Pots and pans, utensils and yak's-wool sacks of rice and flour, six or more months' supplies of rations, all bartered and exchanged on the plains below, still neatly packed from their lengthy journey – lugged by donkey over the mountains' precipitous trails.
From the Tora Bora district, in the shadow of 14,500-foot peaks, it is a grueling six-hour walk up rock-strewn riverbeds and precipitous mountain trails to the international border, and on to remote tribal areas of northwestern Pakistan.
The up was unrelenting, and the trail precipitous, its edges dropping into a granite abyss.
The Street View project takes viewers into the heart of the Sagarmatha national park, home to the world's highest mountain, where icy blue rivers run below snow-capped peaks, monks play traditional music and yak-herders navigate precipitous stone-strewn trails.
Alps trips from £549pp, flights extra, ledomestiquetours.co.uk What the Alps and Pyrenees are to road riders, southern Spain's Sierra Nevada national park is to mountain bikers: endless rolling trails and precipitous descents, with the advantage of a benign climate that permits year-round riding.
A Jordan Bowl warm-up can also include the Wizard's Gulch glades or the precipitous entry of the iCaramba trail.
Trails like the precipitous line Mr. Murphy skied — a funneling chute under a 40-foot cliff called Slide Path — are as difficult as the double-black-diamond runs at many Rocky Mountain resorts.
Trails cling grimly to precipitous slopes overlooking the river from elevations of 4,000 to 5,000 feet (1,200 to 1,500 metres).
Several other summits in the High Tatras, including some with marked trails, offer more spectacular views with precipitous drops, varied scenery, and encompassing vistas.
But Swallow and Gunnerside met up, descended the now-called Saboteurs' Trail from the plateau, scaled down the gorge's precipitous 300-foot walls and up the other side, blew up the heavy water plant, and safely withdrew, some skiing to Sweden despite a humongous German manhunt.
