Wow! So loving Nepal! Especially after my "woe is me" story back in Delhi, Nepal has been a completely different experience. We arrived at Delhi airport with plenty of time to spare.
We then boarded our plane for Nepal... we started to get closer to Nepal when we started to see the outline of the Himalayas. It was the oddest feeling I've had, I was in absolute awe of the Himalayan range, the immensity of it totally overwhelmed me and I had to turn away many times to get to grips with what I was seeing. It was a beautiful and strangely fear inspiring sensation that came over me, one of the most spectacular sights in the world! The only thing that marred it was the amount of pollution in the air! Surprising as the first thing that I think of when it comes to the Himalayas is pristine conditions. In actuality, the city of Kathmandu is extremely polluted, and as we descended there was a huge fog of pollution all around us.
When we arrived, our experience of security was a polar opposite to what we went through in Delhi. The arrival section was very simple and clean. It was lovely to come out of the arrivals section to see our name in huge letters being held up by Bhola, our tour guide with Himalaya Envpro. We've been battling through India on our own, so it was lovely to be greeted and carted away from a million taxi drivers wanting to whisk us to away to who knows which hotel!
Bhola helped us settle in to a lovely clean hotel (Hotel Moonlight) and we went around Kathmandu in the Thamel district. Again... I had a totally different perception of Kathmandu, I expected a sort of "Shangri-La" kind of experience, or a large village feel. Kathmandu is fairly modern in it's thinking, different to India! One thing I learnt and wept about was that you can buy anything, and I mean ANYTHING you want from Kathmandu. We bought quite a bit of out trekking gear back in Australia. There are dozens of shops here that sell jackets, trekking boots , pants, walking rods, backpacks at a fraction of the price that we paid in Australia. Pretty good quality too! Also, a few supermarkets that sell food products from around the world. For example, I bought an American Hershey's bar of chocolate for our journey (darn good stuff too!).
We did a bit of sightseeing of Kathmandu the next day.... taken through the usual gamut of temples, shrines, etc... we've had quite enough of that, so we were taken back to our hotel. Was able to Skype mum, dad and Ruth back in Sydney. So good to see and talk to them! Gave me a boost and encouraged me onwards.
We were taken to Nepal's domestic airport the next morning for our flight to Pokhara to begin our six day trek. What an adventure of a lifetime! To summarise our experience (please note that I've probably spelt our destinations incorrectly):
Day 1 - Greeted by our guide, Mr Kumar, and taken by a kamikaze taxi driver up some windy turns to the top, Nayapul. There we met our porter. Now, I've already written how Davey and I always have this probability factor that we always get the "unusual" side of the stick... well, it happened again. This time, when we met our porter, she ended up being a lady, her name being Kanchi. The only one I saw on the trek the entire way! I have to say that my guilt factor in getting her to carry our 20 kilo luggage was extremely high the entire time. Whenever I got tired and needed to rest, she'd lug our belongings past us. She was incredible, though, and I have a great deal of respect for Kanchi. She is no longer married and is caring for her 10 year old son on her own... for her to do such work is amazing to say the least. Had lunch at Birethanti and then onwards and upwards to Thikedungha at 1,470 mtrs above sea level. Such a beautiful little teahouse! Simple rooms with a bed a window and a small table, but very clean. We had the stream running behind us that we could hear all night long, lulling us to sleep.
Day 2 - the most strenuous part of our trip. We had a six hour trek up to Ghorepani at roughly 2,900 mtrs above sea level. Freezing cold outside but we had a lovely fireplace and hot water showers. Snowy mountain views from our bedroom window, and rhododendron trees all in bloom around us.
Day 3 - woke up at 4.30 am in the morning for our hours ascent trek up to Poon Hill to observe the sun rise over the Himalayan mountains at 6.00 (3,210 mtrs above sea level). Wow! Very spectacular! The mountains were looming all around us! Davey says it's like we climbed Everest, being on top of the world! We're actually planning on seeing Everest by a joyflight for an hour. We plan on telling people casually and oh so cooly "yeah, we've done Everest" and leave it to them to imagine that we've trekked up to base camp! :p shhhh, just don't tell anyone, though.
We then trekked onwards to Tadapani, once again, spectacular views of the snow capped mountain ranges and blooming trees all around. Lovely stay at the teahouse with a Nepalese family. the people here are so welcoming and friendly! They make you feel a part of their family all at once, extremely hospitable. We were invited to sit with the family and other tour guides as they played the "matar". Our guide, Mr Kumar, is extremely talented and produced amazing beats from this double sided drum that sits on the knees. They played Nepalese folk songs and invited Davey to dance! Needless to say, hilarity ensued! Davey did his infamous "Ravey Davey" routine and other guides jumped up and joined him! We were all in hysterics to see them jumping and dancing around! The family's eight year old boy also got up. Mr Personality himself! Fun night.
Day 4 - From Tadapani, we went down to Jhinu. We deviated from our original course set as part of our journey was meant to take us to a monastery, which we've seen quite enough of. We heard along the trek of hot water springs and our guide, Mr Kumar, made arrangements for us to visit! I was still sick from Delhi Belly and finally started taking antibiotics after much resistance. The ground was also very difficult to descend as much of it was easy to slip down, so I slowly made my way down and it ended up being one my hardest days. We also jumped over many fences and if it weren't for Mr Kumar, we definitely would have lost our way many times as the path was always that discernable. However, we made it! And, boy, was it worth the effort! Another half an hour down got us to the hot springs. There were pipes that dropped over Himalayan rocks where we bathed and washed our clothes. There were three separate pools to relax in, all the while the river was raging past us! Davey and I also decided to dunk into the freezing river for, well I don't know, pure nuttiness! It was like being pricked all over with pins and needles when we jumped back into the hot spring pool! We then had a lovely view of the mountains in the evening while enjoying a glass of rakhsi (local moonshine made from millet). Met Lydia & Jan from Holland... they have been on a working holiday for the past year all around the world. They'll be capping it off with two months in India. What a life!
Day 5 - one of the most unexpected loveliest treks we have done so far! All the treks we have done have been filled with lots of other trekkers... we all want our own private slice of the Himalayan treks to ourselves, I guess, so it was lovely that we went through a track that no-one else usually goes through. No teahouses every half hour, no guest places, only little local villages and lovely corn and wheat fields with amazing views. We tr5ekked to Ghandruk, quite a large village! Davey asked about somewhere to swim and the locals told us that there was a dam called Bijuli Pokhari that only the local boys would visit. It provides hydroelectricity for the entire village! The gur must have thought we were nuts when he realised that we were serious about visiting it, because he said that it was like going into a freezer! Nevertheless, Davey and I must really enjoy tormenting ourselves as we got a mudmap and made our way up there and were told that it was easy to get there, telling Mr Kumar just to rest for the afternoon as we'd have no problems getting there. Famous last words. We made so many wrong turns, retracing our steps, wondering if the goat track that diverged in three different directions was the correct path, if Mr Kumar would send a search party for us, if we could follow our way back down, getting yelled at by a goatboy on the opposite hill (???)... basically pandemonium the entire way up! We did eventually stumble upon it like it was Brigadoon! It was a gorgeous huge pool of water set in concrete and we jumped in! This time no hot water springs to warm us up and we were yelling and jumping up and down like madmen for a full five minutes! But it was exhilarating! And it was beautiful.
Day 6 - our final day, we talked quite a bit with Camilla & Ulrika from Sweden, lovely girls! A real ray of sunshine... it's been incredible meeting with other people from around the world. .. strangely the only other aussies we've met were a family from Adelaide... but Adelaideans don't really count as they're in a league of their own, hey :p The trek was uneventful and busier as we made our way back to Birethanti. We all went, porter, guide and us, once more down the windy treks to Pokhara where we were dropped off to our hotel. We enjoyed the best brownie and organic coffee that I've ever had! Wanting to go back for more!
Today is the day after the trek and we've done a bit of sightseeing around Pokhara... the highlight being Devi's falls (quite spectacular naturally :P) and relaxing, trying to ctch up with postcard writing and so forth. Tomorrow we go for two days white water rafting, camping on the beach overnight. w00t w00t!
Thanks again for all your comments! Davey and I love reading them, makes me feel like my rambling on must have something in them! I've posted a whole heap of photos and will try to tag them with descriptions... my favourite being the three Nepalese children in Ghandruk... check out the littlest of them... her nose is a classic!
