To Nepal

The start of our Nepal 2019 adventure! Watch this space, I'll post more as I type days in from my diary.

Day 0-1 - Wellington-Auckland-Guangzhou-Kathmandu

Familiarity breeds taking things for granted. It was Saturday, we were leaving around 4pm, and I hadn't started to pack. But it was ok; everything I needed was in the garage and I knew what to bring.

After a fruitless forage through the garage, my "To do" list was now my "Buy in Nepal" list.

Still, 4pm saw me ready and packed. (Angela had packed a week ago of course.) We said goodbye to Toby who showed the correct amount of sadness at missing us and assured us he would be fine by himself for the next week.


Uneventful trip to the airport and to Auckland. We saw a woman in a green fleece on our flight - she looks like the sort of person who could be going to Nepal, I thought.

China Southern were pretty good to fly with, but very Chinese. First time I've flown an international airline that felt properly foreign instead of international. They hadn't got the vegetarian memo so I ate lots of chicken and Angela ate lots of rice. I still had to eat the beans and carrots though.

Guangzhou Airport was quite a revelation. Very strict transit security with ongoing visa checks, body searches and new rules (they took my battery power pack because it didn't have a capacity written on it). Airport itself was gleaming and immaculate and huge - but shops disappointing. Do Duty Free elsewhere. Food was challengingly local and told you in English exactly what part of the duck they'd fried or boiled. Meat eating Angela would have loved it. Vege Angela not so much. We found a juice bar and a cafe with coffee and croissants.

Sunrise over Guangzhou Airport. Angela says it should be just a shed since that's what she remembers from 1987.

What I forgot

• Read and prep. Be ready to do stuff myself and not rely as much on others. As a 3 trip veteran I should be leading or helping, not following.
• Maps of Kathmandu, Annapurna, Nepal. Be ready to take others on the walk from Thamel to Kathmandu Durbar Square and back. Be able to navigate on the trek and have situational awareness.
• Lonely Planet. Lots of good background in there that's not so easy to find in one place.
• Good First Aid kit with meds. Antibiotics, antiseptic cream and mosquito repellent were the things I was missing.
• Supermarket bags Dry bags. They're essential for organising stuff. I discovered that dry bags are cheap in Nepal, around USD 5 each, and they're a great, permanent alternative to supermarket bags.
• Gifts for kids. Grab a box of sample toothbrushes/toothpastes from your dentist. Grab pencils, pens and paper from the Warehouse.
• Good compact camera. My phone didn't cut it but we decided the DSLR plus lenses wasn't worth the weight, and the hassle to unpack/repack and keep dry. Ideal camera would be: light, waterproof, good optical telephoto zoom, not need recharge/runs on AAs, have bluetooth.
• Hooks for over the bedroom door. Not enough hooks in the guesthouses for hanging wet stuff!
• Paracord or string - as well as duct tape for running repairs
• Power pack. We had no electricity (or wifi) for several days so both our phones ran down. So no strava, no camera, no kindle. Only a problem because of the weather, most guesthouses have solar electricity - but no sun meant no power. But also much easier to keep the power pack topped off and recharge devices in your room or backpack (while still using them).
• Local SIM? USD 15 for the month with several GB data. Wifi was adequate for messenger and email most places but pretty unreliable. Local mobile data is faster and more reliable.

The Guangzhou-Kathmandu flight was uneventful - we were split seated but there was vege food so Angela was happy. No window seats but it was cloudy the whole time so no mountain views anyway.

Kathmandu arrivals was the familiar chaos with queues everywhere and no rhyme or reason. We eventually figured out the rules:

1. Fill out a paper visa application (with passport photo) in advance - or queue to use the electronic kiosks  in arrivals when you get to the airport.
2. Queue to pay the visa fee. USD 30 for 15 days or USD 40 for 30 days (as at 2019). Bring USD or other foreign currency in smallish bills. They saw my AUD and asked for them instead because my visa was AUD 47 which meant less change to have to give out.
3. Queue for immigration with your visa form and your payment receipt.
4. Go through arrivals security (why? No clue) and collect your bags.
5. Landside! Be ready to politely fend off helpful people, or tip them with USD1 bills when you don't.

Great to see Expansion again! We waited a short time to collect Jeanette, our third trekker. Surprise surprise, she was the woman in the green fleece I'd seen back in Wellington. She had popped up in all the transit lounges too so my suspicions were confirmed. After the usual busy drive to our hotel - now renamed to Hotel Jampa, under new management, expanded into the next building and renovated - we went on a short stroll with Jeanette to see the sights. Went back to our hotel room to 'read' and fell asleep. Bad move. Luckily Angela woke up just in time.

Spoilers: One of the only times we see mountains with blue skies

Met our new crew, out to Alchemy Pizzeria for dinner. Back to our room and crashed. Slept really well apart from the first of several 'least scary nightmares ever' I had in Nepal. Tonight - Toby being by himself had adopted another kitten.  Pretty tame stuff compared to could go wrong this week...