I have always wanted to visit
Nepal, ever since I was a really little kid, and in October I got to do just
that with my boyfriend Adam.
Two weeks wasn’t long enough to
do everything we wanted, but with careful planning and research, and a bit of
luck in the forms of the people we met, we were able to create a pretty good
itinerary with a mixture of culture, nature and adventure.
To fit in with the other plans, the trek we decided on
was a 4 day Teahouse Trek in the Annapurna Conservation Area. Deepak, a chap
from our budget hotel, helped us to organise everything. We also decided to use
a guide to help us make the most of the experience, and to provide some income
to an extra family, and Deepak introduced us to Raj.
Meeting at 6am the next day, Raj led us to where we
would catch the local bus to Pokhara. Watching the traffic in Kathmandu is a
pretty eye opening experience, and just as I voiced the thought that I was
amazed there weren’t more accidents, a small car drove into the side of our
bus…
Elsewhere along the road was a further, this time major
delay as there had been an accident involving a motorcyclist. I don’t know the
details as we were far back in the queued traffic, but from the length of the
delays I think it was pretty bad.
Eventually though we arrived at Pokhara, where Raj
showed us to our hotel (arranged by Deepak) and then went to his own digs for
the night. It was early evening by now, so we walked through Pokhara for a
browse around the tourist shops, then got dinner and some Nepalese beers before
heading back to our room for the night. It turned out that we were sharing the
room with the largest cockroach I had ever seen! I wasn’t keen, but I guess
that’s the cost of staying in the cheaper places…
The following morning we met Raj early. He helped us to
organise with the hotel to leave some of our bags behind; some people hire
porters to carry all of their stuff, but this didn’t fit within our budget and
Adam and I would be carrying our own stuff, leaving the rest behind
till after the trek.
Walking us to where we would catch the next local bus,
Raj pointed out to us Fishtail Mountain, promising us much better views along
the trek ahead of us. A pretty hair-raising bus ride later, winding around tiny
Himalayan roads full of trucks with an infinite variety of horn blasts, and we
hopped off at the trail head. Raj went off with our paperwork to get our
trekking permits, and then we began.
Initially we were trekking with another tourist and his
guide, who was friends with Raj. The other tourist, a Japanese man, was very
much the worse for wear after too many beers the previous night, so we set a
very gentle pace with frequent stops.
A little girl stopped me to talk to me, I couldn’t
understand her but Raj translated that she wanted me to take her photograph. I
agreed, and when I lifted my camera she struck such a serious little pose! I
showed her the image on the camera screen afterwards though and she seemed very
happy with it. She was incredibly cute :)
We soon stopped for lunch near the river, I wasn’t good
at noting down any place names as I was too busy enjoying the views, but I think
this stop was Nayapul. It was a little area of tourist restaurants and
teahouses where ate our daal bhat and drank sweet tea before setting off again.
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| Raj |
The path climbed after lunch, and then followed the
river a while before more climbing.
We passed some pretty little villages of Teahouses for
the tourist trekkers, and some homes where children would call out ‘hello’ to
us as we passed.
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| A cute teahouse village. I didn't take photos of the local people we passed in their homes as this seemed disrespectful |
We also saw plenty of work going on: at this part of
the trail a lot of food stuff is delivered around by mule, and when the mule
trains passed we would have to get out of the way.
I was also fascinated by the porters. There were plenty
of groups of tourists with their tiny bags and fancy gear, strolling along the
track while tiny Nepalese porters carried multiple cases bound together, often
going faster than the tourists themselves. At one point when we were waiting on
the trail for the Japanese guy and his guide to catch us up, a few porters
arrived and stopped for a break themselves. I asked, via Raj, if I could feel
how heavy their loads were. They all giggled and laughed at me, but helped me
on with the load of bags all tied together and carried with the aid of a head
strap. Their amazment that I could hold the weight spurred me on and I carried
the load a short way up the steps ahead of us. They were kind of impressed!
Continiuing our trek onwards and upwards, all too soon Raj
told us to stop as we had reached our accomodation for the night. We ordered
more daal bhat and put our stuff in our room, then sat with Raj drinking more
sweet tea. Over dinner together, I asked Raj to teach me some Nepalese, and a
pleasant evening was passed with me practising ‘Danyabad’ (thank you), ‘Ek,
dui, tin, char, pash, cha, sat, aaht, now, desh…’ (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10), etc.
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| The view from our first teahouse, with corn drying on the balcony |
We all went to bed early that night - Raj was exhausted as he had just completed a big trek in Tibet before Deepak had got him working with us, the Japanese tourist was feeling awful with his hangover, and once it was dark there wasn't a lot to do but enjoy the quiet and get a good sleep ready for more trekking in the morning :)
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