RAOC Gazette - page 61
Image details
| Corps | RAOC |
|---|---|
| Material type | Journals |
| Book page | |
| Chapter head | |
| Chapter key | |
| Chapter number | |
| Full title | RAOC Gazette |
| Page number | |
| Publication date | 1980 |
| Real page | |
| Colour | Yes |
| Grey | No |
| Early date | 1980 |
| Late date | 1980 |
| Transcription |
HIMALAYAN HIGHBALL By SERGEANT G. S. DYMOND and found their rucksacks. For many of them it was .the first ALL that was missing was a copy of Mountain Life to make my time in their lives they would be called mountaineers. Our walk equipment complete. We had everything from insect rcpellant was to take us over a main road (track is the word we would to ice axes. When the CSM approached me and said that the use in England) called the Ml by British folks in Dharan. It Unit was organising a trekking expedition to Nepal my mind was the main route from Dharan Bazaar to Bhojpur. A wide could not think of anything else. track with hundreds, even thousands, of bare-footed locals It takes a lot of hard work even cheating, swindling, begging walking back and forth with loads of up to one hundred and to get a large expedition off the ground; but the funny thing fifty pounds strapped over their heads. It was hot, very hot; was that with REME and RAOC of Composite Ordnance Depot temperatures were in the ninety degrees on some days; but Hong Kong this task is just another day's work. We thought humidity was low, equipment would be one of the hardest things to obtain, but when the Hong Kong loan pool is controlled by a fellow The walk to Bhojpur we knew was about four days of going trekker, life becomes much easier. down to large rivers and then working up again to ridges and passes to the tops of six and seven thousand foot mountains. With a week to go to lift-off the team, Major Nick Carter We passed through the villages of Dhankuta and Hille on our RAOC, Lieutenant Steve Becker REME, Lieutenant Allen way north. Hille was very interesting because we saw the Molyneux RAMC, Sergeant Ray Dixon REME, Dave Murrey of remains of a Tibetan festival. It was after Hille that we made the Royal Navy, Corporal Frank Weissgerbcr RAOC, SAC Paul our first major river-crossing. Newman RAF, Private Roger Ching HKMSC (RCT), Private Phillip Lo HKMSC and me packed ourselves up to the shoulders When Ratna said " wear light shoes," we thought that we in equipment 1 remember SAC Paul Newman saying his pack would only cross the river once or even twice; how wrong we was about the right weight until the Boss (Lieutenant Becker) were. That day we walked for three and a half hours along informed him that we still had sixteen days rations per man to the valley, continuously crossing from side to side. We forded put in our already over-full rucksacks. - the river over twenty times before the lunch stop. After lunch we moved again up the valley to a very old, large suspension The rations were great—if you were a connoisseur of fish. bridge which was to take us up four thousand feet to Bhojpur. We were forced to wedge pilchards in our pockets, pilchards in This was a day when all the team felt the hardships which are our wallets and pilchards in our hats. Each man had sixteen associated with mountaineering. Fifty pound packs, hot sun, tins and, towards the end, Frank Weissgerber almost sprouted no water and no way forward but up, up until you find water. gills as a result of the twenty eight tins he cadged from non- In the last light of day we settled down at a small village to connoisseurs. rest for the night—totally exhausted. Medical equipment was really good for the whole expedition We reached Bhojpur at about 11 am and found our way to —Lieutenant Molyneux is the Pharmacist at the BMH here in the Gurkha Welfare Centre where we were to stay for two Hong Kong. We had a little too much of everything, but days. In the two days at Bhojpur we reorganised our equip- better too much than too little. Our problem was getting all ment and collected rations which arrived by aircraft from the medpacks through security at Kai Tak Airport. Customs Kathmandu. After all the rations had been sorted and local were somewhat concerned about the amount of dangerous produce obtained, we found our packs to be over sixty pounds drugs required by one person—the carrier! in weight. This was too heavy for the ten or eleven days hard We flew from Hong Kong at a time so early in the morning walking we would have to face before reaching Lukla, our that even the birds were not singing. After a six hour flight final destination. So it was decided to hire two porters for the via Bangkok we arrived in Kathmandu to find a hot but dry, remainder of our journey. climate. After being neglected, inspected, injected, selected and In paying the porters seventy five pence a day and buying ejected by the Gurkha Trooping Team at the airport we climbed them rice and vegetables to eat, you find you really get your into a Land Rover for the journey to Gawalkel and Britannia money's worth. Apart from normal work the porters build fires, House. help pitch tents and cook food. Britannia House is the home of the RAF air trooping team The guide had said he knew a short-cut for the next stage in Kathmandu and is a very beautiful place. Apart from our- of our journey. This meant short-cut Nepal-style, where one selves in Brit House there were odd bodies roaming around has one hell of a lot of ups and no downs in the walk. We were from the Joint Services West Nepal Hovercraft Expedition, and heading for a village called Rimchim and, after crossing a small RMPs from Germany with a crazy idea about turning Mt Everest river in the valley, the track consisted of about three thousand into a detention centre for wayward squaddies (I think they feet of stepping stone type boulders each about fourteen inches must have seen the film ' The Hill'). The following day we all high. It was head down and just go at your own pace. I decided to go and have a walk around the Bazaar in Kath- managed one thousand two hundred and fifty steps before I mandu. It is said the Bagthatic River, which runs through had to stop. Looking up I could see I was not even half way Kathmandu, is formed from the backside of the world; now 1 up the mountain. know Kathmandu is one thousand six hundred miles up it! At times you could be up to your ankles in rubbish and beggars. While in Rimchim we noticed that Lieutenant Molyneux was troubled by stomach pains. The following day when, After a good day we packed our equipment in the evening after staying with him all morning because his pace was much ready for the move by air to Dharan. Dharan Garrison is slower than the groups, we reached a ridge where the main a beautiful and fantastic place. After the chaos of Hong Kong team groups were having lunch, he just fell down and became you seem to be placed on a deserted island,—clean, quiet, peace- very ill. After resting for two hours and having sent men to ful and outstandingly beautiful. With its mountains to the find water down in the valley, we moved him to our night north and sub-tropical jungle to the south, east and west mixed camp. All night he became increasingly worse with vomiting with plains and farm-land, I felt an instant liking for the area. and diarrhoea. 1 was happy to have the few days while the expedition waited for the trekking permits to arrive. The following day we stayed in the camp site to look after our by now very ill member of the team. By the end of It was about 1.15 pm when the boss made the decision to the day his condition was no better so we decided to bring into move out of Dharan Camp and into the hills. We had met operation a full mountain rescue the following day. our guide Ratna—a most friendly and helpful man and it was At 9.30 am next morning Lieutenant Becker, Dave Murrey he who was to tell us when to sit, stand, eat, walk, climb, camp and Ratna left our camp site to run back to Bhojpur to radio and even swim. for help. What had taken two days to walk took these three We drove for about forty five minutes out of Dharan fit men only nine hours to run. While the other members and before arriving at the start of the walk. Our hopes for an 1 took turns to sit in the tent with Lieutenant Molyneux the easy start were soon shattered when the only thing we saw was weather turned bad and began to snow. At 11 am the follow- a mountain track going up into the clouds. It took three and ing day two of the team and I moved off to find a location a half hours to climb to the pass at the top of our first mountain for the helicopter to land. before Ratna said " camp." Our first day over, and already I could see nine individuals from six different organisations becom- (Continued on page 289) ing a team. All changing slowly as they lost their cap badges — 280 — |
| Book number | R0403a |