Adventures in Nepal

Kathmandu turned out to be my favourite city yet visited on this trip. There was so much to see and do, yet also lots of bars, cheap resteraunts and bearable accomadation. The 5 of us got to a guesthouse in Thamel, the backpacker area of Kathmandu, and me Neil and Paul got a room between us, paying the equivalent of 70p a night. We spent 5 days in Kathmandu in the end. We visited the Monkey temple, a buddhist stupa famous for the many monkeys loitering there, as well as Boudha stupa, a huge building that looks like a cross between a temple and a gigantic laser beam. We also visited Kathmandus durbar square; the royal courtyard full of temples. However, even just walking round the streets of Kathmandu, you would always come across an interesting temple, stupa, statue or old Newari style house. There was also lots of shops selling very very cheap North Face gear, as well as Tibetan objects and Gurkha Knifes. The bars were great and often had loud live music and cheap beer. There was also Cheers Bar next to our hotel, which would put on pirate DVDs in the evenings. I could have spent a month there easily. However, after 5 days I left for Besisahar, the start of the Annapurna circuit, whilst the others left for Pokhara to do some rafting (I was tempted to go, but was not sure how long the Annapurna circuit would take, and was not sure if I had time - in hindsight, I did). My last day in Kathmandu I got some mild food poisoning from a bad chicken chow mein, and spent the night being sick, not a great start for the trek. I had left my big backpack and guitar at the guesthouse in Kathmandu, and carried only my small backpack for the trek; that contained a change of clothes, waterproof gear, hat and gloves, first aid kit, toiletries, map, guidebook, wallet, torch and emergency space blanket. And a towel, which was the most important item. The trek was over 300 km, and reached a high point of 5416m at the Thorung La Pass; the guidebook advised 14-16 days to do it in. The first day, I walked the distance the guidebook recommended, still ill, and got to my destination, a village called Bahundanda, at 1.00pm. It thunderstormed for the rest of the afternoon. The next day, I got to that days destination (according to the LP guide) by 10.00 am, so continued on and did almost 2 days in 1. The terrain was getting more and more spectacular with every gorge I turned into and every mountain pass I trekked on. I went through pine forests and passed raging rivers, I saw the worlds 8th highest mountain. This was all incredible. The storm had taken all the dust out of the air so the views were superb. I was also, despite my fears of being unfit, doing far more then the guidebook thought doable at a faster pace, overtaking the other trekkers I saw. I got to Manang at just over 3000 m after 5 days and spent a day acclimatising there, and watched Slumdog Millionaire at a ver basic cinema, which consisted of a projector, some pirate DVDs and a man giving free Popcorn and cups of tea. From Manang, I walked to the next town at 4000m, from here I spent a day going up 1400m to the Thorung La pass and down 1600m to the next town. This day was arduous but also one of my favourites, there was a real sense of schievment getting to the snow covered top, surrounded by swirling prayer flags, huge cairns and great views. The remaining part of the walk to Naya Pul should have taken 7 days but I pushed myself to do it in 3, including walking 32 miles one day. This was not all downhill either, on the 2nd day I ascended up to Ghorapani, a climb of 1500 m, more then the day I climbed to the Thorung La! Finishing the trek was amazing, I had done it in 10 days (including one acclimatisation day) and felt ready for a good rest. I met some great people on the trek as well, whilst I usually walked alone (so I could go at my own pace) the lodges themselves were really social places where everyone relaxed after a hard days trekking with a cold beer and hot food. After the trek, I took a bus to Pokhara.

Pokhara was very very chilled out, like the Nepalese version of a cross between Varkala and Pushkar. It was a town by a lake, with lots of bars, cafes and cheap accomadation, as well as very little traffic. I checked into a dorm, and met a canadian girl who introduced me to some aussies that were in Pokhara. I also met Paul who was in the dorm next door coincedentally, the others had gone trekking but he had stayed and so I spent a lot of time over outside that dorm drinking and playing an Irish guys guitar he had brought (mine was still in Kathmandu). I spent 4 or 5 days in Pokhara, but really didn't do much, I played poker quite a bit, drunk a lot, celebrated Nepalese New Year (2066! I was in the 60's....) and slept. I felt I had earned it after my trekking. I am still on a net profit from my efforts at Poker over the course of travelling, so its all good.

After Pokhara, I went to Royal Chitwan Park, a national park in the Terai area of Nepal. I did an elephant safari (riding on a howdah), slept overnight in a watchtower in the jungle, and canoed down the river there. I saw 10 Rhinos, a Marsh Mugger, lots of wild boar, deers and elephants, but no TIgers or Leapoards unfortunately. I also swam in a river with a herd of elephants, I rode into the river on one whilst it squirted water at me with its trunk, then I jumped off and swam around for a bit, clambering on and off the elephants. It was amazingly fun, one of the best things I did in Nepal. After a few days in Chitwan, I left for India. I met some other travellers on the bus to the border, one an Aussie called Kate. The two of us were the only ones going to India that day so we took a bus from Sunauli (the town at the border) to Gorakhpur, which I can safely describe as a hole. We both went to get Indian currency out of an ATM (we were using Nepalese before) only to find none of the ATMs accepted Kates card, despite the fact that she had been travelling in India before Nepal for 2 months. I was going to go to Varanasi that night, but ended up staying to help her out, as she had no money at that point. It took us a day to sort it out, none of the cyber cafes had skype headphones to contact her bank (and none of the electrical stores) and the payphones were to expensive, as the bank kept on putting her on hold for ages. Eventually, around midday the next day we persuaded the bank to let us use its phone for free, and got the problem solved (the card had been flagged for visiting too many countries). That left us free to move on, which was a great relief as Gorakhpur had nothing in it at all. We arrived in Delhi, which is where I am now. Kate has gone to Rishikesh, and I have an overnight train to Mumbai later on this afternoon. On the 28th April (5 days) I have a flight from Mumbai to Bangkok, and am very excited about leaving the Indian Subcontinent to start my travels in South East Asia!!!