After a quick flight and a relatively painless immigration procedure I arrived in Kathmandu, took a long nap to make up for the mediocre slumber that occurred in the Slumber Zone, and then went out in the evening to explore. The city is really quite charming, even accounting for the mad crush of traffic which frequently stops dead and sits in a tangled mess for minutes at a time, and which, upon restarting in a flurry, threatens to flatten the unsuspecting tourist at every turn. (There were some close calls, and some terrified squeaking). Despite the chaos, though, it's a great place to wander, window shop, people watch, and pigeon feed. I couldn't believe how colorful it was, how much of the medieval city-state feel has survived to present day, and how many secret courtyard gardens you can find if you just wander down a dark alley and see what's at the other end. Whimsical, was what I kept thinking, like it could have been the setting for a fairy tale, and probably was at some point or another. I bought I shawl that I liked so much I slept with and a brass elephant door handle that my future house hunting will basically revolve around entirely, and was extremely satisfied with the whole experience.
After a few days I went to Pokhara, a city by a lake that I didn't find to be that interesting, but which serves as the jumping off point for most of the trekking that there is to be done. I have to admit I was a little intimidated by the idea of trekking, particularly because it seems to involve a lot of gear, and anything involving gear is usually a lot of work and kind of extreme (I'm thinking rock climbing and spelunking here, that kind of thing. Although actually I feel the same way about skiing, which I generally avoid, and scuba diving, which I do anyway because of the turtle factor.)
But apparently trekking is just glorified walking where you carry a water bottle and can get away with lots of extra pockets and safari hats, if you're into that sort of thing, and I was actually reasonably good at it, given that I've been walking on my own for nigh on 23 years now (even though at one point a Korean Super Trekker called me lazy for arriving at a 3,210 meter summit at 5:45 am, rather than the Standard Super Trekker Sunrise Hour of 5:30. I wanted to roll him into his neon green Super Trekker Super Lightweight Waterproof Super Jacket and push him down the mountain, but instead I told him to "shove it, Korea", which he didn't understand, and smiled politely, which confused him, and that was the end of that).
So I trekked for five days with a friend of a friend named Alice and a lady porter named Isu, who, as it turned out, actually hated walking and didn't really like tourists and kind of objected to sleeping alone and needed to share a room with us. Which was mildly uncomfortable since she didn't really like us, as mentioned, but not the end of the world. But it was incredible scenery and crisp mountain air, and I loved it. Almost every night it rained or hailed, we played Rummy 500 and drank hot chocolate, warmed our toes by the fire or read by flashlight in our sleeping bags until we fell asleep at the ripe old hour of 9 pm. There was tomato cheese soup daily, and hot springs on day four, and rhododendron forests almost the whole way. Glorious -- even the ascents, which were described as anything from "arduous" to "disheartening" and generally were just that.
Anyway, we've now trekked out way almost to the end of the trip and we probably deserve a hot chocolate break. I have a little bit more to tell you about the journey home, but I will save for part three, and another day.
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