Blogs from Himalayas, Nepal, Asia

Many couples, when 'honeymooning' might have some basic desires: like a double bed, or a hot shower, or maybe even a cocktail once in a while. Turns out that 19 days hiking through the Himalayas, sleeping in our little single beds (usually in a private room, at least), sharing a pit toilet with sometimes much of the village, and suffering cold showers or none at all at 10,000 feet was somehow just the honeymoon (part II) we were looking for. We rarely ate anything besides Daal Bhat (rice and lentils), let alone ate a piece of fruit or a blended a cocktail on the beach. Yet our trek through northern Nepal, in the Manaslu conservation area, and into Tsum valley was definitely one of the more memorable experiences of our lifetime. We were both physically challenged ... read more

J: I flew into Kathmandu from Bangkok and I spent the first day looking for a jacket, gloves, thermals, socks, hat, scarf, boots, sleeping bag - basically an entire wardrobe more suited to Nepal in January rather than the beaches of South East Asia. After several fruitless hours I came to the conclusion that renting mountain gear in Kathmandu is unheard of, so I found the cheapest equipment available and met up with my group for the next two weeks - Rob, a British-Canadian DJ booking agent living in LA; Pankaj, an Indian-born Australian IT consultant and Siobhan, an Australian lawyer who quit her job to travel. The following morning we took the small plane from Kathmandu to Lukla - famous for being the world's most dangerous airport. As we approached through buffeting turbulence I could ... read more

When all of us were "safely" seated in the chopper, the pilot climbed in as well, fiddled with his controls, then applied more power to the already whirring rotars. The excitement was building, then very quickly we had liftted off. No sooner than we were airborne a 100 feet or so, the pilot executed a sharp right turn, much to the whoops of delight from the guys in the back. I was smiling a lot, if not a little nervous. We quickly climbed and headed back up the valley we had trudged down slowly before and within what seemed like a minute, we were already circling high over Namche Bazar. Circling overhead of Namche, the pilot was quizzed on his nationality - it turns out he was also an Australian! Too late to get out now! ... read more