Contents
26 Sep - The adventure begins28 Sep - Pokhara to Neyapul and Hille
29 Sep - Hille to Ghorepani
30 Sep - Ghorepani and Poon Hill to Tadepani
1 Oct - Tadepani to Jhinu Dada
2 Oct - Jhinu Dada to Tolka
3 Oct - Tolka to Dhampus
4 Oct - Dhampus to Sarangkot
5 Oct - Paragliding to Pokhara
6-7 Oct - Pokhara to Kathmandu
8-10 Oct Kathmandu and home again
Our Nepal adventure was the most wonderful experience. This is part one of several.
It all started with a long haul flight. It's been so long since I've gone anywhere involving 15 hours' flying! First leg was Wellington to Sydney. Easy short flight with no issues. But we had a reasonable amount of time in Sydney in the departure lounge in transit. Our group formed a 'base camp' and some of us made forays into the shops for things while others read, chatted or dozed. We got to know one another a bit.
The next flight was a long one to Malaysia. And we got there in the middle of the night, so nothing was open apart from a cafe in one of the terminals. After trying out the train between the terminals, we settled into the cafe and "owned" that part of it with all 13 of us and our carry on luggage. This was a fairly lengthy stopover too. One of us (Frances) upgraded and had a bed to sleep in for the stopover. Others found a couch near the gate. But the three of us were so excited, we sat in the cafe and chatted away, making short trips to explore things. Toby found the juice bar and got one of those.
From here we caught our flight to Kathmandu and that flight was also quite long but passed relatively quickly. We saw Everest out the window so I was completely chuffed by that. Even if my holiday finished then - it had been worth it!
Well, we certainly knew we weren't in Kansas anymore as soon as we landed at Kathmandu airport. The hustle and bustle of an Asian airport, the heat, the sounds. All so different from Wellington. But it was all a wonderful experience for the three of us. Toby was knocked about by the flying. He slept for close to sixteen hours here at our accommodation. And then he was as right as rain.
David fell in his shower and broke his wrist - Expansion showed his amazing tour guide abilities by sorting out a hospital visit and subsequent operation. Poor David. He'd only been in the country 2 hours.
With Mike and Toby out for the count for the afternoon, I joined most of the group for a long walk to the monkey temple and back. I loved it. The street sights and sounds were so different to my senses. Steep stairs up. Monkeys. Huge birds of prey. A view that showed Kathmandu stretching out forever up the wide valley. Mountains shrouded in clouds along the sides - far away. Back for dinner to the accommodation and a grateful sleep.
Breakfast was scheduled for 7.30am and Mike suddenly woke me up saying we had overslept and had fifteen minutes to get ready. Toby sleepily said he was in his clothes so could he have five more minutes. I was so tired, I couldn't believe it was morning. But my brain was doing its thing and kicking in to wake me up. It must have been two minutes later when Mike said that it was actually 7:15am in New Zealand, and 1 a.m. in Kathmandu and we can go back to sleep. I found it hilarious and giggled myself back to sleep.
Anyway, eventually it got to 6 a.m. (on the 26th of September) and we got up. I had a quick shower. Our bathroom is among the most scummiest bathrooms I've ever used. Typical Asian functional bathroom, with mould covering most surfaces. Always humid. Nothing dries. The bathroom equivalent of a Petri dish. You don't really want to touch anything when you shower. The water comes out in a trickle. But a fairly forceful trickle. You need to stand right next to the wall. But not so close you touch it. Ha ha.
And nothing is dry so you can't keep your clean dry clothes in there to change into. So Toby has to look away while I change in the room. I made Mike hold up towels this morning. And this afternoon I made Mike and Toby go drink beer on the roof so I could come out into our room to change at my leisure. They were happy to comply with that one.
After the shower this morning we walked about 400m to the black olive cafe. Toby ordered the bacon breakfast. He was interested in the pancakes so I ordered them. But my pancakes were less than great. Well, I'm not a massive pancake fan anyway. I just wanted Toby to check them out for another time. He ate most of his meal. I was so pleased. Last night he only ate rice for dinner. The restaurant put on an amazing dinner. Dhal bat, chicken, vegetables, potatoes, rice. It was good! But Toby only ate rice. Mind you, he had only had three hours sleep and went back and slept for loads more hours, so possibly not many people would feel like eating lots when they were that tired.
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| Typical breakfast place - this is in Pokhara and is called Paradise |
The woman across from me at breakfast is staying at our hotel and knows our guide well. She's from San Francisco and is an oncology nurse. She's volunteered for a month here. This is her fourth trip to Nepal. She'll likely be doing general nursing, not oncology, as her specialty is harder to use in places like Nepal where access to cancer treatment is limited.
She really hates the way the IT young are ruining San Francisco. I heard all about that. She wants to buy a building in another state and move everyone she knows into it. A ten unit building costs 500k wherever she's looking and that wouldn't buy a scummy one bedroom place anymore in San Fran. She's disillusioned with western lifestyles. Greed featured a lot in her sentences.
I liked her. She's happy in herself, wants to help others and speaks her mind confidently. How could she know that I wasn't some redneck and would think she was some leftie liberal hippie? But she did reinforce the notion in me that the U.S. is a tough gig. There are things that are so much easier in New Zealand. Like living, really. Living is easier. I don't have to worry about access to health. I get decent holidays. My employer isn't freaky. I enjoyed the breakfast conversation.
After breakfast we started the walking tour. There are thirteen of us, but David is in hospital. I'm attaching the map of our walk. It's a screenshot of our walk. We walked very slowly and covered 7 km all up. It was a little like herding chickens. We saw quite a bit of earthquake damage. A massive tower fell killing 200 people. It was a special tower for tourism. There was bracing used everywhere to hold up existing buildings. Bit like Christchurch.
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| Walking tour |
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| Map of our walk in Kathmandu |
After lunch we bought a few things for trekking. I wanted more trekking pants. I tried a large pair on but one leg was smaller than the other. So the shop people got confused and got me xl to try. But they were like wearing sails! It was hard trying to get another large one to try on. Eventually I got another pair. Yay. Toby got some too. We're all sorted.
The women on the trip with us are good at shopping. I'm hopeless. But I did find something today. The scarves here look amazing, even to me. Silk, yak wool, pashminas. I might be tempted if I can follow another woman in our group perhaps. I think I missed the shopping gene. Mike and Toby went to buy a ghurka knife. They are both pleased with their purchase. Apparently a ghurka came to Scots to talk so Toby knew loads about it.
And now I've showered again and I'm clean and a little bit hungry for dinner in an hour. About to read quietly on my bed.
Mike and I are sharing a single bed. It worked quite well last night. It's hot so we started with just a sheet and when the 1 a.m. distraction happened, I noticed the sheet was gone and we just slept on top of the bed.
And that was our first day. Marvellous stuff. We haven't traveled as much in the past ten years since moving back to the southern hemisphere. And I quite like it, thank you very much. Toby is handling it really well. I'm hoping we don't get too sick or anything.
Tomorrow we bus to Pokhara. Then the next day we start trekking.
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| Our room in Kathmandu |
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