Nepal (February, 2023)
Nepal: Entry #21, Mar 1
Nepal. The impetus of our journey around the world.
Why? Well, a few years ago when a friend told me that her daughter runs a guesthouse in Nepal, I said, “One day, we shall visit.”
As we made our plans, we said, “While on that side of the sphere, let’s visit other places,” which morphed into a yearlong trip around the world.
So, Nepal became month #9 on our journey. Actually, years and years ago (pre-kids), we had discussed one day doing a trek in Nepal. What a thrill to finally have done this bucket-list item.
We spent our month in the lakeside city of Pokhara, after a stop in Kathmandu both coming and going—where we visited with our friends, Patrick and Tressa.
In Pokhara, we stayed at the New Hotel Castle, hosted by our friends Paul and Amy. Such a perfect spot near the lake, shops, cafés, and lots of activity. Just walking out the door, you step into a cultural mecca.
We got to know the Lakeside district of Pokhara, which is full of coffee shops, restaurants, hotels, craft stores, pharmacies, yoga retreats, and friendly people.
Our one disappointment, though, was not seeing the Himalayan range as we expected to. Pokhara supposedly has a gorgeous view of the mountains, but, alas, it was unusually smoggy our whole month there. We occasionally had a peek of the peaks, just never a full view liked we hoped for. Guess we’ll need to go back another day.
However, we did take a two-day trek to the Australian Base Camp. It was cloudy the first day, but—thank you, God—the fog, smog, clouds lifted on day two, and we saw the Annapurna 1 and 2, Fishtail, and the surrounding mountains. Absolutely glorious!
Even before we saw those gorgeous mountain peaks, the trek was beautiful. Our guide Prem and I discussed that we saw so much more of the surrounding beauty—trees, flowers, birds, people— without always craning our necks to see the high peaks, so there was a silver lining to the clouds. And, if you look at my photos, there is a stunning shot of the fog in the valley. This was taken right before it lifted so we could see the mountains.
Oh, Prem had a new toy, a GoPro, so he videoed our whole trek. If you’re interested in watching it, here’s the link to Day 1 (Day 2 will be released later): Finally Clouds Lifted (Our grandson will be thrilled his Mimi and Poppy are now YouTube stars. LOL!) (PART 2 of our Trek)
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Near the end of our month in Nepal, we had another “out of town” adventure: a jungle safari. We took a 6-hour bus ride to Chitwan National Park, which borders India. Such an extreme contrast to our mountain trek. We stayed at Sapana Village Lodge, an oasis on the edge of the park.
We took a full-day jeep safari, and what a grand experience! Our guide had eyes in the back of his head and could probably spot an ant from a mile away. We saw a tiger, elephants, rhinos, monkeys, an array of birds, crocodiles, and more. I had no idea Nepal was home to all these animals. But it makes sense, because Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book took place in India, and we were right on its border.
Just a note on the bus ride: that was an experience in of itself. They are widening the 127-mile road from Pokhara to Kathmandu…all at one time. We spent 4 hours of our trip on this road, and it was torn up the whole way. However, the slowness of the journey allowed us to observe so much culture from the bus. Villages perched along the road on the cliffs above the river, people carrying their heavy loads using the forehead bands, farmers working in the fields, children in their school uniforms waiting for the bus, and locals waving at us as the bus passed by them. Many of my photos are from the bus window.
Lastly, but definitely not leastly, the people of Nepal are warm and friendly and love to take photos of foreigners. The food is spicy and healthy and plentiful. We felt very welcomed here, and I had my share of dahl bat and curry. Oh, and I must mention the electrical wires. Ugly to some, intriguing to me. The cities do not replace any wires, they just add to them. So, there are dozens of wires attached to poles all around the cities. An interesting sight.
To sum it all up, here’s a word pot-pourri of Nepal:
Mountains and jungles, cafés and smog
Wires and scooters, monkeys and gods
Road construction, treks, and masala tea
Smoothies and beggars and yoga retreats
Forehead bands, dal bhat, and eye-catching beads
Cows and dogs that roam village streets
Momos and tikas and fruity lemonades
Bright-colored houses and garments and gear
“Namaste” greetings and warm, friendly smiles
Nepal grabbed my heart and won’t ever let go.
Hasta luego. We’re off to Thailand.
Pam
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