at the end of my last email, i think we were about to go for our third trek...we trekked the helambu area, which is pretty close to kathmandu...well, the start of the trek is close to kathmandu...this trek wasn't as high, or as long as our first, but it was still my favorite...there wasn't quite the variety of scenery, but it was still awesome...we saw soooooooo many farming terraces, each of which was farmed by hand...absolutely incredible...they went all the way up to about 2200m...each day was both physically and mentally challenging...rarely did this trek go flat...most of the time the ascents and descents were rather steep...this trek is less popular than other treks, we saw very few other trekkers during our time on the trails...it's also not marked like the other two treks we did...there were quite a few times we came to forks in the trail and had to decide where to go...most of the time both options looked equally good...several times during the 8 days we missed a turnoff and were lucky enough to run into a nice local person who sent us in the right direction...two of the days we spent 3/4 of our day without any clue as to where we were...it's a bit scary to walk through/over/around hills and valleys when you don't know where you are, and people can only communicate vague directions...
during one of my last days in kathmandu i went to the town of bhaktapur...waaaayyyy back when, during the days of the malla kings, the kathmandu valley was divided into three kingdoms...patan, (which i visited during our first few days in nepal,) kathmandu and bhaktapur...now they're all one giant area, but bhaktapur has held up the best in terms of what it used to be...there is almost no traffic in bhaktapur, it's much more pleasant to walk around than kathmandu...lots of temples, etc...two different guys decided they wanted to be my guide, w/out me asking for that service...one guy got the hint when i said i wanted to wander around on my own...the other guy, not so much...he kept telling me things, and showing me places in the town...i sat near one temple for over an hour and watched people, he even hung around for that!!! i knew he wanted money, and while he did take time out of his day for me, i knew he did it because he got to practice english, and was hoping for money from me...i didn't ask for it though...
another one of our last days in kathmandu we spent more than 5 hours total at the indian embassy...all waiting around, not doing anything...when they finally called our numbers, we were at the window for less than a couple minutes!!! getting a tourist visa to india involved going to the indian embassy a total of three different times...
we spent new years eve day in the village of lumbini...most of you have probably never heard of the place, unless you are buddhist...lumbini is where buddha was born...he was born as a prince...prince siddartha gautama, or something along those lines...just before he was born, someone prophesied to his father that he would be a great teacher or a great ruler...obviously, his father wanted him to be a great king, so he kept him in the palace, learning only the life of a ruler...i don't know why he left, but when he did, he saw the opposite side of life...the sick and the poor...eventually, in bodghaya, in india, under a tree, he found enlightenment...and thats how the "middle path" was born...anywho, in lumbini there is something now called the lumbini development zone...all the countries with strong buddhist histories were asked if they wanted to build a monastary there...nearly all of them did, even countries in which it is currently not a good thing to be a practicing buddhist...(like myanmar and china)...the monastaries in lumbini are big and ornate...another area to visit is the temple in which there is a rock that marks the exact spot where buddha was born...(how they know that for sure, i don't know...cause the rock was put there several hundred years later i think)...just outside this temple is a pool in which buddha's mom supposedly bathed before giving birth...again, how they would know that, i don't know...there are also remains of quite a few monastaries that were built and in use from the 3rd and 4th centuries BC to the 4th century AD...
the morning of new years day we got up early, and somehow managed to avoid all the cycle rickshaw drivers who wanted to take us to the border...they all said the bus wouldn't get us close, that we'd still have to walk 2km...the bus did get us close, we had to walk about 100m at most...we've learned not to trust distance measurements from anyone, as none of them are ever correct...(even signs during trekking shouldn't be trusted completely)...we officially left nepal, walked over the invisible line, then officially entered india...the immigration office in india was a completely open room...four men sat on one side of a table, drinking chai and reading newspapers...if someone hadn't pointed it out to us, we would have missed it completely...
after entering india, we got on a bus, and 30 hours later ended up in delhi...definitely a LONG bus ride, but not nearly as bad as either one of us expected...sure, we were stared at the whole time, but we're used to that...while talking to one guy who sat next to me for a while, i discovered that all of india's problems can be attributed to pakistan...he was also looking forward to obama becoming president:)
and so ends the saga of nepal...
Showing posts with label kathmandu. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kathmandu. Show all posts
03 January 2009
18 December 2008
nepal 3
IX. ANOTHER TREK the second trek we decided to do is called the langtang valley...it's much shorter, only 7-8 days, depending on how you do it...we took a bus to syabrubesi, stayed the night, and started the next morning...the first day was a 1000m climb (net)...it took us around 6 hours...there was a lot of up and down, quite a bit of it was steep, so we actually climbed more than 1000m...we climbed more than 1000m on the day...it was a relief to arrive at the "friendly guest house"...the next day was another 900m climb, this one much easier and faster...the third day was only 2 hours, though we knew it would be short...we were howeva, expecting three hours, and were quite surprised to come over a hill and see the village all of a sudden...we had been excited, as kyanjin gompa has a cheese factory...but because it's not high season anymore, it was closed...soooo disappointed...from our guesthouse we could see part of the langtang glacier, as well as two ridges in the himalayas...the kanja la himal, and i've forgotten the name of the other one...gorgeous...the fourth day we decided to stay in kyanjin gompa another day, and do a day hike...so we continued up the valley for three hours, and almost made it to seeing another glacier...by the time we got back, we could feel it in our legs...layna stepped into an icy river we had to cross, i can still imagine the cold!! the next day it was back down again, back to friendly guest house...(we skipped the village we had stayed in the night before first arriving in kyanjin gompa)...the 6th day we intended to descend 800m, then climb 600m to a village called thulo syaphru...but we didn't get to the turnoff until having been on the trail for more than four hours...i wasn't in the mindset to climb at that point...layna let me make the call, and we went to syabrubesi again...the following morning we walked back to that turnoff, and did the climb...steady, pretty steep for 3 hours...it was worth it though, the views of the valley were great...we could see how steep the langtang valley is, and appreciate the climbing and descending we had done earlier in the trek...that night there was a "jamboree" in the village of thulo syaphru...at least that was what the lady who owned our guest house called it...we had no idea what was going on, but it was great to watch...lots of singing...it seemed to move through the village, stopping in open areas in front of guesthouses...there was always a table in the middle of the area, and the same people lined up at the table each time...the men would sing, then the women...over and over and over again...they circled around a bit, and there were some men in some sort of costume beating drums and spinning around...the last day we walked to dhunche... during this trek we saw white monkeys, yay!! awesome to see animals in the wild...i've only seen monkeys in a zoo previously...well, there is a temple in kathmandu sometimes called the monkey temple because of the troop that lives around the area...but that's not really "wild"...those monkeys have figured out how to take food off visitors, they can even unwrap lollies!! this trek was cheaper than our first trek...because it wasn't as long, of course, and also because we didn't pay for our lodging 75% of the time...because we were trekking outside of high season, the people who run the lodges have a harder time getting people...they usually offered us a free room, and a bit of a discount on our food...(the food is where the lodges actually make any money)...not a huge amount, but still, it was nice...during this trek we also got our first taste of yak curd...SO GOOD...you all know i'm a huge fan of curd (yoghurt) in general, so i was happy to try it...the first time we had it, it had been made freshly that day, and was still warm...GOOD...the next morning, we had it again, from the same place, and it was still GOOD...the day we came back down the valley, from kyanjin gompa to the friendly guest house (in the village of lama hotel) we tried another place for yak curd...it was the best we had...AMAZING...i wish yak curd was available in more places, but i suppose it's best that it isn't...hee hee...the other food of interest we tried was a snickers momo...the owner of the lodge wrapped the snickers in pastry, and pan fried it...so when we got it, the snickers was melted inside the crust...heaven!!
X. "HOME" TO KATHMANDU we're now in kathmandu for the third time...we've done a few more errands, gotten permits and tomorrow will take off for our third trek...this morning we started the process for getting our indian tourist visas...it was my first time in the embassy of another country...lots of waiting around, (about 5 hours worth!...when they finally called our numbers, it only took a minute or so to do what needed to be done)...but oh well...we'll finish up the process when we return from this trek...we've stayed at the same hotel each time, they've gotten to know us pretty well...hee hee...they hold onto all our stuff we don't take with us, which is awesome...
X. "HOME" TO KATHMANDU we're now in kathmandu for the third time...we've done a few more errands, gotten permits and tomorrow will take off for our third trek...this morning we started the process for getting our indian tourist visas...it was my first time in the embassy of another country...lots of waiting around, (about 5 hours worth!...when they finally called our numbers, it only took a minute or so to do what needed to be done)...but oh well...we'll finish up the process when we return from this trek...we've stayed at the same hotel each time, they've gotten to know us pretty well...hee hee...they hold onto all our stuff we don't take with us, which is awesome...
05 December 2008
nepal 1
I. INTRODUCTION
layna and i met in germany, she moved there a year after i did, in june 2002...who knows exactly when we met, but it was sometime not too long afterward...one of her sisters had already been there a few years...layna is a graduate of texas a&m...she went to yell practice regularly, but wasn't often a 12th man...she's way more impressive than me, in that she put herself entirely through school by herself...(a side note, the sister already in garmisch is a UT graduate...or, as aggies call it, TU)
II. THE BEGINNING
our first trip together was while we were living in germany...purely by accident we both had the same few days off, and while we didn't know each other well at all, thought hey, lets go somewhere...so we went to the travel agent, and ended up going to turkey...at the time our visa cost more than our flight!! sometimes being an american sucks...anywho, we loved the trip, and found that we have similar traveling styles...our next trip together was to russia (moscow and st petersburg) with the sister i already mentioned...another great trip...
i left garmisch in march of 2004, then traveled for 7 weeks in southeast asia, (including visiting hana who was living in the philippines at the time)...that summer, i worked in seward, alaska, home of the seward army resort...sometime during that summer, layna and i hatched the plan for this trip...we thought hey, wouldn't it be cool if we spent a bunch of months budget traveling all over asia...we originally thought we'd start it in late october or november of 2006...obviously that didn't happen...for various reasons, each of us pushed it back a couple times, always knowing that we were still going to do it...and finally, about a year ago, we said YES, WE ARE GOING TO START IN NOVEMBER...
III. THE PLANNING
all these years, layna and i would email every few months, and check in, that yes, each of us is still up for the trip...each making preparations, but not really coordinating anything...it wasn't until just a couple months or so before we were supposed to start that we even started emailing weekly...hee hee...but yes, we did get it all together...tickets bought, gear bought, etc...it helped a lot that each of us knew people who had trekked in nepal, so we knew who to ask questions...
IV. THE MEETING
we agreed to meet in kathmandu...originally, layna had a ticket that had her arriving on 5 november...but that ticket had her transferring through india, and apparently you need a visa to do that, which she didnt know at the time...so she got stuck in new york, and had to buy another ticket...(don't worry, she got most of the first one refunded)...so she ended up arriving the same day i did, 6 november...she found me in the airport, and our hotel picked us up, so we were set to go...
V. MORE PLANNING
since our flights arrived in kathmandu in the early afternoon, we actually had part of the day with which to do things..we went straight to the travel agent (there are gbillions from which to choose) to figure out details for the trek we had chosen...the annapurna circuit...it's one of the most popular (along with the everest base camp trek) as well as the longest...we originally thought of doing the everest base camp trek, but had both changed our minds w/out telling each other, so it worked out well...we knew that we could do the trek ourselves, w/out a porter, and w/out a guide, and we didn't want to pay for them anywho...(though porters and guides make a VERY small amount of money for all that they do...still, what they make is considerably more than the average nepali)...we got our bus tickets, and necessary permits
the next couple days we checked out a few places in kathmandu, and stocked up on what we'd need for the trek...i had showed up w/out a hat, and w/out mittens...fortunately, that stuff is available here, by the truckload, and super cheap...if you're good at bargaining, you'll pay almost nothing...i'm not as good as i'd like to be, since i rarely have any idea what i should be paying for anything...
VI. THE TREK
we took a six hour bus ride from kathmandu to the town of besisahar...the only reason foreigners go to this town is to stay the night before they start the circuit...the day we were on the bus was in the middle of a few holidays, so there were a LOT of people getting on and off...it occured to us that it might be difficult to find a room in besisahar, but it wasn't...we stayed at hotel mongolia, for what we thought was the bargain rate of 500Rps...($1USD = 75NRps)...the view from the back of the hotel was pretty good...or so we thought...our room had it's own bathroom, and two single beds with very thin mattresses...that's it...oh, and a couple windows...but it was all we needed...
the next morning we were up and ready to go (we even ate breakfast) before 0700...we found a bus to take us a little way (7km) down the road to khudi, where we would start walking...the road was, well, um, not good...not sealed at all...when you looked at the bus we were on, you wouldn't have thought it was capable of anything off road...but it was...i don't know if it was actually 4WD, but it certainly was expected to behave that way...the bus driver definitely knew what he was doing...we got off in khudi, and started walking...our first checkpoint (there are police and tourist checkpoints all along the trek) was in the village after that, though i can't remember the name of it...the first hour and a half were pretty flat, and we were both thinking it wasn't going to be as hard as we thought...we had tea around 1000...not too long after we started walking again, we started going up...not too bad at first, but remember that i haven't hiked regularly, ever...still, we took it slow and steady, which would become our mantra as the trek went on...we arrived in bahundanda around 1400...
most of our days ended up having the same routine, give or take hours or minutes...wake up, lay around and daydream, eat breakfast, trek for 4-6 hours, arrive somewhere new, relax and look at the menu and try to decide what we wanted for dinner, eat dinner, go to bed around 2000...(yes, i know, that's early)...in general, the first half of the trek was mostly going up...and the second half was mostly going down...some days were difficult, some were easier...after just a few days, we were sleeping higher than i ever was during 2.5 years in korea...(the highest mountain in south korea is only about 2000m)...day 7 was difficult, as we took the upper route from pisang to manang...it has a pretty harsh climb, but the views for the rest of the day are totally worth it...it was a 7 hour day, and we arrived in manang tired and hungry...manang is a town at 3500m or so, and nearly everyone doing the trek spends two nights there instead of one, to acclimatize...most of the world never spends time at this height, but it's when altitude sickness starts to show...there are several bakeries in the town, of course we had to try the goods...never has apple pie looked so good:)...
the next difficult day was day 10...by far the most difficult of the trek...we spent the night in thorung phedi, at 4400m...the village consists of the two lodges for trekkers, (and porters/guides/etc) and that's it...most people go to bed very early, because you start the next morning in the dark...people eat breakfast around 0400-0430, and start up the mountain in the dark, at 0500...its neat to look up and see the line of head torch lights winding up the mountain...1000m later, (4.5 hours for us) we were at the top, the pass called thorung la...layna started the day with nausea, one of many symptoms of AMS, though she elected to try the climb anywho...as we climbed, she got worse, though she still carried on...at the top, there is a hut where quite a few people stop and have a cup of tea to celebrate where they are and what they've done...we didn't stop...we took the obligatory pictures by the sign, and started our way down...the last hour of the climb i had developed a headache, which i knew would go away as we descended...and it did...5.5 hours later, we arrived in muktinath, after a descent of 1600m+...my knees hurt a little, and my feet HURT A LOT...it was a long long LONG day, and we were exhausted...i was so tired that i kept kicking stones i should have been able to lift my feet over...we arrived around 1530, and stumbled into the mona lisa hotel...the next morning we decided to stay an extra day in muktinath, just because we could...(not having an itinerary is great)...there were a few things in muktinath that we wanted to see, and didn't have the energy when we arrived after the long day...we also used the rest day to rinse our clothes in the FREEZING COLD water...SO COLD...
then we continued going down...the next day we arrived in kagbeni, which has to be one of the windiest places ever...from the north side of kagbeni you can see into a tiny little area of the upper mustang region...we would have loved to go farther...there is a special permit fee to go there, a whopping $700USD...(birthday present for me next year? hee hee)...for a while, nepal has had 75 districts...for a number of years, one king ruled over 74 of them...another king ruled over the other one, known as the upper mustang region...i would love to see it someday...anywho, from kagbeni we continued on...this side of the trek has a road through a good portion, which isn't nearly as fun as the trail on the first half...plus, several of our days were much flatter...we weren't feeling the challenge nearly as much...but it was still amazing...the scenery was totally different, its much more desertlike...by this point, a 4 hour day was a breeze...we'd arrive somewhere and drop our packs and hike around whereva we were...
i don't remember the number of the day, but at some point we arrived in tatopani...the next day is a tough one, as you climb quite a lot again...after going down for days, it's definitely a shock to the system...tatopani itself means hot springs, and there are some right next to the town...there are also a few really good looking bakeries in the town...the next morning, we took off, and kept thinking "when do we start climbing?"...at some point, i looked at the map and realized we had missed the turnoff to the climb...whoops...so we walked back, found the turnoff, and started climbing...we only made half the climb, but that was okay...we slept the night at sikha, then continued the climb the next day, finishing at ghorepani...it actually worked out really well that we did the climb in two days instead of one...
the last morning, we got up in the dark again...ghorepani is at the bottom of what is known at poon hill...watching the sun rise from poon hill is great, so we figured, why not? again, climbing up in the dark with the line of lights from head torches...the sun rise was beautiful, and the perfect morning...cold, but awesome...we walked back down to the lodge, ate breakfast, and started going down even more...that last day we descended almost 2000m, down to the town of naya pul...from there we caught a bus (after saying no to a taxi who wanted WAY too much money) to pokhara...
one of our biggest concerns in doing the trek w/out a porter was how hard it would be to carry our packs each day...but our bodies adjusted surprisingly well...that's not to say it was easy, because it wasn't...but it wasn't as bad as we thought...and we didn't need a guide, except for the one time...hee hee...
layna and i met in germany, she moved there a year after i did, in june 2002...who knows exactly when we met, but it was sometime not too long afterward...one of her sisters had already been there a few years...layna is a graduate of texas a&m...she went to yell practice regularly, but wasn't often a 12th man...she's way more impressive than me, in that she put herself entirely through school by herself...(a side note, the sister already in garmisch is a UT graduate...or, as aggies call it, TU)
II. THE BEGINNING
our first trip together was while we were living in germany...purely by accident we both had the same few days off, and while we didn't know each other well at all, thought hey, lets go somewhere...so we went to the travel agent, and ended up going to turkey...at the time our visa cost more than our flight!! sometimes being an american sucks...anywho, we loved the trip, and found that we have similar traveling styles...our next trip together was to russia (moscow and st petersburg) with the sister i already mentioned...another great trip...
i left garmisch in march of 2004, then traveled for 7 weeks in southeast asia, (including visiting hana who was living in the philippines at the time)...that summer, i worked in seward, alaska, home of the seward army resort...sometime during that summer, layna and i hatched the plan for this trip...we thought hey, wouldn't it be cool if we spent a bunch of months budget traveling all over asia...we originally thought we'd start it in late october or november of 2006...obviously that didn't happen...for various reasons, each of us pushed it back a couple times, always knowing that we were still going to do it...and finally, about a year ago, we said YES, WE ARE GOING TO START IN NOVEMBER...
III. THE PLANNING
all these years, layna and i would email every few months, and check in, that yes, each of us is still up for the trip...each making preparations, but not really coordinating anything...it wasn't until just a couple months or so before we were supposed to start that we even started emailing weekly...hee hee...but yes, we did get it all together...tickets bought, gear bought, etc...it helped a lot that each of us knew people who had trekked in nepal, so we knew who to ask questions...
IV. THE MEETING
we agreed to meet in kathmandu...originally, layna had a ticket that had her arriving on 5 november...but that ticket had her transferring through india, and apparently you need a visa to do that, which she didnt know at the time...so she got stuck in new york, and had to buy another ticket...(don't worry, she got most of the first one refunded)...so she ended up arriving the same day i did, 6 november...she found me in the airport, and our hotel picked us up, so we were set to go...
V. MORE PLANNING
since our flights arrived in kathmandu in the early afternoon, we actually had part of the day with which to do things..we went straight to the travel agent (there are gbillions from which to choose) to figure out details for the trek we had chosen...the annapurna circuit...it's one of the most popular (along with the everest base camp trek) as well as the longest...we originally thought of doing the everest base camp trek, but had both changed our minds w/out telling each other, so it worked out well...we knew that we could do the trek ourselves, w/out a porter, and w/out a guide, and we didn't want to pay for them anywho...(though porters and guides make a VERY small amount of money for all that they do...still, what they make is considerably more than the average nepali)...we got our bus tickets, and necessary permits
the next couple days we checked out a few places in kathmandu, and stocked up on what we'd need for the trek...i had showed up w/out a hat, and w/out mittens...fortunately, that stuff is available here, by the truckload, and super cheap...if you're good at bargaining, you'll pay almost nothing...i'm not as good as i'd like to be, since i rarely have any idea what i should be paying for anything...
VI. THE TREK
we took a six hour bus ride from kathmandu to the town of besisahar...the only reason foreigners go to this town is to stay the night before they start the circuit...the day we were on the bus was in the middle of a few holidays, so there were a LOT of people getting on and off...it occured to us that it might be difficult to find a room in besisahar, but it wasn't...we stayed at hotel mongolia, for what we thought was the bargain rate of 500Rps...($1USD = 75NRps)...the view from the back of the hotel was pretty good...or so we thought...our room had it's own bathroom, and two single beds with very thin mattresses...that's it...oh, and a couple windows...but it was all we needed...
the next morning we were up and ready to go (we even ate breakfast) before 0700...we found a bus to take us a little way (7km) down the road to khudi, where we would start walking...the road was, well, um, not good...not sealed at all...when you looked at the bus we were on, you wouldn't have thought it was capable of anything off road...but it was...i don't know if it was actually 4WD, but it certainly was expected to behave that way...the bus driver definitely knew what he was doing...we got off in khudi, and started walking...our first checkpoint (there are police and tourist checkpoints all along the trek) was in the village after that, though i can't remember the name of it...the first hour and a half were pretty flat, and we were both thinking it wasn't going to be as hard as we thought...we had tea around 1000...not too long after we started walking again, we started going up...not too bad at first, but remember that i haven't hiked regularly, ever...still, we took it slow and steady, which would become our mantra as the trek went on...we arrived in bahundanda around 1400...
most of our days ended up having the same routine, give or take hours or minutes...wake up, lay around and daydream, eat breakfast, trek for 4-6 hours, arrive somewhere new, relax and look at the menu and try to decide what we wanted for dinner, eat dinner, go to bed around 2000...(yes, i know, that's early)...in general, the first half of the trek was mostly going up...and the second half was mostly going down...some days were difficult, some were easier...after just a few days, we were sleeping higher than i ever was during 2.5 years in korea...(the highest mountain in south korea is only about 2000m)...day 7 was difficult, as we took the upper route from pisang to manang...it has a pretty harsh climb, but the views for the rest of the day are totally worth it...it was a 7 hour day, and we arrived in manang tired and hungry...manang is a town at 3500m or so, and nearly everyone doing the trek spends two nights there instead of one, to acclimatize...most of the world never spends time at this height, but it's when altitude sickness starts to show...there are several bakeries in the town, of course we had to try the goods...never has apple pie looked so good:)...
the next difficult day was day 10...by far the most difficult of the trek...we spent the night in thorung phedi, at 4400m...the village consists of the two lodges for trekkers, (and porters/guides/etc) and that's it...most people go to bed very early, because you start the next morning in the dark...people eat breakfast around 0400-0430, and start up the mountain in the dark, at 0500...its neat to look up and see the line of head torch lights winding up the mountain...1000m later, (4.5 hours for us) we were at the top, the pass called thorung la...layna started the day with nausea, one of many symptoms of AMS, though she elected to try the climb anywho...as we climbed, she got worse, though she still carried on...at the top, there is a hut where quite a few people stop and have a cup of tea to celebrate where they are and what they've done...we didn't stop...we took the obligatory pictures by the sign, and started our way down...the last hour of the climb i had developed a headache, which i knew would go away as we descended...and it did...5.5 hours later, we arrived in muktinath, after a descent of 1600m+...my knees hurt a little, and my feet HURT A LOT...it was a long long LONG day, and we were exhausted...i was so tired that i kept kicking stones i should have been able to lift my feet over...we arrived around 1530, and stumbled into the mona lisa hotel...the next morning we decided to stay an extra day in muktinath, just because we could...(not having an itinerary is great)...there were a few things in muktinath that we wanted to see, and didn't have the energy when we arrived after the long day...we also used the rest day to rinse our clothes in the FREEZING COLD water...SO COLD...
then we continued going down...the next day we arrived in kagbeni, which has to be one of the windiest places ever...from the north side of kagbeni you can see into a tiny little area of the upper mustang region...we would have loved to go farther...there is a special permit fee to go there, a whopping $700USD...(birthday present for me next year? hee hee)...for a while, nepal has had 75 districts...for a number of years, one king ruled over 74 of them...another king ruled over the other one, known as the upper mustang region...i would love to see it someday...anywho, from kagbeni we continued on...this side of the trek has a road through a good portion, which isn't nearly as fun as the trail on the first half...plus, several of our days were much flatter...we weren't feeling the challenge nearly as much...but it was still amazing...the scenery was totally different, its much more desertlike...by this point, a 4 hour day was a breeze...we'd arrive somewhere and drop our packs and hike around whereva we were...
i don't remember the number of the day, but at some point we arrived in tatopani...the next day is a tough one, as you climb quite a lot again...after going down for days, it's definitely a shock to the system...tatopani itself means hot springs, and there are some right next to the town...there are also a few really good looking bakeries in the town...the next morning, we took off, and kept thinking "when do we start climbing?"...at some point, i looked at the map and realized we had missed the turnoff to the climb...whoops...so we walked back, found the turnoff, and started climbing...we only made half the climb, but that was okay...we slept the night at sikha, then continued the climb the next day, finishing at ghorepani...it actually worked out really well that we did the climb in two days instead of one...
the last morning, we got up in the dark again...ghorepani is at the bottom of what is known at poon hill...watching the sun rise from poon hill is great, so we figured, why not? again, climbing up in the dark with the line of lights from head torches...the sun rise was beautiful, and the perfect morning...cold, but awesome...we walked back down to the lodge, ate breakfast, and started going down even more...that last day we descended almost 2000m, down to the town of naya pul...from there we caught a bus (after saying no to a taxi who wanted WAY too much money) to pokhara...
one of our biggest concerns in doing the trek w/out a porter was how hard it would be to carry our packs each day...but our bodies adjusted surprisingly well...that's not to say it was easy, because it wasn't...but it wasn't as bad as we thought...and we didn't need a guide, except for the one time...hee hee...
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