This has been the one Kelsey (my Canadian roommate in Saudi) and I have been looking forward to since conception of the idea. Before going I had heard Nepal was many things: majestic, unreal, peaceful, beautiful, incredible, “you just have to go to understand.” Honestly even with such high expectations I was blown away by everything Nepal had to offer. Three weeks in Nepal was not nearly enough time, I will just have to return!
Kathmandu is a big busy city only at about 4500 feet. We were able to walk to many many Buddhist temples in the area where we stayed, Thamal district, kind of a little gathering of tourists, also kind of a hilarious place within the city. At any rate the temples were very intricate with people lighting candles, prayer flags strung everywhere, and marigolds dangling all over the place. People would go for their prayer and then have a red/orange chalk pressed on their foreheads for the rest of the day. I guess similar to ash in Catholicism. Even small kids had the red stamped on their foreheads and babies eyes’ were outlined with black charcoal to ward off evil spirits. You are meant to walk clockwise around the stupas at the Buddhist temples and you can spin the prayer wheels to have your worries blown to the wind, similar idea with the prayer flags. We didn’t see the Himalayas from Kathmandu because it was cloudy but we got caught in a rainstorm which was maybe even better! A really good downpour I was pretty excited to see good rain, maybe there was even a little rain dance! With no taxis available we just drank tea huddled inside a tiny shop and watched the rain and people go by!
We visited Chitwan National Park, a jungle in Nepal near the Indian border. We stayed on an island in the middle of the river where we had to ride a boat to get there and use gas lanterns at night to find our way! WE RODE ON AN ELEPHANT through the jungle! He was so steady and beautiful, a very lovely ride. Monkey’s were swinging in the trees and jumping between the branches. Crocodiles were bathing on the sand banks and all types of exotic birds were flying above. Even love birds that mate all their lives and fly around together and if one dies the partner commits suicide. We didn’t see a tiger but we saw evidence of them having been there recently! But we did see 2 Rhinos in the marshes! SO so big! It was lovely to sit on the river banks and drink wine while watching the monkey’s play by the water’s edge, so peaceful and lovely! And then the best part! Elephant bathing!!!! The elephants went down to the river and we rode on them while they splashed us with water!!!! They were also trained to roll their heads and dunk us down into the water! Oh so fuN!
After arriving in Pokhara and procuring our hiking permits, filling up on some good food we set out for what we thought might be a 10 day trek up to the Annapurna Sanctuary at the Annapurna base camp (ABC). Ahhhh!! So very exciting, hiking with the enormous majestic Himalayas as a backdrop, really, I don’t think it could get much better! Such a lucky life I do lead, no worries, I do realize this, and so very clearly on all these amazing adventures I’ve been having this year! So, on this hike you start at about 2,600 feet and after 4 days of hiking we arrived at the sanctuary above 13,500 feet. But strangely for such a drastic elevation gain it didn’t really feel like walking uphill for 4 days straight, there was a lot of up and down. I was just in awe of the beautiful scenery surrounding me! Really only pictures can explain how lovely this was. We stayed in tea houses, little lodges along the trail run by the local people. These places had fantastic views and super friendly accommodating hosts. So nice at the end of a long hike to come to a place where you can be in dry clothes and drink hot tea or hot chocolate (it was chilly, did I mention that?). Also so November is meant to be one of the clearest months weather-wise; however, I think because of the crazy weather in Thailand we ended up with a bit of cloud cover. This, for me, was actually amazing. Not only do I have a slight disliking for strong sunlight but I loved the mystical feel of walking in a cloud high near the Himalayas! The smokey clouds rolled in and lifted up to reveal craggy hillsides or left us to just look out to a sea of white cloud. We could watch them swirl around us! Uh just lovely!
Early on the fourth day we arrived to the Annapurna Santuary! It was thick with clouds and fog, so we sat around drinking hot drinks and reading, later sharing dinner and beers with other hikers. We all had high hopes to see the sanctuary in the morning. At 6am Kelsey woke up and said I’d better get out of bed…I have not moved that fast first thing in the morning maybe ever. What a sight!!! The sanctuary is like the bottom of a bowl completely surrounded, 360 degrees, by huge snowy Himalayan peaks rising over 26,000 feet. The clouds swirled, moved, and disappeared. The moon set behind one peak and the sun rose from behind another. Truly an experience!!! Annapurna I was the first mountain over 8000 feet to be climbed in 1950.
One of the many things I enjoyed about walking this trail was all the porters. They carry dauntingly huge loads in a basket suspended by a strap that is hooked to their forehead. Passing these guys (and actually a few ladies!) multiple times a day we’d greet with Nameste! Napali for “I salute you” or “the goddess within me appreciates and acknowledges the goddess within you.” Often they would mimic me and my high squeaky girl voice and I would hear them hustling down the trail squealing Nameste and giggling with each other! Sometimes I used pretend voices and they would mimic these as well, like a deep manly voice; once there was almost a contest to see which one of us could say it deeper and louder as we walked by! Even though they were carrying massive loads they were still so cheerful and happy! And also there are a ton of rules through porter protection organizations that set the weight maximum and hours of walking, but still these loads just seemed so large.
I did not expect to see such glorious fall foliage in the Nepal! This was definitely an added bonus and I think I felt the need to stop on multiple occasions to take copious pictures of the yellow fall leaves on the ground! I just loved seeing a season of change! My favorite!
On the return trip from the sanctuary we hit up the hot springs by the river for a well deserved soak and relaxation. The water was the most perfect warm temperature imaginable and the river rushing by made for such a great spot to spend a day relaxing! Quite a popular spot too! We ran into many folks we’d met up at base camp.
After this I went up to check out Poon Hill which is said to be the best view in Nepal. Which I just can’t believe this could have been determined, every view in Nepal is amazing. But from Poon Hill you can see the entirety of the Annapurna range of the Himalayas and onto the Dhaulagiri as well. It was meant to be a 2 day hike to arrive to Poon Hill but I ended up doing it one long day of up and down through forests and jungles and sleet, rain, and snow. At a few points I was lost, one of which I ended up going literally straight up a mountain on hands and feet. Always an adventure! Sitting in front of a wood burning fire at the end of the day was perfect! Also the guy that ran the lodge was really funny. He told me to stay there for 1 year or 2 or the rest of my life and teach him English, even though his English was perfect! I hiked up in the predawn darkness with half the people staying in the town to see this marvelous view. It was a clear night, but by the time the sun peaked out the clouds had rolled in. The clouds did part several times for a minute or two and it was actually startling every time the mountains would appear, yes there was cheering and loads of eeewwing and ahhhing (in several languages). Beautiful experience!
Back in Pokhara there was a lot of great food to experience and relaxing to be done after 9 days of tough hiking!! On the way back to Pokhara I rode with a guy from Nepal who told me now there is not as much snow on the mountains as there used to be pointing out the “black mountains” as he called them. He explained this was due to global warming. I did not expect to talk about climate change while on this trip. And actually I recently saw on the news a guy in Peru is noticing the same Black Mountain phenomenon caused by global warming and is painting the mountains white to reduce the temperature on the mountain, which is apparently working in this area of Peru.
Pokhara is a quarky town on the side of a big lake, Lake Fewa. We rowed out in a canoe, went biking, went out to catch another great sunrise (more eeewwing and ahhing, as if these people thought the sun would never see another day! But really it was magnificent!). We ran into folks we’d met on the trail and made new friends as well. Just a lot of relaxing!
At the end of the trip we went out of the main town of Pokhara to further become experts in the art of relaxation and spent a few days down with the birds and paragliders. We were in for Parahawking!! Kelsey had read about this guys’ Parahawking venture in Nepal in an in-flight magazine on her way back from Oman. Basically he’s rescued hawks and trained them to kind of guide paragliders to the warm thermal air that allows the bird, and thus also the paraglider, to soar effortlessly adrift in the sky! At first I was like “ok, Kelsey you crazy birder, ya let’s do it.” But really it was an awesomely amazing experience to fly with a bird of prey on my hand! Again pictures are the only way to describe it!
The populations of the birds of prey in Nepal are being significantly reduced, down to about 10% of the population 10 years ago. Basically the cow is sacred and so when the cow is nearing the end of their lives they will be given loads of antibiotics to help prolong their lives. Normally a small dose of antibiotics can be metabolized efficiently by the end of life but in this case since the doses are so high and the drugs are given up to death the meat retains high levels of antibiotics which is transferred to the birds when they eat the cow. The birds then die. There is an organization attempting to educate people about this phenomenon but it is difficult. The alternative drug that is safer for the birds is not as effective for the cow and is more expensive. Also since there are so many species of birds of prey in Nepal it is difficult to convince natives that even though it seems there are many birds flying around that in fact their populations are dwindling. Another organization sponsors a safe cow prey zone. They have a sanctuary for cows who are nearing end of life and do not give them the antibiotics and then when the cow dies they let the birds safely eat the cow…the best part is this place has a restaurant and you can go and watch the birds feast as you feast, oh the circle of life. Unfortunately, there was a cow that decided not to die until the day after we left Pokhara! Would have been a fun experience!
While in Nepal I read several books about the country to further my experience I suppose, trying to be cultured, or something. Two of these books had to do with human trafficking. A friend of Kelsey’s who works in Kathmandu works for an organization to recover girls who are sold into the sex trade and to prevent them from getting into it in the first place. And then when I got home I realized CNN Hero’s, a program to end modern day slavery, had highlighted a story last year about a woman, Anuradha Koirala, in Nepal who has saved 12,000 thousand girls from trafficking. This woman actually won the CNN Hero of 2010 award. So there is a huge problem of human trafficking, kids being sold into the sex trade or slave labor. Worldwide there is thought to be 10-30 million people kept as slaves, and about 10-20,000 in America alone. Many of these families are offered what to them may be a lot of money or promised that their child is going to get a better education and opportunities but are sold and tortured and treated like property. The way it seems most NGOs try to prevent this is through education. Educate the girls and the families about what is really going on. The child is not going to get an education by going with a trafficker. Also these organizations train the girls in a skill (sewing, basket making, etc) where they can earn a living that way. And then some of the organizations give money directly to the families so the girls can go to school without having to rely on the traffickers’ promises of education or money. But it is obviously a huge problem still and an extremely difficult cycle to break.
During the three weeks we met a lady from America who works for a group of lawyers in Calcutta, India who deal with several different types of human rights violations, human trafficking being one of them. Actually we met several interesting people along our journey. Another American/Isreali had been working in international development in Jordan and was going to move back to Boston to start a job as a lawyer. Actually we met several people also with Middle East ties. At the airport we met a group of western teachers working in Abu Dhabi, UAE who were on break from school and vacationing in Nepal. Later we met a mother and her 6 year old son who were living in Doha, Qatar as expats from Canada. This kid thoroughly entertained us with his constant banter during a long bus ride! I met a woman from Scotland who had lived in Dammam, Saudi Arabia for 8 years as a child of a ship builder. She also lived in Durban, South Africa; and Tehran. She said she enjoyed Tehran most of all and actually was sent into culture shock when in high school she was sent to a UK boarding school having never actually lived in the UK. She is an environmental lawyer whose company recently experienced a downsize leaving her free and clear to travel the world and volunteer as she pleases for the next year. We met a dready guy from Israel who has been traveling for 3 years and working on his photography, a sort of portrait of beautiful landscapes. And actually another guy from Isreal who Kelsey and I were scared to even bring up the fact that we were living in Saudi Arabia. But we did eventually and they talked about being in the Israeli Armed forces. It sounded neither of them believed in what they were being forced to take part in. I met one guy from Lake Oswego (a town outside of Portland). We met loads of speedy hilarious German hikers! Two of which we spent some time with at A.B.C. drinking beer and checking out pictures on their IPAD from an outing with their friends who all were fully clad in lederhosen and dirndl meanwhile these guys were jokingly trying to convince us that this was portraying a typical day in Germany. We met a guy from Columbia with an obvious zest for life and beautiful experiences who was traveling after completing a masters in Australia. We made a friend from Wales who had worked in Australia and after leaving this country as a foreigner he received payback of all the taxes that he had paid on wages so he’s been traveling Asia for 6 months surfing, diving, boxing, hiking, yoga/meditating, fire dancing, and having a pretty good time. One Scotsman said he’d never eat eggs because it was disgusting to eat a chicken period but he raved about his love for Black Pudding (cow innards cooked with blood or something, also I just looked it up on the truthnet and now feel sick to my stomach!). I met a guy from Croatia who was a young kid during the revolution in Croatia when it broke away from the Soviet Union and he said it was kind of fun for a young boy to be caught in the revolution, feeling blissfully unconnected to the dangers of war until his dad was taken hostage for a short time and they had to flee the country. So ya, we met some interesting people!
Whew, after thinking about this whole trip and being able to digest my experience a bit further I am just so thankful for this experience and all my experiences and adventures! Always a chance to learn something new and interesting! I shall return to Nepal someday!
