Nepal November 10^th – 25^th

I had a 3.30am flight to Nepal (actually the first of 3 flights to get to Nepal via India) so I did what anyone would do ant went out to dinner and then to the pub before getting a taxi to the airport just after midnight.  My first flight went to Chennai in southern India then it was on to Delhi and finally Kathmandu over 12 hours.  Despite the fact I was flying with the same airline the whole way I was they wouldn’t link check my baggage to Kathmandu so I had to collect it and recheck it each time.  After clearing immigration in Chennai, picking up my bag, walking 300m to the domestic terminal, re-checking my bag, being frisked, scanned, searched about 5 times and waiting 2 hours I was put on a bus and taken back down the tarmac to board the same plane I’d arrived on for my flight to Delhi.  I went through this process all over again at Delhi only this time it was a different plane and I got absolutely fleeced by the taxi driver who drove me between terminals (it was a fair bit more than 300m at Delhi).  When I finally arrived at Kathmandu I was exhausted, I didn’t really sleep much on the plane although I do vaguely remember being woken up for a meal on one flight with drool on my chin so that was fairly embarrassing.

Kathmandu is situated in a valley at 1350m above sea level so the cool weather was great after living in Sri Lanka for 7 months (32 degrees… every… single… day…).  There are also lots of cool restaurants there and Thamel, where I was staying is a great little tourist area in the city.  Every second shop sells climbing and trekking gear and the others all sell souveniers.  The place is full of travelers either embarking on or returning from trekking tours or people hanging about pretending they are alternative and cool because there doing nothing in Kathmandu instead of Thailand.  There also seems to be a mindset that it is also ok for men to where tights as an outer garment here, especially with hiking boots and a polarfleece jacket.  This crime against fashion is mostly perpetrated by Europeans and is even more common once you get up into the mountains but I think is especially unforgiveable in a city.

Our trek started with a flight into Lukla at 2800m which is the starting off point for all trekking & climbing in the Everest region.  On the side of the steep hill the runway at lukla “airport” is about 200m long and runs up hill so that the plane stops almost as soon as it touches the ground, quite an experience to land on as it feels like you’ve just dropped out of the sky and landed on the spot.

It took us 7 days to reach base camp with a couple of acclimatization stops along the way where we would stay in the same place for 2 nights but ascend 4-500m during the day and come back down.  The landscape was quite different to what I had expected, the path very dry and dusty and vegetation larger than a bush disappeared above 4000m.   The snowline didn’t begin until almost 5000m and even then it was patchy  and only on the shaded side of the valley.  The trail was crowded with hundreds of trekkers, Yaks, porters and Sherpas going about their business.  For the first few days there were villages every few kilometers but the higher up we got the less common these became.  Similarly the price of food and water increased the further along we got.  There are no roads anywhere in this region and everything is either brought in by porters carried on their backs or by Yak.  Obviously the higher and further someone has to carry something the more expensive it will be.  After seeing what these guys do every day any pretense of toughness I might have had previously has definately vanished.  Most of the porters are little over 5 foot tall but carry between 40-70kg on the back, walking for up to 9 hours a day in high altitude.  This trek was hard enough carrying a day pack with a couple of bottles of water and a camera.

The altitude started to affect me at about 3400m, I woke up one morning in Namche where we had stayed 2 nights with a light headache which gradually got worse the further up we went, the day we reached base camp I had completely lost my appitite (though whether this was altitude sickness or the quality of food I am not sure) and thought I was going to throw up just walking along a path.  I had thought beforehand that the altitude would simply mean it was harder to breather and it would be more of an effort to walk so the headaches and nausea were definitely unexpected and very unpleasant, particularly when added to the effects of some more common travelers afflictions.

Base camp itself is a fairly plain place despite being at 5363m, at the bottom of the Nuptse, one of the peaks that shares a ridge with Everst it is basically just a rocky patch of glacier that is cleared every spring when the climbing expeditions arrive.  The only sign of its existence on our visit is a small monument (which must have to be moved every year to prevent it gradually being carried away by the ice flow) and the wreckage of a crashed helicopter that no-one has bothered to remove – understandable given it would have to be carried out by hand.  You can’t actually see Everest from base camp either, the peak is obscured by the surrounding ridge but the scenery is spectacular none the less.

The following day before beginning our descent we climbed to the summit of Kala Pattar which is 5545m and has the best views of Everest from the Nepal side (the Tibetan border was quite close by – but is former by a ridge about 6500m high so couldn’t see much).  This was pretty much the hardest thing I have ever done.  We left at 5.30am for the 2 hour climb to the top, the overnight temperature had been -12 but when we left had warmed to around -8, I had a throbbing headache and could barely breathe with the cold and low oxygen.  By the time we neared the summit I was almost crawling over the rocks and was breathing like I had just finished a 400m sprint but it was well worth it for the view at the top.  Out of 12 on the group only 5 of us attempted Kala Pattar and thankfully we all made it (although one girl did get a lift on our guide, Gelu’s shoulders for a couple of hundred meters along the way).  All of us could barely move up at the top while our guides looked like they had just strolled down to the shops.

After Kala Pattar we began our hike back towards Lukla and some form of civilization, dropping from 5545m down to 4060m in a day definitely helped with the altitude sickness and arriving in Namche at 3400m the next day was even better – not least because that was the only place where we could have a hot shower, our first in 6 days and because we could finally have a beer.

A few days later and we were back in Kathmandu, luckily we got out of Lukla on our scheduled flight, the airport had been clouded in for 5 days before hand and there was a backlog of people trying to get out (scheduled flights have priority but if you are not able to depart on the correct day you go to the back of the queue).  Lots of very anxious travelers at the airport when we departed who were no doubt keen to get home, many had missed international flights out of Kathmandu, one group we met had even charted a helicopter to pick them up that morning at US$600 each.

From Kathmandu (after a hot shower, a decent meal and a few quick stops at  Durbur Square and the Monkey Temple) it was on to India for my 24 hr stopover in Delhi.  After all the horror stories I’d heard about India I was dreading spending a day there but was pleasantly surprised to find that the place is actually really nice (at least the bits I saw).  I didn’t have to be at the airport until 3.30 in the afternoon so I crabbed a taxi and went around to see a few sights in the city and found the place really clean, no-one hassled me, the taxi driver didn’t rip me off and when I went to a temple or monument “guides” would ask if I needed help and then simply say good bye and walk off when I said I didn’t.  It was all very weird compared to the usually treatment you get as a tourist in this part of the world.  What was also a bit weird was the chicken maharaja mac I had at McDonalds but better than getting delhi belly on a one day stopover.

Back in Colombo now with about 3 weeks to go before I finish up and head to Europe for a couple of weeks so probably won’t write again before I’m home.  For anyone else reading this thanks for putting up with my blogs/winges while I’ve been away.

Cheers, Sam.