The Thriving Metropolis of Tashigon – aka. “Leech Central”

We were met at Tashigon by a very blood stained Adrian who ran to the heli door looking less the fashionista with his pant legs tucked firmly deep into his socks.  Looking closely at his ankle you could see where blood had begun to seep through his sock. As we stepped out of the heli and into the drizzle Adrian and Monica gave us a warning in unisin – LEECHES BEWARE!! Within three minutes Chad had a 2 cm long ‘specimen’ inching its way up his bare leg. We all screamed (seriously? And we’re about to climb an 8000m mountain!?!) and danced around the helicopter anxiously trying to deter any further leeches who were also on expedition and frantically tucking our pants into our socks.  We all ran from the heli to the safety of one of the small lodges to escape the leeches. Alarmingly, the children seemed oblivious to the infestation and ran through the grass in bare feet and wrestling eath other to the ground. We remained ‘jittery’ all afternoon as the lodge remained our island of safety and as we kept a keen eye on the sky waiting for the cloud to part so that we could continue on with the next shuttle.  As the sun began to set we accepted the fact that we weren’t going anywhere fast that day so we made ourselves comfortable in the dormitory accommodation while the heavens opened and a rain of biblical proportions came down overnight. I genuinely thought we’d have more success building an ark to escape leech central than expect our heli shuttle to our final destination.

In spite of the rain, the humidity, the leeches, the spiders and the damp we all remained in good spirits and ready to accept whatever fate the weather held for us...