Category: Nepal

Nepal - Kathmandu Valley

1/19/2015

Our Himilayan trek (see our last post for details) started and ended in Pokhara, a lake town about 200 kilometers, but a 7 hour drive, from Kathmandu. There's not much to say about Pokhara other than it is a relatively chilled out town full of trekking tourists that offers lots of nice restaurants, cafés, bars and handicraft shops. Some tourists use the surrounding mountains to launch paragliding flights but we were more than happy to just relax for a couple of days by the lake.

We spent the rest of our time in and around Kathmandu, enjoying the buzz of the tourist district (Thamel) at night and exploring the temples and palaces of the surrounding Kathmandu valley during the day.

The first temple we visited, Swayambunath, sits on top of a hill and would offer fantastic views of the Kathmandu valley on a clear day (but thick smog means there aren't many of those). The temple is home to hundreds of monkeys (so is often called the monkey temple), which didn't exactly help our enjoyment of the place. After several months in countries full of monkeys we had come to look at them not as cute little furry animals but as often aggressive rabies carrying thieves.

Our favorite temple in the Kathmandu valley was the Bodhnah stupa, one of the largest Buddhist Stupas in the world. The absence of pesky monkeys and the presence of an adjacent rooftop bar/restaurant meant we were more than happy to spend a couple of hours there.

Hundreds of years ago, the now unified Nepal used to consist of hundreds of small kingdoms, each centered around a 'Durbar Square'. Each square features temples, open courts, water fountains and a royal palace. We visited the three most impressive Durbar Squares, starting with Patan.

Next up, we visited Kathmandu Durbar square, which due to its central location is the most popular among both locals and tourists.

Finally, we traveled out to Bhaktapur, which is the most expansive of the three, featuring several squares and hundreds of historic buildings spread out across dozens of ancient streets.

After seeing the best Buddhist temples Nepal had to offer we headed to the airport, taking an indirect flight to the ultimate Buddhist temple destination, Myanmar.

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Nepal - Annapurna Circuit

1/3/2015

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Tourists visit Nepal for two main reasons; to trek through the Himalayas and to visit the country's many Buddhist temples and towns. We did a bit of both, but we'll cover the trek first.

The peak trekking season in Nepal is quite short, limited to the months of October and November. At this time the rain has mostly stopped but the cold of winter hasn't set in yet. We arrived in early December, which meant that many of the country's longer treks (including the insanely popular everest base camp trek) were already not a good idea (particularly for increasingly unfit backpackers only carrying summer clothes).

Trekking enthusiasts (not us) can hike for weeks or even a month in Nepal. We chose to do the shorter Annapurna circuit, which offers lots of beautiful Himalayan viewpoints in a relatively short trek (usually 5 days but we did it in 4).

Starting from Nayapul, a small town near Pokhara (Nepal's 2nd largest city), we climbed steadily uphill. We regularly passed through small villages, each offering basic food and 'tea house' style lodging to tourists. The residents of these villages live pretty simple lives, trying to grow as many vegetables as they can (using buffaloes to plow the fields), and carrying all other supplies up the hill (often with the help of reluctant donkeys).

We were given the choice of two villages to spend our first night, with the two separated by 3000 steps. We decided to power through to the second village (Ulleri), and when we arrived at the top were rewarded with our first snow-capped Himalayan views.

The highlight of the Annapurna circuit trek is seeing the sunrise from Poon Hill, so day two involved a short trek to Ghorepani, a small town just below the peak of that hill. In December, mornings are reliably clear but clouds roll in from the mid-afternoon, so we kept a reasonably swift pace to make sure we arrived at Ghorepani by 1pm. From there, we saw beautiful panoramic views of the Annapurna mountain range, including several mountains over 7000 meters high. For us, the most impressive mountain was Fishtail, which although not one of the tallest offers the most impressive silhouette and has never been successfully climbed.

Over the course of the afternoon and evening, temperatures steadily dropped to below freezing, and we put on all of the layers we had been carrying (including lots of cheap pants, gloves, beanies and socks we had bought in Kathmandu and some down jackets we had rented from Pokhara).

After a cold and not particularly comfortable night we woke up at 5am to make the short, but challenging (particularly without a head light), 45 minute climb to the top of Poon Hill. We arrived just as the sun was starting to rise and stayed for about an hour, enjoying spectacular 360 degree views. The experience was everything we'd hoped for, offering the feeling that the huge snow capped Himalayan mountains (some 4000 meters higher than Poon hill) to our north and west were almost on top of us. Reminding us that we were already 3200 meters above sea level were the views to the south and east, with a thick layer of cloud hovering over the lower valleys and perfectly framing the rising sun.

The hour on the peak was the only part of our four day trek that felt crowded, with almost 100 people joining us at the top. Even so, we're told that was nothing compared to crowds of 500 regularly seen during peak season (only a couple of weeks earlier).

After descending and having a quick breakfast we embarked on the longest and most interesting day of our trek. We hiked up and down along a scenic ridge line, enjoying particularly impressive views at Gurung hill and Tadapani (our lunch stop) before making a steady descent to Ghandruk, where we spent our last night.

Along the way, we ran into a group of small children carrying huge stacks of firewood on their backs, so we stopped to give them some candy to keep them going.

Over the course of the previous three days we had seen some beautiful villages, but Ghandruk was our favorite. Our lodge for the last night was also our favorite, offering a nice hot shower and beautiful Himalayan views in a building worthy of a two star rating in a larger town.

Our last day involved a steady downhill trek, which was easy on the lungs but not so much on the legs. By lunchtime, we were back in Pokhara. More on that, and the Kathmandu valley, in our next post.

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Nepal - Kathmandu Valley

Nepal - Annapurna Circuit

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