'Caravan' ("I am Tinle, I conquer passes!") in a freezing and tiny cinema, watched amazing sunrises and sunsets and gone to bed before 8pm just about every day.
I have had belly sickness, blisters, headaches, shortness of breath and have visited doctors of the Himalayan Rescue Association at both Manang and Thorung Base Camp.

The day before yesterday, I crossed the Thorung La Pass, which is about as high as you can walk without climbing a mountain, at 5416 metres (2 1/2 Mount Kosciuszkos). After reading a lot of information about altitude sickness and hearing an information talk given by the Himalayan Rescue Association, I was super conscious (to the point of paranoia) of the symptoms, however I crossed the pass with the help of a local porter and little more than shortness of breath and a teensy headache. It was a damn hard slog up the scree slope then through snow up and down a series of false summits, especially with so little oxygen available. After the pass, we had to race down as the boys (Darryl and Benny) were both in bad shape with headache, nausea, blueness of lips, lethargy and vomiting. We decended 1600 meters (oooh, knees) to Muktinath where we fell ravenously on steaming dahl bhat and hot tea.