Step 1 Trekking: Getting There

Hello all! Sorry it has been so long, but I have been a roaming nomad in Nepal and haven't had a lot of free time to just sit down and collect my thoughts. Despite having already visited Nepal 4 years ago this tiny little country sandwiched between the giants of China and India still amazed me as much as my first journey here. I still feel like I have only scratched the surface of exploring the valleys, mountains and meeting the people that live here.

I arrived in Kathmandu to find it mostly the same as I remember it other than some new buildings being constructed. It is still dusty, the roads are still narrow and bumpy and there are still interesting things and people and buildings everywhere. You can walk down the same street over and over again and notice something new each time. The constant honking of horns as and the packs of barking dogs late at night haven't changed at all either. The electricity in the city is still only on for about 12 hours a day and most of those hours occur after 9 pm. There is no power during peak times in the mornings and evenings which means businesses have to resort to generators and batteries to stay operational throughout the day. It also means you have to be strategic in charging all of your electronic devices.

As Kathmandu is a crazy busy place I was eager to escape the madness and hit the mountains for some trekking. Having completed the three most touristy treks on my last trip this time I wanted to do a trek a little more off the beaten track. On the recommendation of my trekking agency I set off with my guide Binod for a three week excursion to Kanchenjunga, the third highest mountain in the world. I wanted remote and I definitely got it starting with the ordeal just to get to the start of the trek.

From the moment we left Kathmandu on a short 40 minute flight I met only a handful of other tourists. We stepped off the plane in a sweltering hot and humid city in the flat Tarai region of Nepal. The easy part of the journey complete we hopped on a bicycle rickshaw to take us out to the main road and then threw our bags on the roof of one of the thousands of dilapidated buses and set off.

I will start off with a brief primer on how the buses work in Nepal. Each bus has a driver and one to three young men that hang out the door looking for people to pick up. They yell out at people and when someone flags that they want to get on they bang on the side of the bus to signal the driver to stop and then when to start again. Their job is to cram the bus full with as many people as possible and then add at least 5 more after you think the capacity has been completely maxed out. The process is brutally slow as many people are only traveling short distances and there is constant starting and stopping. When you get to a major stop and lots of people get off you don't leave until the bus has been deemed sufficiently full to continue onwards. Personal space is non-existent as there is constant jostling of people trying to get on and off. It is hot and there is nothing but dust and fumes to breath in.

After enduring three hours of dusty travel on a decent sized highway we switched to a jeep. My excitement to move to a seemingly more comfortable form of transport was almost immediately ruined as I very quickly realized that the exact same rules apply to the jeep. My guide and I were wedged with two other people in the jump seats in the back of the jeep. It was tight but bearable and then all of a sudden another lady was added sitting on a stool at our feet. I spent the entire journey with this lady's leg jammed in between mine and with her using my lap as an armrest. At one point I think I counted 18 people inside the jeep and a few more hanging onto the back and roof.

This is also when the journey itself got interesting as we started winding our way up and down the steep valleys that Nepal is renowned for. Through tiny villages clinging the sides of steep terraced cliffs we crawled around hairpin turn after hairpin turn. Almost every corner is blind which meant the horn was constantly blared to make sure that oncoming traffic on the narrow road knew we were coming. Although not the most terrifying road I have traveled on in Nepal it was still best not to watch the cliff edges go by. We were literally traveling around 10 or 15 km per hour as I kept tabs on the kilometer markers in between towns.

Needless to say after another 3 or 4 hours I was pushed to the extreme limits of my tolerance for personal contact with strangers. We finally escaped the jeep around dinner time to spend the night in the tea growing village of Ilam and my guide informed me that we still had at least 7 more hours of the same travel to look forward to the next day. It was not a very happy moment for me to think about spending another full day in the same condition, but I did have to laugh at the craziness of the day and be thankful that I live in a place where I don't have to travel like this all the time.

The next morning we were back in another jeep by 6am to finish off our journey to the town where we would start our walking from. From this point forward all the villages we would walk through are only accessible by foot. Another long day of cramped travel and finally after two full days we were only just ready to start the true trip.

Since this is already quite lengthy you will have to check out the next post for the conclusion of my trip...