Our trekmates have a blog. Click on their photo in the "follower" section to get to their blog. Sorry no photos. It would cost me too much internet time to figure out how to post them. Maybe when I get back to KMD.
Namaste!
Thursday, October 23, 2008
TP makes me happy
Yes, that's right. Toilet paper makes me happy. We were given a ration of 4 single-ply roles and let me tell you, that's not enough. Not even close. One reason is that one of the effects of altitude is that you have to pee 5 (and up to 12 times...Holly), in the middle of the night. That's a lotta paper. So, here it is. The bathroom report: They don't have many western toilets here in the east. Go figure. What we've seen so far is the fancy porcelain toilet which is basically like a bathroom sink in the floor with places to put your feet on either side. While this seems pretty bad, it's really not. I've been in port-a-pottys that are far worse (helloooo, the Yough stop!). Generally, the trick with these is to make sure you roll your pant legs up and keep your boot laces tucked in to avoid any...soilage. Also, make sure you have your TP ready and a pocket to put it in so you don't accidentally drop this paper gold down the hole. That would be bad. So, these are the fancy toilets. In one village that we trekked through, fancy wasn't available. Here, we had an outhouse situated over wood slats with one missing. Yep, that was bad. Worse than the yough stop. Anyhow, after the first night of getting up a billion times in the middle of the night and fiddling with boot laces and pant legs, I think I have a system down. Subsequent nights have been better. Of course, #2 is not very easy when you're balanced over a hole trying to keep your boot laces and pant cuffs dry. It's not just me. We're all having issues. Let's just say we were all happy that the "lodge" we're staying in has flush toilets. Nice. Hopefully, the next 10 days goes well.
Okay, that's it for the bathroom report. Hopefully it wasn't too much info : ) but I know you were all wondering.
As for the rest of the trek, it's amazing. There are mountains and blue skies all around us. It's hard to describe. Yesterday, we got our first glimpse of Everest as we hiked up and up and up all those stairs. Today, we did a short hike (again, straight up), to the Everest View Hotel. AMAZING! It's all worth it. I think we were at 12,800 ft today. Again, we're doing well with altitude. I wasn't short of breath today and no headache. Yea! Oh, and we get to shower today. Yea yea yea!
We'll be out of contact now for several days (10??). Wish us luck. It will be very cold and very high. But it will be beautiful too.
Namaste!
Okay, that's it for the bathroom report. Hopefully it wasn't too much info : ) but I know you were all wondering.
As for the rest of the trek, it's amazing. There are mountains and blue skies all around us. It's hard to describe. Yesterday, we got our first glimpse of Everest as we hiked up and up and up all those stairs. Today, we did a short hike (again, straight up), to the Everest View Hotel. AMAZING! It's all worth it. I think we were at 12,800 ft today. Again, we're doing well with altitude. I wasn't short of breath today and no headache. Yea! Oh, and we get to shower today. Yea yea yea!
We'll be out of contact now for several days (10??). Wish us luck. It will be very cold and very high. But it will be beautiful too.
Namaste!
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
The pilot stuck the landing!
Flight:
- Get there early (6AM or so). Flights are first-come, first-served.
- Sit on the left side of the plane for a view of the himalaya. Beautiful
- Only about 18 seats in the plane. I assume the seatbelts are for show only.
- Stick the landing. The runway is short-- it starts at the edge of a cliff and ends at a wall (just below baggage claim).
Lukla:
Beautiful town. No cars. Cows (not yaks, that only live above 3000m) are the local transportation. One "street" with shops on either side selling water, snickers bars, pringles (yep), and various trekking gear.
My group:
4 people total. Holly, me, and a couple (mid-30s) from NJ.
Our crew:
Guide: Harka- head guy. He's worked for World Expeditions since '96. Educated in "commerce" in university in Kathmandu. The guide is the go-to guy for everything and is in charge of the staff. Harka walks behind us on the trek.
Sherpa guide (it's what they call him though he's not sherpa?): MingMa. 2nd in command. He's done 40+ treks. He's on a 45 day holiday from university in KMD (also studying commerce). He serves us our meals, washing water (in a sing-song voice) and morning wake-up tea. He walks in from on treks.
Cook: we haven't met him yet but the food is good and plentiful.
Porters: at least 10. They carry our kit bags, tents, food, and cookware. Lots of stuff. All are shorter than me and carry bags over their heads!!
Trekking: So far so good. Today was the hardest day: 30 minutes down, 4 hours up, up, up. We're now at 11,500 ft. Lots of up. No altitude sickness thoough. so far so good. Oh yah, watch out for the big, huge, cows with long, sharp horns (not yaks). They tie a bell around their necks so you can hear them coming. Stay to the inside of the path and away from the cliff edge. No sudden movements.
That's all for now. The internet here is 15 rupees a minute (crazy). We're in Namche Bazaar for two nights, staying in a lodge (heavenly!). Stay tuned for the bathroom report tomorrow. I know you were all wondering how that would go.
Also, if you have questions, I"ll try to answer them. Send me an email tlgortner@yahoo.com today and I'll read them tomorrow (at a cheaper internet cafe, hopefully).
Namaste!
- Get there early (6AM or so). Flights are first-come, first-served.
- Sit on the left side of the plane for a view of the himalaya. Beautiful
- Only about 18 seats in the plane. I assume the seatbelts are for show only.
- Stick the landing. The runway is short-- it starts at the edge of a cliff and ends at a wall (just below baggage claim).
Lukla:
Beautiful town. No cars. Cows (not yaks, that only live above 3000m) are the local transportation. One "street" with shops on either side selling water, snickers bars, pringles (yep), and various trekking gear.
My group:
4 people total. Holly, me, and a couple (mid-30s) from NJ.
Our crew:
Guide: Harka- head guy. He's worked for World Expeditions since '96. Educated in "commerce" in university in Kathmandu. The guide is the go-to guy for everything and is in charge of the staff. Harka walks behind us on the trek.
Sherpa guide (it's what they call him though he's not sherpa?): MingMa. 2nd in command. He's done 40+ treks. He's on a 45 day holiday from university in KMD (also studying commerce). He serves us our meals, washing water (in a sing-song voice) and morning wake-up tea. He walks in from on treks.
Cook: we haven't met him yet but the food is good and plentiful.
Porters: at least 10. They carry our kit bags, tents, food, and cookware. Lots of stuff. All are shorter than me and carry bags over their heads!!
Trekking: So far so good. Today was the hardest day: 30 minutes down, 4 hours up, up, up. We're now at 11,500 ft. Lots of up. No altitude sickness thoough. so far so good. Oh yah, watch out for the big, huge, cows with long, sharp horns (not yaks). They tie a bell around their necks so you can hear them coming. Stay to the inside of the path and away from the cliff edge. No sudden movements.
That's all for now. The internet here is 15 rupees a minute (crazy). We're in Namche Bazaar for two nights, staying in a lodge (heavenly!). Stay tuned for the bathroom report tomorrow. I know you were all wondering how that would go.
Also, if you have questions, I"ll try to answer them. Send me an email tlgortner@yahoo.com today and I'll read them tomorrow (at a cheaper internet cafe, hopefully).
Namaste!
Sunday, October 19, 2008
last day in the big city
Holly and I will both be glad to head to the mountains tomorrow. The tour today was like 101 world heritage sites in 6 hours. I saw people bathing in a holy and dirty river, bodies being cremated (exhausted stupor caused misspelling of this earlier...hope confusion wasn't caused), a monkey taking an offering from a buddhist shrine, and a woman fastidiously cleaning a cows tail with her hands (seriously!). That's enough for one day. This will be the last you hear or read from me for quite some time. At about midnight your time, we should be flying to Lukla. I'm sure it will be fine, really. Really. I'm sure.
Namaste.
Namaste.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
IJA: Internet Junkies Anonymous
Hi, my name is Tammie and I'm an Internet junkie. So we spent the better part of a day wandering Thamel. Pure chaos. It will be nice to get out of the city and into the mountains. But, alas, we found a hole-in-the-wall Internet location recommended on a random web site. Prices vary...a lot! Hotel: 15 Internet minutes = 200 rupees. Here: 15 minutes = 15 rupees.
If I didn't mention it earlier, 1 dollar = about 75 rupees
Purchases
1 set of trekking poles: 900 rupees
1 pair of boot gaiters: 300 rupees
1 fleece neck gaiter: 100 rupees
1 rickshaw ride: priceless
Actually, the rickshaw ride (prefix, rick-, as in rickety) was 200 rupees (yes, way way too much).
More later!
If I didn't mention it earlier, 1 dollar = about 75 rupees
Purchases
1 set of trekking poles: 900 rupees
1 pair of boot gaiters: 300 rupees
1 fleece neck gaiter: 100 rupees
1 rickshaw ride: priceless
Actually, the rickshaw ride (prefix, rick-, as in rickety) was 200 rupees (yes, way way too much).
More later!
Friday, October 17, 2008
Well, we’re here in Kathmandu. I’ve been in a catatonic state most of my few waking hours here so I haven’t seen much. Here’s what I remember:
The airport
Even though we’d been warned not to give our bags to anyone at the airport, we were easily duped by a guy that we though was with World Expeditions. He wanted $10 to push my bag cart about 30 yards to the car. Chalk that one up to sleep deprivation : ) We each gave them $2 and they seemed satisfied. On the plus side, my bags made it safely from Columbus to Kathmandu through 5 airport transfers! No kidding! Yea for United, Asiana Air, and Jet Airways.
The transfer from the airport to the hotel
Kathmandu gives new meaning to the term tailgaiting. Our taxi nearly rear-ended a motorbike (seriously, slamming breaks, 2-3 inches to spare) and we saw several other near-misses with other vehicles. I was surprised not to see downed cyclists on the side of the road. But, due to my catatonic state, it didn’t really faze me.
The hotel
Radisson Kathmandu. Nice. Really. For $60 it’s far better than the Super 8 we stayed at between WV and NC a few weeks ago. That was billed as a non-smoking room and smelled of cigarette smoke. This one has two ashtrays with matches but doesn’t smell at all (and you all know I have a really sensitive sense of smell). However, even though we’d been warned to look at the seals on water bottles, we were duped by water in resealed bottles. The complimentary bottles of water in our room looked like new, seals and all, but after a few hours of sleep and upon reexamination, they turned out to have been refilled bottles. Who knows if the water was contaminated or not. We only had a few sips and treated the rest with iodine tabs.
The food
Good. Really good. The dahl (sp??) is excellent, and thoroughly cooked! And for breakfast, Holly got two eggs over easy (sort of), bacon, and coffee. For those of you that know her, that made her happy. Also, the black tea here is so good, it doesn’t need sugar.
Today’s plan
We’re going to wander around Kathmandu and look for a few last-minute trekking items. We’ll also look for un-tampered with bottled water. We meet with the World Expeditions tour group tonight and then tomorrow we’ll get a guided tour of Kathmandu. Yea!
So far so good. Will write more again before we start the trek.
The airport
Even though we’d been warned not to give our bags to anyone at the airport, we were easily duped by a guy that we though was with World Expeditions. He wanted $10 to push my bag cart about 30 yards to the car. Chalk that one up to sleep deprivation : ) We each gave them $2 and they seemed satisfied. On the plus side, my bags made it safely from Columbus to Kathmandu through 5 airport transfers! No kidding! Yea for United, Asiana Air, and Jet Airways.
The transfer from the airport to the hotel
Kathmandu gives new meaning to the term tailgaiting. Our taxi nearly rear-ended a motorbike (seriously, slamming breaks, 2-3 inches to spare) and we saw several other near-misses with other vehicles. I was surprised not to see downed cyclists on the side of the road. But, due to my catatonic state, it didn’t really faze me.
The hotel
Radisson Kathmandu. Nice. Really. For $60 it’s far better than the Super 8 we stayed at between WV and NC a few weeks ago. That was billed as a non-smoking room and smelled of cigarette smoke. This one has two ashtrays with matches but doesn’t smell at all (and you all know I have a really sensitive sense of smell). However, even though we’d been warned to look at the seals on water bottles, we were duped by water in resealed bottles. The complimentary bottles of water in our room looked like new, seals and all, but after a few hours of sleep and upon reexamination, they turned out to have been refilled bottles. Who knows if the water was contaminated or not. We only had a few sips and treated the rest with iodine tabs.
The food
Good. Really good. The dahl (sp??) is excellent, and thoroughly cooked! And for breakfast, Holly got two eggs over easy (sort of), bacon, and coffee. For those of you that know her, that made her happy. Also, the black tea here is so good, it doesn’t need sugar.
Today’s plan
We’re going to wander around Kathmandu and look for a few last-minute trekking items. We’ll also look for un-tampered with bottled water. We meet with the World Expeditions tour group tonight and then tomorrow we’ll get a guided tour of Kathmandu. Yea!
So far so good. Will write more again before we start the trek.
We're here
It's 10:47 AM in Nepal and we've been here for about 2 hours. Our room isn't ready yet so we're spending a few minutes in the hotel's business center (15 minutes on the net = 200 NR). I knew that 26 hours in flight would be rough but I had no idea how little sleep I'd be able to get. I'm running on fumes at this point with maybe 8 hours of sleep since Tuesday morning. First impressions: the weather here is fantastic. It's clear, dry, and about 70 degrees F.
I'll write more when I'm feeling coherent.
I'll write more when I'm feeling coherent.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
7 and 10
Yikes. After months of planning and mulling and shopping and fretting, I have just 7 days and 10 hours before my travels begin. It's all a little surreal. Yes, I'm excited about traveling, but I'm still waist-deep in the last-minute planning that's involved in leaving the country for a few months so I haven't really had a lot of time to dwell or dream about what's to come. I'm doing such a random list of things: vote, get my teeth cleaned, clean out the fridge, pay ahead on my car insurance, apply for private heath insurance, pack, get traveler's checks, order extra camera batteries, etc. etc. I think it will all sink in during that 11 hour flight over the Pacific : )
My Flight
To save a little cash on the flight, I'll be taking the "scenic" route to Kathmandu, Nepal.
Columbus - Chicago: 1 hr (6AM flight, Wednesday morning)
Chicago - Tacoma: 4 hr, 30 mins
Tacoma - Seoul: 11 hr, 50 mins (!!!)
Seoul - Delhi: 7 hr, 45 mins (!)
Dehli - Kathmandu: 1 hr, 30 mins (arrive 8:15AM Friday morning or 10:30PM EST Thursday)
That's 26 hrs, 36 mins in the air, not counting layovers! Most of the layovers are 2-3 hours although the Dehli layover is about 7 hours. I wonder what it will be like spending 7 hours in the Dehli airport. God, please let them have flush toilets ; )
Lukla
Next Monday, I'll be flying to an airstrip in Lukla, near the base of the Himalaya. This airstrip was built by Sir Edmund Hillary when he began building schools and hospitals for the Sherpa people. The trek to Everest base camp starts from here.
Here's a video of a takeoff from Lukla. Watch the runway disappear about 2 seconds after the plane lifts off. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHkcEpxVc6o
Nepal Facts for Today
Time Zone: Nepal time is 9 hours and 45 minutes ahead of Columbus time. So if it's 8:30PM here, it's 6:15AM the next day in Nepal. What's with the odd 15 minutes? I'm not sure.
Exchange Rate: $1 = 77 nepalese rupees (which supposedly will buy one meal of daal bhaat, made of lentils, rice, curried vegetables). Since it's cheap, plentiful, filling, and healthy (?), I'll be eating plenty of it so I hope I like it. I hope my belly likes it too.
Hopefully, this gives you a little insight into the first few days of my trip. I'll write again when I get to Kathmandu!
My Flight
To save a little cash on the flight, I'll be taking the "scenic" route to Kathmandu, Nepal.
Columbus - Chicago: 1 hr (6AM flight, Wednesday morning)
Chicago - Tacoma: 4 hr, 30 mins
Tacoma - Seoul: 11 hr, 50 mins (!!!)
Seoul - Delhi: 7 hr, 45 mins (!)
Dehli - Kathmandu: 1 hr, 30 mins (arrive 8:15AM Friday morning or 10:30PM EST Thursday)
That's 26 hrs, 36 mins in the air, not counting layovers! Most of the layovers are 2-3 hours although the Dehli layover is about 7 hours. I wonder what it will be like spending 7 hours in the Dehli airport. God, please let them have flush toilets ; )
Lukla
Next Monday, I'll be flying to an airstrip in Lukla, near the base of the Himalaya. This airstrip was built by Sir Edmund Hillary when he began building schools and hospitals for the Sherpa people. The trek to Everest base camp starts from here.
Here's a video of a takeoff from Lukla. Watch the runway disappear about 2 seconds after the plane lifts off. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHkcEpxVc6o
Nepal Facts for Today
Time Zone: Nepal time is 9 hours and 45 minutes ahead of Columbus time. So if it's 8:30PM here, it's 6:15AM the next day in Nepal. What's with the odd 15 minutes? I'm not sure.
Exchange Rate: $1 = 77 nepalese rupees (which supposedly will buy one meal of daal bhaat, made of lentils, rice, curried vegetables). Since it's cheap, plentiful, filling, and healthy (?), I'll be eating plenty of it so I hope I like it. I hope my belly likes it too.
Hopefully, this gives you a little insight into the first few days of my trip. I'll write again when I get to Kathmandu!
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