Oh, the Places We'll Go

Wow, the tourist area of Kathmandu is insane! After spending weeks in the wilderness and small, somewhat sleepier towns, Kathmandu is a slap in the face. Cruising down the road in Thamel (the tourist ghetto), you are bombarded with hanging signs, and even walking becomes an obstacle course, choosing where to eat is overwhelming, and avoiding tour operators trying to sell you Everest Base Camp hikes requires athletic ability.

Tourist ghetto - Thamel

Bombardment by sign!

A little shopping

Most people arrive into Nepal through Kathmandu however, we were doing just the opposite. It is an excellent spot to arrange trekking, stock up on fake North Face gear and get ready to head into the wilderness, but we had already done that.

So for us, Kathmandu was a place to do laundry, catch up on email and eat yummy food. We overlapped with Dave and Jesse again for a few days, visiting the famous Monkey Temple which is an impressive stupa overlooking the whole city, and splurging on gigantic servings of dal bhat (typical Nepali food), for their last meal in the country. We also had a great meal with Ted’s friend and former boss John Watson from Colorado, who happened to be passing through at the same time (we actually planned to overlap for a night in Bandipur, but those damn strikes got in the way!). All and all, a nice and easy way to spend our last few days in Nepal.

The very long staircase to the Monkey Temple

Jesse low-fives a buddha

The only friggin monkey we saw at the "Monkey Temple"!

Swayambhunath - aka the Monkey Temple

The Kathmandu Valley, from Swayambhunath

Favorite picture from Swayambhunath

Between pre- and post-trekking and the Buddhism retreat, we spent nearly 2 weeks chillin in Pokhara – the longest of any place we’ve been to date. Though a bit overdeveloped in terms of tourism services, we really enjoyed taking advantage of the many activities and great restaurants in the town. Some highlights of our time here:

Growing trekking beards is a must when you’re on the trail, but when you get back to town, there are many barber shops ready to help you clean up. Dave and I couldn’t pass up the $2 shave (including post-shave massage!).

Pre-shave

Mid-shave

Post-shave face massage

Across the lake and up the hill from Pokhara’s Lakeside neighborhood (where we stayed), lies the Peace Pagoda.  We spent one hot morning hiking up and enjoying the views.

Phewa Tal Lake

Ride across Phewa Tal

World Peace Pagoda

World Peace Pagoda

It was a very hot day...

Gorgeous views

Some nice locals we met on the way back

While we had phenomenal weather on the trek, apparently it rained every afternoon in Pokhara. Upon returning, we witnessed the torrential downpour that fell at about 3:30 every afternoon. No big deal for us – we were busy eating and drinking our way through town. Hard rains just meant more beers!

pre-monsoon rains

Caught in the rain

We got caught too, here at a waterfall on the far side of town

We intended to leave Pokhara 2 days earlier than we did. But, somebody (well, probably a lot of somebodies) in Nepal was angry, and strikes were organized. Nepali strikes focus on freezing transportation, road blocks are put up, and cars that drive on strike days are likely to get stoned. Being stuck in Pokhara for a couple extra days ain’t all that bad though! We took the opportunity to rent some bikes, ride around the lake, and explore some of the neighboring communities.

Cruising the shores of Phewa Tal

We picked up a couple hitchhikers along the way

Bike riding on strike day

Potentially the best thing about Pokhara’s overly-developed tourism ghetto is the extensive options of delicious food. The best and cheapest pizza on the trip – Pokhara Pizza: $2. Our favorite local food (well, kinda local, the recipes were brought over by the exiled Tibetans) was undoubtedly momos – steamed or fried dumplings stuffed with veggies, potatoes, or meat. We ate lots of momos on the trek, but we really embraced these dumplings during MoMo Fest 2011, a tour of all the local momo shops in Pokhara. Read Jesse and Dave’s hilarious account of our momo progressive party here.

Pokhara pizza - best $2 we spent on the trip!

MoMo Fest 2011 begins!!

MoMo Fest 2011 continues!

Needless to say, Pokhara was good to us, and I’m certain that we’ll be back someday.

After returning from our hike, we exchanged contact info with our guide and new best friend Shiba with the promise to send potential clients his way and to stay in touch in general. As we were hanging around the town of Pokhara for a few more days, Shiba generously reached out and invited us to dinner at his home. Unfortunately Charles and Kate had already left, but Dave, Jesse, Ted and I happily accepted.

With Shiba once again as our navigator and translator, he was able to direct our taxi driver to his neighborhood. Shiba was there with his 3-year old daughter to meet us. His daughter set eyes on us for one second before bursting into tears. We were unable to win her over, even with Jesse’s tempting offer of sweet treats.

At Shiba’s home we met his mother, his wife and his newborn son. We happened to be visiting on Nepal’s version of Mother’s Day, so we hope they didn’t mind us crashing their celebration! Though Shiba’s English is excellent, neither his wife nor mother speak any English so smiles and handshakes made up the bulk of our communication with them.

Shiba and family

Shiba's little dude

Before we even arrived we knew were going to having dhal baat for dinner. While we were eating various forms of Western food on the Annapurna Circuit, Shiba was eating dal bhat. Dal bhat is the typical Nepali meal, eaten twice a day, every day. It consists of rice, dal (lentil curry), and usually a separate vegetable curry. When dal bhat is served in a restaurant, there are endless amount of refills, and this was the case at Shiba’s house too. We were served small portions of chicken as well as a glass of apple brandy, which were fancy touches for us guests. Awww, so sweet!

Dal bhat, eaten sitting on the floor Nepali-style

Apple brandy toast!

After dinner we showed Shiba and his family some of our favorite pictures from the hike, and presented him a small photo album we made as a keepsake of our trek and time together. It was the least we could do for a man that put up with the six of us for 10+ days in the mountains!

Dinner at Shiba’s was an absolute treat. A rare opportunity for most trekkers in Nepal, we felt honored to spend some time in a Nepali home with our new best friend and his family. If you ever plan to visit Nepal, let us know – we’ve got the best guide in the country already lined up!

Shiba - the Man, the Legend

Shiba, Martens, and Meshkovs

After a couple days of downhill walking, beautiful and arid landscapes, and splurging on new and exciting foods that we hadn’t seen along the trail, our time on the Annapurna Circuit came to an end. The village of Jomson is the main hub in the area and it is from here that you organize your transport back to civilization. The options include a $90 flight in a small plane that flies over Annapurna’s tallest peaks and gets you back to Pokhara in about 25 minutes. Or an assortment of 4 different buses and Jeep rides, taking 10+ hours, spread over 2 days that costs closer to $15. Please remember that the ‘roads’ are miserable – nearly all dirt, pot-holed, narrow, at times dangerous – and the transportation is uncomfortable at best.

The hike down to Jomsom

Very different, but equally stunning landscapes on this side of Thorong La Pass

Tiered irrgation in the desert

Vegetables on our pasta - what a novel concept!

For some reason, the guesthouse had an Ohio State t-shirt up. Charles was non-too-pleased

Seems like a pretty easy choice, huh? Unfortunately, when your traveling for a year dropping $180 for a 20-minute activity does not fit in the budget. And so it happened that our friends visiting from the States who were time-short and money-long opted for the plane flight while we and our fellow round-the-world trippers made the trip overland. As a reward for our misery, the village we stopped at overnight had hot springs that we happily soaked in and wicked views of an incredibly unreal peak.

Setting off on our bus journey

We wave goodbye to the flyers, and their new friend

Our bus ride back was rather spacious

Jealous

But we got to do this

And see this!

So take that Charles and Kate! Or rather, we just wish you would have taken us with you.

Our days and days of hiking along the Annapurna Circuit were inching us toward the big pass we had to get over. At 17769 feet (5416m), it’s definitely up there and the highest elevation most of our group members had ever climbed. We spent two nights in the village of Manang shortly before the pass to allow our bodies to acclimatize. We then had another two nights of sleeping at even higher altitude to get our bodies ready for the big day (including a night sleeping at nearly 16,000ft!).

The steep hike up to High Camp

Possibly the highest hotel in the world?

Unparelleled views from up here

In every direction

Prayer flags cover every peak

Though most of our group had mild headaches, and Chucky was fighting nausea, we set off for the pass from our guesthouse just before dawn. The darkness and wind made for a cold morning, but the rising sun bouncing light off the mountain tops and reflecting off the snow made for fantastic scenery.

Pre-dawn departure from High Camp

Pink peaks of sunrise

Sunrise shadows

Smile - we're almost at the top!

It's always a nice day when you're hiking above the clouds

The whole crew charges up the final steps

We arrived, with relative ease, at the top of the pass only a couple of hours later. Hooray for us! We celebrated with Snickers and Oreos while we took dozens of pictures at the prayer-flag-littered-summit-marker.

Bagged it!

Hugs from Shiba! Everybody got one!

Required boy-band photo

Since we were only 231 feet below 18,000 at the pass, the boys scaled an adjacent mountain just to make it up to this arbitrary altitude. The girls, not interested in hiking further uphill just to make it up to a round number, decided to stretch and laugh at the energy-wasting wasting endeavor.

Yup, that's them up there

According to Charles' watch, they made it

Smile, you're at 18k feet!

And then it was time to descend. Little did we know we had hours upon hours of downhill hiking in front of us that would prove to be more painful than anything we experienced going up (and would result in us limping for days). Over 1500 vertical feet down per hour, for 3.5 hours! However, ignorance was bliss and we were too busy celebrating and thinking about our beers at lunch to let such matters distract us at the pass!

The decent to Muktinath

And the beers we were waiting for!

What makes hiking in Nepal so unique is the concept of teahouse trekking. Few other places in the world can you set out on 3+ week backpacking trip and not have to camp and make your own food. Many of the trails throughout Nepal connect isolated villages to each other, and as trekking has become more and more popular, many Nepalis have converted their homes or built new guesthouses to accommodate international visitors.

This teahouse was brand new

Some teahouses have pretty spectacular views

A teahouse may sound quite lovely, however, the accommodation is very basic and it was always interesting to see where we’d end up. The quality and charm varied from place to place but in general we were getting a room with a double bed and a shared bath. By ‘bath’, I mean a squat toilet. A couple places had actual showers but most spots involved bucket hot water showers. That is, the teahouse owner heated hot water for us, put it in a bucket and then we used a cup to pour the water over our bodies to rinse off. When we got to high altitudes, the showers stopped for a few days as it was too cold for us to shower and required too much energy/logs for them to boil water at that altitude.

A typical room along the Circuit

The "toilet" left a little something to be desired

But the views didn't!

The food also varied in quality, but certainly not in options provided. Nearly every menu along the 11 day route was strikingly similar – some were completely identical. The major and featured foodstuffs included carbohydrates with a side of carbohydrates: fried noodles, fried rice, curries, potato in many forms (fried, baked, and our favorite, the Swiss rosti), eggs and momos. Momos are essentially dumplings stuffed with meat or veggie and they were our saving grace. Once in awhile a bigger village would have something wonderfully exciting that we hadn’t seen in days – like a sandwich – and we would be overwhelmed by our options and good fortune. But in general, our food selection (or lack thereof) was our running joke throughout meal times because nothing was particularly memorable or even appetizing after awhile. That being said, the food was hot, it was caloric and it was made by someone else so though we laughingly complained, we usually cleared our plates!

Lots of soups

Carb on carb action - Potato rosti with a side of mashed potatoes

Momos!

And of course, Dal Bhat - the Nepali meal of choice twice a day, everyday, for your entire life

But after a long day on the trail, it was somehow all delicious

Check out this amazing map created by our trekking partners, Jesse and Dave. Blue Pins are where we slept; Green Pins are places of interest; Forks & Knifes are where we ate, and the Blue Line is where we drove. Each pin has some information and a link to the post about that day. View Annapurna Circuit Trek in a larger map

Dave is a funny guy and a great photographer. Someday, he might be a great trekker as well. Check out his hilarious daily blog posts of our adventure across the Annapurna Circuit. Really, these are all worth reading.

• Actually, Yes. The Return of the Super Trek.
• Actually, Not. Freezing the Water Does Not Purify it (Annapurna Circuit, Day One)
• Actually, Not. Those Are Not Spices in My Curry. (Annapurna Circuit, Day Two)
• Actually, Yes. That is a Huge Steel Plate on My Back (Annapurna Circuit, Day Three)
• Actually, Not. We’ll pass on the optional afternoon hike in the middle of a 90 mile trek (Annapurna Circuit, Day Four)
• Actually, Yes. Mexican Food in Nepal? Same Same but Different (Annapurna Circuit, Day Five)
• Actually, Not. There’s No Resting on a Rest Day. (Annapurna Circuit, Day Six)
• Actually, Yes. It’s Freezing Up Here! (Annapurna Circuit, Day Seven)
• Actually, Yes. You Can Get Altitude Sickness When Hiking at 16,000 Feet (Annapurna Circuit, Day Eight)
• Actually, Yes. We Made It! (Annapurna Circuit Day Nine)
• Actually, Yes. The Pilgrims Are Stopping For Apple Brandy (Annapurna Circuit, Day Ten)
• Actually Yes. The Woman on My Lap is Car Sick. (Annapurna Circuit, Day Eleven)
• Actually Yes. They Can Carry Six Times Their Own Weight
• Actually Yes. This is the Last Post About the Annapurna Circuit (Annapurna Circuit Wrap-Up)

Our next 10 days involved nearly one hundred miles of beautiful, glorious mountain scenery. The weather was fantastic, our group was so much fun, our guide was amazing, and the variety of landscapes and trail was a treat. We walked through charming villages (and exchanged dozens of namastes with the adorable children), past hundreds of local porters transporting goods on their backs from village to village, over roaring rivers of glacial melt, along the sides of cliff edges, up steep switchbacks, down into picture-perfect valleys, and through all of this the Annapurnas continually graced us with their presence.

Gorgeous, or what?

Namaste!

Wicked peaks like we've never seen!

Lots of glaciers means turquoise glacial lakes

Our idyllic trip was made even easier and better with the help of our guide and porters. Each couple had a porter carrying their bag of gear so we were only schlepping our day pack on our backs. Our guide Shiba was exceptional and we learned a lot from him while having lot of fun. He took care of everything from picking our accommodation each night, helping us to order food, teaching us some Nepali words, filling our water bottles, taking our pictures and answering our millions of questions (How high is that peak? Tell me again which mountain is Annapurna IV? When will this uphill be over?). At the same time he was taking care of us, he also knew how to sit back and relax and hang out. He was a rockstar guide and we would happily recommend him to anyone who is headed to Nepal to do some trekking – Look him up! (email: trekkingnepal2001@yahoo.com)

Shiba!

Our porters, Sunkar, Mila, and Krishna

Shiba and the crew

After an amazing and trying 5 weeks in India, we were looking forward to heading to Nepal for a change of pace. We’d been told that Nepalese folks are much more chill and the pace of life is a welcome relief from the intensity of India. Indeed, there was a significant reduction in hassling and haggling immediately upon crossing the border. After two back-to-back days of 10+ hour bus rides on local transport (read – made for small people, dirty as all hell, lacking any sort of suspension) from Varanasi to the Nepal border and from the border to Pokhara, we were very happy to arrive. Not only were we happy to be getting off a bus in one of the most picturesque mountain towns in the world, but we were meeting up with some of our favorite old and new friends.

The Annapurna trekking crew unites at the North Face Inn

Our great friend Charles and his girlfriend Kate flew over from Colorado to meet us for some Himalayan hiking and we were so excited to see them. They earned the title as first non-family visitors on our trip and it was such a treat to arrive at our hostel and hear Charles’ booming laugh from the rooftop. And to make life even more fun, our fellow round-the-world trippers, Dave and Jesse, who we met in Argentina and rendez-vous’d with in South Africa also wanted in on the Annapurna action. Woohoo!

Hanging with Dave and Jesse by Pokhara's lake, Phewa Tal

Pokhara vistas with aptly named beer

We had a day in Pokhara to enjoy the overly-priced Western food and to purchase Chinese North Face knock-off gear and other supplies for our 10+ days of trekking in the mountains. We also met our guide to make sure we liked him and that he spoke English – we did and he did. Everything was in order and we were off!

One of the many rewards of traveling for an extended period of time are the small world encounters. With over 6 billion people on the planet, it’s a wonder that any random encounter 3000 miles from home could result in a shared connection. But miraculously, it happens, and it’s not that uncommon. Our two most striking small world encounters:

We’re on the last day of our Northern Circuit Safari in Tanzania at Lake Manyara National Park, in a rare moment outside the Land Rover, standing at the hippo pool. Another Land Rover pulls up, and a couple hops out and comes to stand next to us. An exchange of greetings identifies that we’re both from the US, and after a couple “where are you from” rounds, we come to find that we’ve grown up in cities within 50 miles of each other. We keep digging deeper, learning that they went to the same high school of many of our college friends, so for the hell of it, we throw out a few names of people we know from their high school:

Sarah: Do you know Katie Waller?

Katie C: I love Katie Waller!!

Sarah: No, I love Katie Waller!! Wait, who are you?

Katie C: Jim and Katie Constantine

Ted: As in, the brother of Lori Constantine?

Katie C: Yes!!

Wow, small world. Standing in front of us is the younger brother of one of our best friend’s best friend. At the hippo pool in Tanzania.

Crazy encounter with Michiganders

Our next encounter happened here in Udaipur, on one of the fabulous rooftops overlooking the lake. I’m looking over at this couple sitting a few tables away, trying to place why they look familiar. And then it comes to me. I walk over to them, and ask if they are from Barcelona (the one fact I remembered from our previous encounter). Yup it’s them, only 1/2 a world away. We first Montserrat and Aleix back in Bolivia, 6 months earlier on our salt flat tour. It was a short encounter, but they stuck out to me because they were Spaniards who looked like they were Swedish. 2 months after the Bolivia meet, we saw them again in Torres del Paine National Park in southern Chile. This 2^nd encounter was already pretty crazy, but within South America, it’s not unheard of to see people who are on the same general path. But 4 months after Chile, we had chosen different directions around the globe (us to Africa, them to Australia and New Zealand), we find each other sitting on the same rooftop in Udaipur, India. That is a crazy small world.

Spaniards on the right, us on the left, and random Israeli guy in the middle