Most people come to Nepal for trekking which is totally understandable when you consider how fantastic it is here, but Nepal is also one of the best (and cheapest) places in the world for white-water rafting. We really fancied giving this a go so booked a two day trip with Ultimate Rivers which included food and a night's accommodation in a resort up in the hills, all for 60 euros. Meeting up at 6am, a group of 10 + guides set off for a three hour bus ride through the green valleys up to the Bhoti-Kosi river. We helped load two [View Full Entry]

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Day 8- Lobuche to Gorak Shep (5140m) to Everest Base Camp (5364m) We got up at a very unsociable time at 5:15am as there way a long day ahead of us. A quick breakfast before departure but were surprised when we went to brush our teeth that there was no water coming from the taps as the pipes had frozen solid. It was still -10 when we set off as the sun had yet to rise. We broke out the recently acquired down jackets and bundled up for a very cold start to the day. I'd left a litre bottle of [View Full Entry]

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Day 5 - Tengboche to Dingboche (4410m) After a breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast and potatoes and a last look at the monastery, we headed off into the clear, cold morning just before 8am. As usual, Ratna set a good pace down the hill and we enjoyed it after the climb the day before. The way was lined with rhododendron trees (unfortunately not in flower) and an abundance of old man's beard - Bear Grills would have been jealous! As the path levelled out we came across 'Rivendell Lodge'. Not quite from Lord of the Rings in appearance, but the setting [View Full Entry]

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Namaste all. I'm going to split the tale of our trek to Everest base camp over several blogs because it is too long for a single entry - better than squashing it all into one. I'll try and keep it brief as we did do a lot over the 13 days, but if anyone would like more detail then please post a comment and I'll get back to you. The journey really let us get a look at the real Nepal as a mountain country and let us see the more simple side of life that the rural Nepalese lead. We [View Full Entry]

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So we sat around the rooftop cafe for the afternoon with a French girl Sophie and a Czech guy called Lada. They were not a couple but had hooked up to travel across the border into Nepal. Private buses only ran three times a week in the morning so doing this would mean staying another night in Varanasi. This would have been totally fine but we were itching to get on to Nepal, being the second country on our trip and were looking forward to something a bit different after 6 weeks in India. We decided to take one of the [View Full Entry]

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Varanasi was the first place that sparked my interest in India. It seemed the epitome of all that was Indian: religion, ghats, friendly people and a generally interesting culture and place. It is supposedly one of the oldest cities in the world and was founded by the Hindu god Shiva. Let's just say, it did not meet our expectations. Of course, an experience is always influenced by the arrival in the new place and our was pretty tiresome. The sleeper train itself was fine - in fact the best night sleep on a train we had achieved across the whole of [View Full Entry]

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Shimla is a town in the hill province of Himanchel Pradesh, towards the far north of India. It became a military hill station during the Guerka wars in the nineteenth century but subsequently became a popular destination for the British due to its fantastic views and high altitude of 2400 metres, giving respite from the extreme summer heat of Delhi. The place became so popular that the British used it as their summer capital between April and November and its impressive to think that the whole country was run remotely from this small hill retreat. Getting to Shimla can be [View Full Entry]

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First of all a note to any other backpackers reading this- Delhi is the worst place weve been to so far for touts and scammers and New Delhi railway station harbours the largest concentration. Our guide book suggests being wary of anyone approaching you as theyll be after your money and from what weve seen, this is entirely correct. It seems that they want to lure you to one corner of the station where all the rickshaw mafia and money-changers lurk. For instance, there is a help ticket reservation centre upstairs for foreigners but when we tried to enter the [View Full Entry]

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Agra. What a dump. Now don't get me wrong, every Indian city we've been to has had the usual rotting garbage in the streets being feasted on by animals, open sewers, bad smells, exposed high voltage cables and general grime but Agra has taken all of this to a whole new level. Thankfully it makes up for all of this with its two redeeming landmarks: the Agra Fort and the Taj Mahal, which were the main purpose of our visit. Arriving around midday on an early train from Jaipur, we put our big bags into the railway station cloakroom, which [View Full Entry]

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Arriving at the station on time (roughly) we steeled ourselves against the deluge of rickshaw drivers and touts we had been previously warned about in our guide book. We thankfully managed to get to the booking office without too much hassle, just a friendly man (ulterior motive hidden at the point, but we had guessed) helping us find the way. An hour later we emerged, our next 2 onward journeys planned, too find the guy still waiting for us. He took us to our hotel for 10rs - a bargain - as according to him “people matter more than money”. [View Full Entry]

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