Great Himalaya Trail: Cédi plans his adventure

Cédi, how did you come up with the idea of doing the GHT?
When I attended the European Outdoor Film Tour in 2019, I saw the film ‘Le Minimaliste’ about the French adventurer Eliott Schonfeld. He crossed the Himalayas from west to east, accompanied by his horse Robert – and with the bare minimum of equipment. That got me thinking: I wanted to do something like that, push myself to my limits and force myself to battle my way through. When I was doing some research, I came across a website set up by Robin Boustead, who’d developed the Great Himalaya Trail as a cohesive route.

What’s the trail like?
Nepal’s GHT is one of the longest, highest and hardest trails in the world. It crosses the Himalayas from east to west on two routes: the challenging upper trail and the more manageable teahouse trail.

What exactly is your plan?
Next year, I want to fly to Nepal with my friend Loris in late February or early March. We’ll start in Kathmandu before travelling to the most easterly part of the country and then head back west on the upper trail with our bags full. I reckon it’ll take around 115 days of hiking, at an average of 15 kilometres a day: we’ll be on the road for four to five months. We want to take the trail nice and steady, spend a few days here and there and interact with locals. The trail spans 1,700 kilometres, and we’ll cover around 160,000 metres of elevation and 17 passes over 5,000 metres. The highest point of the trail is located at more than 6,200 metres.

Have you done anything like this in the past?
No, I’ve never done something this long, and I’ve never done it abroad, either. I did the Jura Crest Trail here in Switzerland, but that’s simply not on a comparable scale. For that, I spent two weeks hiking on my own and gained some initial experience. But, as I said, it’s all about pushing myself to the limit and having a real adventure...

In your view, what’s the greatest challenge?
Our equipment is a major challenge, of course: what do we need? How heavy can our backpacks be? How much food do we need to take with us? We need to plan all this perfectly. Technically speaking, the passes over 6,000 metres – including abseiling sections – will be a real challenge. Fundamentally, it’s just hard to have an overarching sense of what the Great Himalaya Trail (GHT) will be like ahead of time when you’ll be travelling for four to five months.

What’s the infrastructure like on the ground? Will you be sleeping in a tent?
I’m estimating that we’ll sleep outdoors 20 to 25 times. Otherwise, we’ll spend the night in teahouses on the edge of the Great Himalaya Trail (GHT) or look for alternative accommodation. The teahouses play a crucial role in the GHT. Thanks to them, we only need to take food for during the day, as they serve hot meals in the evenings. That said, there are also legs where we won’t pass anything for five to ten days on the trot.

Do you need any permits?
Yes – around 15 of them. In some regions, you pay USD 500 in exchange for the right to stay there for ten days. The permits are a huge bureaucratic headache, so we outsourced that to a trekking agency in Kathmandu. We also used this same agency to book a guide for three technically challenging passes. And we’ll have food delivered to us at four points along the trail to trim down the weight of our backpacks somewhat.

Have you set a limit on what you can pack?
Our goal is for our backpacks to never exceed 20 kilograms. For instance, we won’t be taking a heavy all-seasons tent with us, but rather a model weighing just 765 grams, made by Big Agnes. We’ll also opt for lightweight versions of sleeping bags, sleeping mats and backpacks. True, this is a slightly riskier approach, but we’ve heard lots of people’s experiences and they’ve given us a fairly clear idea of what’s ahead.

The weather in the Himalayas is still pretty wintry in March, right?
Our trip starts just as winter will be turning into spring. The issue is the monsoon: this normally comes from the east at the end of May. In other words, we’ll be walking away from the rainy season. Luckily, the first few legs aren’t too tricky, technically speaking, so we’ll have time to acclimatise.

Have you spent a long time at these kinds of altitudes before?
I’ve never been higher than 4,200 metres before – but that was enough for me to realise that I’m not a natural when it comes to spending time at lofty altitudes! I need plenty of time to acclimatise. The good thing is that the GHT gets off to a relatively moderate start and climbs upwards gradually. And we’ll doubtless spend time at more than 5,000 metres in the area around Kangchenjunga (8,586 m) so our bodies can get used to the altitude.

Personal shopping

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