I’d been in Rishikesh a week and was keen to get up north before winter set in and the opportunity gone; I must have missed the winter has already set in memo.

The planned 4 day / 3 night trek up in the Indian Himalayas close to the Tibetan border began so well. It took 2 days in a jeep to cover the 248km up to Gangotri – the starting point for the 25km trek to Gomukh glacier – the source of the Ganges. The views on the ride up were breathtaking – bright turquoise water flowing through the dramtic valley carved out by the Ganga – though progress up into the Himalayas towards Tibet round endless hair pin bends was slow. Stopping overnight in Uttarakashi I did a fabulous morning run – the format being the now familiar 5km up… followed by 5km down.

On arrival in Gangotri at 3200m, I learned it had snowed three times in the mountains already – 29 September, 8 October and 10 october… It’s now mid October and I know the road we’ve just taken closes early November… I start to get nervous and voice my anxieties… but helpfully no Indian around offers a word of caution…

Departing the next morning it was already spitting with rain, 9km later and a few hundred metres up and it’s snowing… a couple more km and it’s a complete white out. I had decided, thank god, to stick with a 65 year old Canadian guy who has done loads of trekking in his time, and has no problem keeping to the trail and picking his way through the snow in sandals and bare feet (I am not even joking). By the time we arrive at Bhojpasa where we planned to stay the night, there was nearly a foot of snow, I was cold, my trail running shoes were soaked through and the clothes in my backpack were decidedly soggy too.

At the village we attempted to dry out as the snow continued to pile up and went straight to bed at 3 in the afternoon in what can only be described as a glorified cow shed. It was the worst place I’ve ever stayed and we were snowed in. I was however super grateful. Grateful for shelter, for good hot food and great company. We went to bed after dinner at 8pm. The cold felt like it had penetrated right through to my bones and sleep seemed impossible… I drifted off after a few hours dreaming of a hot water bottle…

The next day we abandoned all plans to go to the glacier and 4 of us started to head down. More snow had fallen overnight and the walk down wasn’t clever… the sun was shining brightly, the trail was in places super narrow, we were on the edge of a valley and the snow was melting… On returning I learned the Annapurna Circuit disaster in Nepal- perhaps we got the tail end of that storm as it was on the same day and we were only a few hundred miles away. For us however, everything was fine.