The Kingdom of Bhutan is in the Eastern Himalayas between Tibet to the north and India to the south. Bhutan has only been open to tourists since the mid-1970s and is still trying hard to preserve its traditional culture while gradually modernising and so the number of tourists permitted into the country is limited and there is a significant minimum daily spend requirement for non-Indian tourists. The complete Lunana Snowman trek across the north of the country starts near Paro in the west and finishes near Bumthang in the east. This trip report is from 2019.

A lovely morningAll photos by Dave Edwards

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days, so I started popping diamox and the numbers turned around almost instantly. The only downside was the group size which was initially 14 before three bailed out after about 10 days. Although we weren't generally walking as a group, I generally enjoy being away from people when I go for a walk. So having to sit in a meal tent with the group so many times without sticking a fork in someone, was quite a struggle.

A quick reality check on the remoteness of this trip. The highest camp is at about the same elevation as Everest base camp. At times you are quite a few days walk from the nearest road. Because the trail continually goes quite steeply up and down valleys, getting on a pony in the event of difficulty just isn't possible. Towards the end of the walk, one of the crew became very unwell to

the extent that the guides tried to helicopter him out. The helicopters are based quite some distance away and won't leave base after 3 pm, and we had a low cloud ceiling and almost nowhere flat enough and clear enough for a chopper to land. The end result was the sick crewman had to walk three days to the nearest road where an ambulance was waiting for him!

Given you are only carrying day packs, albeit with enough warmer clothing to cope with the colder passes and waterproofs in case of precipitation, the main degrees of difficulty are the duration, the continual high altitude, the remoteness and the relentless steep up and down. We were doing training walks of 1000 metres up and 1000 metres down each week before we went, and although the days aren't all as much as that, realistically given the lower training altitude, if you can't do that for two days in a row, you probably need to train some more. You don't need to be fast, just capable.

Tshorim Lake, our highest camp at a little over 5200 metres

Prayer flags at The Chele La at 3800 metres

On the way down ... again

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High-altitude lake

A day on the track A typical day on the walk started with a hot cup of tea delivered to our tent in the morning followed by breakfast which was sometimes porridge, sometimes eggs etc. We needed to be packed up before breakfast because while we were having our relaxed breakfast, the crew would start taking down the tents and loading the donkeys. Two crew members with a horse would get ahead of us and have a hot lunch set up by the time we got there. Apart from the first couple of days while the crew was getting organised, by the time we got to camp, our tents were already set up. We would then be brought a bowl of hot water for a quick wash before afternoon tea in the meal tent followed by a little bit of down time to check out the local

area. A three-course meal was served in the meal tent and was accompanied by the daily health check, a description of the following days walk and information on whether there was likely to be more or less mud than today!

Bhutan is spectacular and the people are ever so friendly. It's not a cheap destination, but if the opportunity to travel internationally seems sensible while I can still walk up and down a hill, it's very tempting to go back in search of better weather.

Another lovely high mountain river on a surprisingly sunny day