Trek, Buddha and animals: The essence of Nepal
Door: Alex
03 November 2016 | Nepal, Mahendranagar
Ok so we left early, and since the most interesting thing I did on the hike was talk to Eva – and trust me, that was a lot of fun – I will just give a short account of the trek itself.
Day 1 was comprised of walking up and down hills – mostly up though. At the end we could choose between sleeping there or ending the day with 3500 steps up to Ulleri. Since we didn’t want to start that the next morning, we decided to go up to Ulleri first. When we arrived, we were tired, but happy. We met some nice people, including a Rastafari looking Nepali who lived in France, and who was showing around his parents-in-law. We went to bed at 9, which would be our rule for the rest of the trip: You have to stay awake until 9, because otherwise you’ll wake up at 4 and you can only start walking when it gets light – at 6.30… The second day saw us walking up a bunch of steps again, but it was only 4 hours until we got to Gorapani, close to Poon hill, where we would see the sunrise the next day. We basically slept the afternoon away, still going to bed at 9.
Day 3: Interesting day where we got up at 4.45, started walking up Poon hill (more steps) at 5 and saw the beautiful sunrise at 6.15. After we got back, we had breakfast and walked for another 6 hours to Tadapani. When we got there, we decided to go on to Gandruk, since there was so much still to walk and we only had two more days. Another Dutch girl joined us for this part, and we slept at a place for free as long as we had dinner and breakfast there, so we did, since they had hot showers. Although they actually weren’t that hot. So that was another day without hot water, which for me meant another day without a shower (it was cold up in the mountains…). We had some really fun “conversation” with the owner, who reeked of alcohol and kept offering us weed, and left late next morning for our trip to Landruk and on to Deurali.
Lucky for us, it was only 2,5 hours of walking down steps, followed immediately by half an hour up steps (about 1250m down, then 900m up) to Landruk, and then mostly flat ground and stairs up for the next four hours. Deurali apparently means “High Place”, meaning some more stairs at the end of the day, up to the village… The scenery was beautiful though, and the guesthouse had a hot bucket shower! I’ve never been so happy about a bucket of hot water in my life. After a truly wonderful moment when I actually felt clean for the first time in 5 days, we had dinner and then I saw apple pie on the menu. So the sweet woman made a fresh apple pie for me, made of dough folded around apple, caramelized sugar and cinnamon, put in the middle of a fire in tin foil… It was amazing. And big. So big…
The next morning, we had breakfast (I got the banana pie, since I knew how big it was) and we ate it overlooking a beautiful valley and some snowcapped mountains. We continued to the endpoint in Phedi, down some steps, and then some stairs, and more steps… In other words, I wouldn’t mind never seeing stairs again… And we figured out that the trek we walked was supposed to be seven days, and we did it in five, which explained how tired we were.
We arrived back in Pokhara late in the afternoon, went back to the same hostel and as I walk back up to the counter to ask something, I see Maria the German girl from Kathmandu! I didn’t mention her before since we only talked for about an hour the night before I left, as she was coming back from the Annapurna circuit trek with horror stories about no water and horrible (and expensive) food… Making me decide not to trek in Nepal. So I told her I went trekking and had a lot of fun. We hung out a lot the next few days, mostly with Eva as well, and that’s when we learned that one person with a lot of allergies, one with a bowel disease that is activated by a number of foods, and one who is allergic to gluten actually have some difficulty finding a restaurant that suits everyone.
The next day I had something that felt like it would turn into a throat infection and I found out that I’d lost my HTC phone… Not a good day. Then later, the throat infection cleared up and I had great food, which made me think that it actually wasn’t such a bad day after all. Although I still lost my phone… Oh well, I’d transferred almost everything to my new phone anyway.
The next morning I went to a yoga class, then rented a mountainbike. Since my calves were hurting from the trek, I thought a good way to spend the day would be to cycle up a mountain to the World Peace Pagoda. It hurt, but the next day my calves felt better, so I guess it was. At the WPP, I saw many people talking loudly across the huge “PLEASE BE QUIET” and “SILENCE” signs. Which made me think that if more people would actually do what signs said, and thought about others a bit more, there might one day be world peace…
The way down was actually harder than the way up, since I chose a route that was just sand and rocks on a 10% slope… Let’s say it was interesting, and I didn’t hurt myself – I didn’t even fall down! When I got back, I had lunch and some coffee. Yup, I drank coffee. Me. No seriously, I did. I can prove it! Ok, maybe I can’t, but I did drink it. Asia’s changing me already.
The next morning I got on the bus to Lumbini, the birth place of Buddha. Once I got there, I found a hotel, but everything was more expensive than the Lonely Planet said it would be… Eventually I was trying to decide whether 550 rupee (4.80 euro) was an ok price for a private room. Oh, how I’m going to love coming back to the Netherlands and spending that amount on a bus ride from Kudelstaart to Amsterdam, or 3 times as much on lunch.
Afterwards, I went to the Lumbini Monastic Zone. I saw the place where Buddha was born from afar and back at the hotel I met Celeste, a South African girl who was sharing my room (yay, that meant I’d only pay 3 euro) and we immediately started talking about complex subjects, which was quite weird and cool. We spent the entire next day visiting all the beautiful temples (and the place where Buddha was born, up close) and talking, finally joining a group of great people in the evening for drinks. When we went to bed at 10.30, the guesthouse owners weren’t too happy that we woke them up since the shutters had been closed and all the doors locked, but we did get in and went to sleep quickly since everyone but me was leaving early the next morning.
The next two days, I did nothing. Seriously, I stayed in my room and watched series, went out for food, came back and watched more series. It was awesome.
At the end of the two days, it was Deepawali, Festival of Lights. I went out to see the fireworks and candles and sand mandalas. It was stunning.
The next morning, I got up at 4.30 to go to Bardia. Well, I planned to do that, but my alarm clock didn’t work… So hey, here I was, getting woken up by a knock on my door. Luckily I only had to put a few things in my bag and I could leave.
The buses took most of the day, but there was a welcome committee when I arrived, so that was really nice. Tihar (the festival that Deepawali belongs to) was coming to a close with great dance performances of the local youth, who insisted we should join, and when we did, screamed with joy. The last day I even woke up with the same music and screaming, which led me to think “There ain’t no party like a Tihar party, cuz a Tihar party don’t stop”.
During 2 days of safari in Bardia, I rode an elephant, saw a lot of birds, including a woodpecker that some birdwatchers spent weeks trying to find (but didn’t) because it’s incredibly rare and only really exists in Bardia, a python, two one horned rhino’s, millions of cotton bugs, and some lizards and salamanders. Pretty awesome for just two days of mostly sitting still.
The next morning, I had to be ready by 5.30 to get the bus to the border. Bye bye Nepal…
Day 1 was comprised of walking up and down hills – mostly up though. At the end we could choose between sleeping there or ending the day with 3500 steps up to Ulleri. Since we didn’t want to start that the next morning, we decided to go up to Ulleri first. When we arrived, we were tired, but happy. We met some nice people, including a Rastafari looking Nepali who lived in France, and who was showing around his parents-in-law. We went to bed at 9, which would be our rule for the rest of the trip: You have to stay awake until 9, because otherwise you’ll wake up at 4 and you can only start walking when it gets light – at 6.30… The second day saw us walking up a bunch of steps again, but it was only 4 hours until we got to Gorapani, close to Poon hill, where we would see the sunrise the next day. We basically slept the afternoon away, still going to bed at 9.
Day 3: Interesting day where we got up at 4.45, started walking up Poon hill (more steps) at 5 and saw the beautiful sunrise at 6.15. After we got back, we had breakfast and walked for another 6 hours to Tadapani. When we got there, we decided to go on to Gandruk, since there was so much still to walk and we only had two more days. Another Dutch girl joined us for this part, and we slept at a place for free as long as we had dinner and breakfast there, so we did, since they had hot showers. Although they actually weren’t that hot. So that was another day without hot water, which for me meant another day without a shower (it was cold up in the mountains…). We had some really fun “conversation” with the owner, who reeked of alcohol and kept offering us weed, and left late next morning for our trip to Landruk and on to Deurali.
Lucky for us, it was only 2,5 hours of walking down steps, followed immediately by half an hour up steps (about 1250m down, then 900m up) to Landruk, and then mostly flat ground and stairs up for the next four hours. Deurali apparently means “High Place”, meaning some more stairs at the end of the day, up to the village… The scenery was beautiful though, and the guesthouse had a hot bucket shower! I’ve never been so happy about a bucket of hot water in my life. After a truly wonderful moment when I actually felt clean for the first time in 5 days, we had dinner and then I saw apple pie on the menu. So the sweet woman made a fresh apple pie for me, made of dough folded around apple, caramelized sugar and cinnamon, put in the middle of a fire in tin foil… It was amazing. And big. So big…
The next morning, we had breakfast (I got the banana pie, since I knew how big it was) and we ate it overlooking a beautiful valley and some snowcapped mountains. We continued to the endpoint in Phedi, down some steps, and then some stairs, and more steps… In other words, I wouldn’t mind never seeing stairs again… And we figured out that the trek we walked was supposed to be seven days, and we did it in five, which explained how tired we were.
We arrived back in Pokhara late in the afternoon, went back to the same hostel and as I walk back up to the counter to ask something, I see Maria the German girl from Kathmandu! I didn’t mention her before since we only talked for about an hour the night before I left, as she was coming back from the Annapurna circuit trek with horror stories about no water and horrible (and expensive) food… Making me decide not to trek in Nepal. So I told her I went trekking and had a lot of fun. We hung out a lot the next few days, mostly with Eva as well, and that’s when we learned that one person with a lot of allergies, one with a bowel disease that is activated by a number of foods, and one who is allergic to gluten actually have some difficulty finding a restaurant that suits everyone.
The next day I had something that felt like it would turn into a throat infection and I found out that I’d lost my HTC phone… Not a good day. Then later, the throat infection cleared up and I had great food, which made me think that it actually wasn’t such a bad day after all. Although I still lost my phone… Oh well, I’d transferred almost everything to my new phone anyway.
The next morning I went to a yoga class, then rented a mountainbike. Since my calves were hurting from the trek, I thought a good way to spend the day would be to cycle up a mountain to the World Peace Pagoda. It hurt, but the next day my calves felt better, so I guess it was. At the WPP, I saw many people talking loudly across the huge “PLEASE BE QUIET” and “SILENCE” signs. Which made me think that if more people would actually do what signs said, and thought about others a bit more, there might one day be world peace…
The way down was actually harder than the way up, since I chose a route that was just sand and rocks on a 10% slope… Let’s say it was interesting, and I didn’t hurt myself – I didn’t even fall down! When I got back, I had lunch and some coffee. Yup, I drank coffee. Me. No seriously, I did. I can prove it! Ok, maybe I can’t, but I did drink it. Asia’s changing me already.
The next morning I got on the bus to Lumbini, the birth place of Buddha. Once I got there, I found a hotel, but everything was more expensive than the Lonely Planet said it would be… Eventually I was trying to decide whether 550 rupee (4.80 euro) was an ok price for a private room. Oh, how I’m going to love coming back to the Netherlands and spending that amount on a bus ride from Kudelstaart to Amsterdam, or 3 times as much on lunch.
Afterwards, I went to the Lumbini Monastic Zone. I saw the place where Buddha was born from afar and back at the hotel I met Celeste, a South African girl who was sharing my room (yay, that meant I’d only pay 3 euro) and we immediately started talking about complex subjects, which was quite weird and cool. We spent the entire next day visiting all the beautiful temples (and the place where Buddha was born, up close) and talking, finally joining a group of great people in the evening for drinks. When we went to bed at 10.30, the guesthouse owners weren’t too happy that we woke them up since the shutters had been closed and all the doors locked, but we did get in and went to sleep quickly since everyone but me was leaving early the next morning.
The next two days, I did nothing. Seriously, I stayed in my room and watched series, went out for food, came back and watched more series. It was awesome.
At the end of the two days, it was Deepawali, Festival of Lights. I went out to see the fireworks and candles and sand mandalas. It was stunning.
The next morning, I got up at 4.30 to go to Bardia. Well, I planned to do that, but my alarm clock didn’t work… So hey, here I was, getting woken up by a knock on my door. Luckily I only had to put a few things in my bag and I could leave.
The buses took most of the day, but there was a welcome committee when I arrived, so that was really nice. Tihar (the festival that Deepawali belongs to) was coming to a close with great dance performances of the local youth, who insisted we should join, and when we did, screamed with joy. The last day I even woke up with the same music and screaming, which led me to think “There ain’t no party like a Tihar party, cuz a Tihar party don’t stop”.
During 2 days of safari in Bardia, I rode an elephant, saw a lot of birds, including a woodpecker that some birdwatchers spent weeks trying to find (but didn’t) because it’s incredibly rare and only really exists in Bardia, a python, two one horned rhino’s, millions of cotton bugs, and some lizards and salamanders. Pretty awesome for just two days of mostly sitting still.
The next morning, I had to be ready by 5.30 to get the bus to the border. Bye bye Nepal…
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