Bangkok, Thailand

Flew into Bangkok the day before yesterday....things are a little different here than in Nepal.  There is reliable electricity, wealth, finished buildings, cars made in the last 30 years.  We were greeted in Bangkok by an infra-red scan to test us for the Swine flu, you had to be looking for it to even tell.  In Nepal they were trying to call it the "Mexican" flu, so people wouldn't be biased against eating pork....thinking that Mexicans might not be too happy about lending their name so pigs aren't offended.  Otherwise it's a non-issue here at the moment, although Asia was burned pretty badly with SARS and took a big tourism hit, so I'm guessing they'll be cautious on this one.

Bangkok is great, it's around 100 degrees, but it's a wet heat so there's the cooling aspect of all the humidity.  The street food here is just as good as everyone says it is, haven't eaten at a restaurant yet.  This is a short one for now.  Flying to Chaing Mai in Northern Thailand in a few hours.

Annapurna Circuit Trek

Namaste!- There's been some blog silence since I've been on the trail for 17 days in the Annapurna region of Nepal.  The trek was unbelievable- the people, agriculture, towns, views, altitude, culture were all amazing.  It's hard to believe how much new information was thrown into my head in just a couple of weeks.  Today was our first "down day" at the end of the trek in Pokhara, although I still got in a 3 hours hike up to a temple in the morning.  So much happened that I think I'll just add a few sequential entries about the trip to catch up.  I'm going to try to backdate posts, don't know if it'll work so you may need to page back to find the start if choose to, I think you click "older posts" if you want to start from the beginning of Nepal.  For the ultra curious (Haney) This was the route once on foot: Besisahar-Khudi-Ngadi-Tal-Dhanakyu-Chame-Lower Pisang-Manang-Yak Karka-Thorung Phedi (Thorung Pass)-Mukinath (now on the Jomsom trek)-Marpha-Ghasa-Tatopani-Sikha-Ghorepani-Naya Pul and cab to Pokhara.

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Jomsom Trek

Once we're in Mukinath we're technically on the very popular Jomsom trek.  There is a very poor road up to Mukinath so we see some motorcycles but not cars...maybe a Jeep.  There is a temple here that is a mix of Hindi and Buddist that we visit with our Hindi guides, we challenge eachother to feats of strenght in lifting a big rock inside the temple grounds.  The Mukinath temple is a pilgrimage site for some.  The air feels thick at 13,000 feet.  We find out that we've been calling Qumar "Duma" for 11 days before he corrects us...he thinks it's hilarious.  Day 12 we find out that Duma, now Qumar, finds the many bridges that we cross to be just about the only thing that he doesn't find funny.  We rejoice and take lots of pictures of him on nearly every scary bridge after that...the humor of another man's fear simply trancends language and culture.  By this time we've gotten to know a number of fellow travelers on the same route, great people a alot of fun playing card and throwing dice with them.  The rest of the trip is a lot of down, with some flat, and then two days of up and then a bunch of down.  I am charged/chased by a water buffalo, they are surprisingly spry but a rearing waterbuffalo insires quickness of my own and I prevail.  Laxma and Qumar throw rocks at them.  At one point there are 3,300 stone steps hand cut and placed...I realize that if you count steps and name them, people feel compelled to go up and down them- this is one of my first recognizable themes linking all my travel so far.  Still amazing sights, but we all feel the Jomsom side to be less interesting than the first half- and frankly I've already written too much to hold anyones attention save my Mother.  Big mountains still surround us.  The last day is a tough 7hr one espcially for Eberly who is still ill and running on fumes and luke warm Sprite.  Pictures are of offending water buffalo that chased me.

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Thorung Pass

This is the most challenging day.  We leave Thorung Phedi at 4am to begin our climb 3,000 feet up to the pass of 17.7ft and then decend for 5,000+ feet.  On the way up there is enough moonlight so that I can turn my headlamp off and see my shadow and the mountains around me.  The down jacket and warm clothing are appreciated on this part.  The climb takes 4 hours the last 2 of which are slow-mo style in the thin air.  The weather is perfect and the view is amazing at the pass, we can see mountains in the distance that are still thousands of feet above us.  The decent is a knee burner and takes more 4 hours into Mukinath.  Picture is of the four of us at the pass.

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Manang to Thorung Pedi

Yaks begin to dominate instead of crops.  Potatos are the last thing they can grow (it looks like) in the altitude.  We stand at 13,000ft+ and still have mountains towering over us by more than 10,000ft.  My daily Dal Bhat habit is posponed since the rice they use up here can make westerners sick.  I switch to various versions of pizza and what they think a pasta dish might look and taste like.  My tea habit is growing.  Our last stop before the pass is Thorung Phedi where we sleep at 4455 meters or around 14,700ft.  This is now the highest altitude I've ever been in outside an airplane.  I took a day hike up to 16k feet to further aclimatize and get an incredible view including Annapurna I, one of 13 8,000+meter mountains in the world.  Eberly stomach now hurts more than his back after some confusion about the rice in Yak Kharka.  The weather has been spectacular, we're basically getting 1st season weather in their 2nd treking season (October weather in April)- so views have been crystal clear.  I'm too excited for Thorung La pass at 17.7k feet to sleep properly.

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Tal to Manang

This portion took 4 days.  We started gaining a lot of altitude here.  From Tal we spent a good portion of the day walking about as fast a fully loaded mule is inclined to walk...if he doesn't feel like walking.  Trail was narrow and sometimes blasted and hand cut with a sledge and iron bar into the cliff...so it wasn't easy getting around the mules.  The government and army has decided to built a basic road from Beisisahar to Manang, it's too bad, they did this on the Jomsom side (after the pass).  On the positive side they are literally doing much of this by hand, foot by foot and rock by rock with occasional blasting, so they won't finish anytime soon.  After Pisang we started to get our first really good look at the mountains.  Annapurna II, III, and IV.  Everything is carried by hand or mule, chickens, rice, tourist supplies, wood, crops, rock, water, steel pipe and rebar.  All ages carry incredibly heavy loads using a strap on the top of their head- some of the loads are obviously exhausting.  Our porters use the western straps for our backpacks, but many will use a strap for their head instead.  Food ranges from good to simply filling, we treat all our water with iodine and purchase some at safe water stations build by a bunch of Kiwi's to cut down on the plastic bottle waste here.  Toilets on this side of the pass are all Nepali squat style...you either just embrace this fact or you don't.  We stayed in Manang for two days to help aclimatize since we're now at 12K feet+.  Our porter Qumar, who basicaaly laughed his way around this trek, all of the sudden begins speaking very passable English, much to our surprise on day 5.

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First part of trek- Besisahar to Tal

Once we walked out of Besisahar, overnighted at our first guest house and moved on to Khudi, Nhadi, an Tal we started to realize a few things.  First, this isn't a U.S. style wilderness experience, there were other tourists, but just as many or more locals using the foot paths up the hills and mountains as an active trade route.  We generally got on the trail around 7am and were in bed when it was dark.  The guest houses ranged from basic to something you might consider a very small mountain cabin.  Sometimes there was electricity, sometimes warm water, and only western toilets at the very end of the trek (on the Jomsom trek portion).  The guides that John and I hired, Laxman and porter Qumar we more than reliable but also became friends by the end.  We debated hiring a guide/porter and in the end were happy we did...even for reasons besides having them carry most of our stuff.  American's were a minority, rough estimation is that about 4,000 American's have done this full trek over the course of the last 20 years.  The agriculture carved into the mountains is stunning, with terraces in impossible places sometimes only a few meters wide.  Crops are corn, rice, potato, cabbage, carrots, wheat.  All crops are tended by hand and are generally immaculate.

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