While in Nargakot we took a stroll up the hill and out of town.
To say ‘out of town’ sounds like a bigger journey than it actually is. You can walk from one side of Nargakot to the other in fifteen minutes at a brisk pace.
We followed the crumbling asphalt road up and around, and past the Hillside Hotel, the last stable building we saw on the steep hills for a long while.
The road twisted and turned, cutting through the hill as it led from one switchback into another.
We passed a small shack that was perched on a grassy slope with a front wall that looked to be constructed from a mass of jagged rocks and debris collected from the roadside.
A pack of five dogs in the yards came running out onto the road barking as we walked by. A tan bitch in the pack assumed control and quickly pulled the other into line.
We were not sure what was about to unfold as we cautiously continued, watching for signs that they may attempt to attack.
The tan bitch moved to a position in front of us, with the others following her. She seemed to be scouting the way as she occasionally turned back and snarled at the dogs behind her, snapping them back into line.
She stayed with us for the best part of two hours walking out of Nargakot, through small villages, and back. All the way back to the exact place where she joined us.
When we went through the other villages and the local dogs came near she corralled them away and made sure we were safe.
I felt very much like we had our own Littelest Hobo.
As we passed through a small village the locals were massed in the street out the front of a small building that looked to be a very scantily stocked shop.
A group of men played a game with a couple of stones on a board where they seemed to be shuffling and skidding the stones from one side to another. The objective didn’t reveal itself to me as I watched on.
Our canine companion was growing restless with the local dogs trying to mount her and the looks we were getting from people there said that we need to take her away before there is trouble.
We moved on and found that as we passed through that villages that the daylight was slipping away and some ominous storm clouds were massing on the horizon.
It was time to head back to Nargakot.
