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Nepal 10th October - 2nd November
Hi all - sorry taken a while to update the sight! Jen and I had an absolutely fantastic time in Nepal.
Arrived in Kathmandu met Jen at the airport and transfered to Shangri-La, Kathmandu - very posh 4/5 star hotel - our base for a few days prior to our trek. Great room with proper flushing toilet and a proper bath with HOT water - yay! Might sound normal but hadnt had hot water for a while! And proper sheets with towels that actually looked white! Also an outdoor pool and sauna and a posh restaurant - with prices too match! Nice to go posh for a while.
Kathmandu is a great city (some say mad, noisy and too much hassle) but after Indian cities its pretty calm. Many temples to look at and beautiful monasteries.
Got some great news whilst in Kathmandu - Naomi gave birth to my new bautiful nephew Thomas William - so that was such nice news before going on trek.
Chitwan National Park 12th - 15th October
Had a few days before going on our trek so headed to Chitwan national park - a jungle full of tigers, rhino, elephants and many other animals and birds - right on borders of Nepal/Indis - so hot
Great few days - jungle walk with a guide - saw the backside of a rhino - before it fled (we had had a talk before going into the jungle that if a rhino or tiger came near us - to run and climb a tree!) didnt need to worry as the rhino wasnt interested in us and no tigers around. Got to see some crazy monkeys and crocs though bתug out canoe ride along the river where we saw a few of kingfishers among other beautiful birds - so peaceful. ג
An elephant ride through the jungle was so much fun - and then we got to bathe with the elephants in the river - getting totally soaked by their trunks and thn getting dunked - so much fun and great being so close to such beautiful creatures - they are so calm.
Night in the jungle (in a tower) I was really scared as we had to go down the tower to use the loos (hoel in the floor) and was convinced i was going to get eaten by a tiger - everyone (including Jen) thought this was funny! Great fun sitting in pitch black listening to the very loud sounds of the jungle - and all the insects flying around.
No tigers or any other animlas were spotted all night! and no-one got eaten - but apparently i had been sleeping in a room (very basic) with a wasps nest in it! Luckily i didnt know.
Annapurna Sanctuary Trek 18th - 29th October
So this was the trek we had arranged months ago with a company called Mountain Kingdoms - 12 days, 12 clients, 9 porters and 4 guides.
Wow wow wow - what an amazing, stunning, brilliant trek. It was really hard going but worth every second of steep hills we climbed up and down.
Flew from Kathmandu to Pokhara and started our trek at a place called Dhampus Phedi - and after about 3 - 4 hours of steep climbing that afternoon i think most of us thought - are we on the right trek?!
It didnt get any easier but the scenery was breathtaking. We were assending each day and walking most days between 4 - 6 hours a day. The only thing with assending and the Himalayas is that there is no such thing as flat in fact there is a great saying - Nepali flat - little bit up, little bit down! Which is excactly what it is although little aint the word! To go up you always have to go down first.
Unfortunatley Jen hurt her knee after the second day so going down hill - was really painful - but she was very brave and didnt moan at all.
We walked through jungles, forests, crossed over some amazing wooden bridges, walked through gorgeous little villages, farm land, paddy fields and obvioulsy saw some amazing mountain views. Each day we were heading nearer and nearer to Annapurna base. We stayed in little tea houses - very basic with outdoor squat loos and only 2 hot showers in 12 days - hmmm nice! but bearing in mind these places were in the middle of the mountains - no roads they were very nice.
Our porteres were amazing - they carried our bags (2 kit bags each) (using their heads!) every day - always arriving earlier than us and on long days they would come back and help carry our day packs - they were absolute stars - and could not have done it without them.
Me and Jen were mainly at the back most days - whiuch was great as we got to take our time, enjoy the scenery, take loads of photos and chat to our guide - KC - who was brilliant - and apparently has won awards for being eth best guide in Nepal! He certianly knew his stuff and was very caring towards us and the porters - all local people from Pokhara area.
Although we nearly lost 1 porter - second to last day the porter carrring all the sleeping bags was stumbling along the track in front of us (normally way ahead as they usually left before us) he was drunk and not so steady on his feet. We asked our guide (big boss) if we could help carry his bags - but no no as that is definitely not the Nepali way. A few minutes later someone came running back to tell us a porter had fallen down the side of the mountain - OMG - he was so so lucky - a shear drop - luckily the sleeping bags we think stopped him falling all the way down - he struggled with a sore head and hurt his leg. So could have been a lot worse.
We reached Annapurna base camp (4130m above sea level) on 23rd October - wow wow wow - so amazing to get there - last couple days had been hard going - suffering slightly with altitude - shortness of breath and headaches - but how worth it it was. We reached the camp - and you are literally surrounded by some of the highest mountains in the world - Machapuchre (fishtail 6993m) Annapurna South (7219) Hiunchulli (6441m) and Annapurna 1 (8091m) it was absolutely stunning - breathtaking.
We stayed at the base camp the night and had an afternnon stroll! up higher to sleep low - to help altitude sickness. We reached the snow line at 4500m - brilliant.
The trek back over the next few days was a slightly different way so we headed down to go back up to reach a place called Poon Hill for a fantastic sunrise view of the other side of the same mountain range.
The whole trek was just brillliant - we had stunning blue skies every day - we met some lovely people and saw some amazing things - we walked with cows, buffalo, chickens, goats, sheep.
We got woken up every morning around 6am with wake up tea from the guides and then a warm bowl of water and more often than not great views of the mountains - we ate some great food - although mainly carbs - 'chips and rice' seemed to be the order of the day for lunch! and i even started drinking beer - Everest! well as we were in the himalayas it would be rude not too.
It was very sad to finish the trek - but i think our legs needed a break!
Unfortunately came back to the very very sad news that Dave has passed away - so im sorry Dave that you didnt get to read the next installment and laugh that i have started drinking beer!
If you are reading somewhere - Here's to a great friend and colleague and thankyou for all the great times - gonna miss you greatly but thankyou for the wonderful memories.
- comments
Chris Campbell Wow; you're so lucky! It's brought back some fond memories of trekking in the Khumbu region I did about four years ago. I also satyed at the Shangri-La (a fantastic feeling after the colder comforts of the Tea Lodges), and I just ADORED Kathmandu. I'd go back in a heartbeat, and the Annapurna circuit sounds ideal... Wow. Dave is sorely missed and he would have loved to hear about your travels. He'd want to wish you well with the rest of your adventures, too - and so do we all. So happy trekking, and I'll look forward to the next update! C.// X. PS - Everest beer is quite one thing, but stay off the Everest whisky... It's so cheap I suspect it will make us all blind...