Kathmandu

Things looked a little different on our approach to Kathmandu—the Himalayas were eye level with the plane.  The “abode of snow” reached heights we had never seen before, and it stunned a Rocky Mountain mama.  Our journey through Kathmandu continued to impress beyond the landing. The dusty streets choked with cars and motorbikes were only a backdrop to the hive of activity the pedestrians acted out on every corner.  The pleasure of visiting Kathmandu is to just be present. 

As we continue to meander the world, the journey is nothing without the cast of characters providing a friendly hand.  We arrived at our hotel without one iota of a plan for our Nepal visit.  We just simply noticed—hey, Nepal isn’t far from Sri Lanka—we should probably go.  Luckily, Bijay our hotel manager, took us in and quickly sorted our discombobulation.  Before we knew it, we were meeting with Bishnu and planning our trek to Everest Base Camp and Gokyo Ri.  Climbing up to 17,600 feet was a real possibility now.  Beyond our trek planning, our week stay in Kathmandu was filled with temple visits, wandering through the many Durbar squares, and indulging in the new influx of international food.  We loved the Sri Lankan food, but dove in fork first with the new variety of middle eastern, Indian, and Italian grub. 

Between planning our next meal, the trek plan took shape and we booked tickets to fly into Lukla, the “world’s most dangerous airport”. Let’s hope this is false advertising and is only promoted to add intrigue to the whole Everest thing. Again, the hospitality bubbled over when Prem, one of our hotel managers, took us shopping to get all of the necessary items for our trek—sleeping bags, micro-spikes, shoes, trekking poles and more. He was the muscle to ensure the shop merchants gave us a fair price. Yes, we have all of this gear, it’s just miles away snuggly riding out the winter in our basement—this is a problem with traveling on a whim. In the gear shops, we learned there is “normal” and “real” gear. So, now we are sporting a “normal” Patagonia fleece for $5 and new Marmot down sleeping bags for $80. Let’s hope we look “normal” and the gear “real”ly works at 17,000 feet!