After a breakfast of fried rice and leftover curry, we set off down the mountainside to the main road which runs along the river valley. Leon and Tony go galloping off, surefooted through fields and rice paddies. I must fly along after them to keep up. As long as I don’t think about where to put my foot next, I do not stumble. We are hot and sweaty by the time we reach the row of shops at Duksam, where there is hot tea, warm beer or unfiltered water to drink. We opt for the warm beer, which makes me sleepy, and then continue to trudge along the road. It is sixteen kilometers back to the bridge below Tashigang. There is no shade, and the sun is merciless. Below us, the river is a deliciously cool turquoise surge. Tony says the color indicates its origin: the turquoise comes from suspended particles of stone crushed by the grinding of a glacier. I long to climb down the bank and immerse myself in its blue-green chill. The flat road is aerobically easy but endlessly tedious. We stop to talk to everyone we pass.
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