Haven't posted for a looong time, but been lurking a bit in the background. Great to see so many known faces in all the NY-GTG posts, wish I could have been there as well.
Anyway, as some of you know, I spend all of october in Nepal, after I quit my job earlier this year that gave me the opportunity to do what I always had wanted, but never had time to do. It actually widened my personal horizon significantly and became one of my best traveling experiences so far. Not the least also, because it gave me the chance to spend some quality time with my father, who had always wanted to do a trip like that with me. And who knows for how long he'll be able to, currently he's 65.
Despite being a long-time Paneristi I decided not to wear any, but had instead the privilege to bring along the Land-Instrument from Danish brand Linde Werdelin. It proved to be an excellent traveling companion, specially because the build-in altimeter allowed me to monitor the changes in altitude, of which there were plenty! As "base" for the instrument I took my LW "Hard Black" Biformeter, a LE of 22 BTW:
(altitude in Kathmandu, around 1.300 meters)
Timezone settings are interesting in Nepal as its CET + 4.45 hours - a bit weird I think and I couldnt find out about the reasons why. The special hard black coating of the LW actually prooved to be really tough as the trip left no visible signs on the watch, just a few hairline scratches on the folding clasp after I unintentionally had some rock contact... Not sure I could have said the same thing about the PVD/DLC coating of my 195 when my 7-yr. old can leave marks like this:
Anyway, Nepal is a fascinating country, statistically one of the world's poorest, however it feels extremely rich culturally. People are very welcoming and interested, the nature is breathtaking and my impressions during my visit immensely diverse. Religions (90% Hindu, 10% Budhist) have co-existed peacefully for centuries and are practised as a natural part of people's everyday lives, sometimes with symbols and references of both religions within the same temples.
(one of the largest buddhist temples in Kathmandu, the Bodnath stupa)
(buddhist monk concentrating on his prayers)
I spend a total of 15 days trekking first the Everest region, where there are plenty of tourists, followed by almost a week through non-tourist territory to get to the nearest road. While being in the high-altitude region was absolutely breathtaking (in every respect), I personally enjoyed the second half even more, as people were much less encountering tourists in a professional sense, but very interested and open-minded about us foreigners, sticking our cameras right into their faces, houses, lives. If we in Europe could be just half as welcoming ind inviting towards foreigners visiting our country, I think we would have advanced very far from where we are today.
Anyway, enough said, would like to share some pics, as they say more than a 1000 words, right? I promise to keep the comments short.
Main square of Patan, once of of the three kingdoms in the Kathmandu valley, today more like a suburb.
A holy man that has dedicated his life to his religion (and asking money to be photographed)
Getting a fresh haircut and a rather painful 30 min "massage" for less than a $
At one of the numerous temples
Everything is being sold everywhere, in this case its...? Yes, flutes!
Street side sale of coloured powder for hindu-worship
Damn, too early!
Work as an electrician obviously requires special talents
Wood, anyone? Ah, the good old way, selling wood by weight
Kathmandus most trustworthy watch-expert
Specializing in fabric: fantastic colours for beautiful Saris, the traditional female clothing. Not too many customers at the moment though...
Getting ready to depart to Kathmandu airport with our guide and porter, the extremely spacious taxi and driver in the background:
Traffic is crazy, a horn is the most important feature, others would chop off each other's angry heads, but somehow all are calm and manage to get to their destination safe & sound - amazing.
Checking in at the domestic airport. And yes, we got on the plane in time with all our luggage (I had lost hope to be honest)
Approaching Lukla, a spectacular airstrip just below 2.900 meters and the main gate for tourists trekking the Everest region. Do you see the ascending landing strip? It felt as if we would hit the mountain side any moment.
Going downhill: starting from here means getting enough speed before the drop-off at the end of the runway. I guess it still must be a pretty exciting experience for the pilots as well.
As there are no roads up here, everything has to be transported by yaks, donkeys or most commonly human porters, that do an amazing job (check out the load the man back in Kathmandu was carrying!). The tracks are narrow and at times very steep, and in bad weather conditions, quiet slippery - thankfully they have the best suited footwear
First touch of tibetan influence: these are manis, stones inscribed with budhist prayers - they are everywhere
Weather wasn't all together great in the beginning, wind was actually quiet chilly at this pass
Checking our altitude and remaining distance for the day. Having to cross a river (often the same one several times) often meant descending for hours just to climb up again for hours on the other side. Funny how distances suddenly are measured in hours or days instead of kilometers or miles...
"What goes up, must come down". In this case, go down first then go up again. Pretty tough stuff at these altitudes with limited training and acclimatization. Yet, it didn't feel so bad after all
A first glimpse of the stunning high mountains (I believe 6 or 7 of the world's highest peaks are located in Nepal) - no idea which one lurks through the clouds here
A well-deserved tea-break in the self-acclaimed highest located hotel in the world, the Everest View hotel, build by a crazy, or should we say, rather passionate japanese business man. Almost everything needs to be carried up there and each room is equipped with oxygen tanks for the usually japanese guests that fly in there for a day or two by helicopter.
"Where do I find the restrooms, please?"
Testing my LX-3's black & white capabilities before the long climb up to the Chukung-Ri
Finally reached the summit. Unfortunately my old man didn't make it all the way but hey, you can't have everything in life, right?
What a panorama! I was high, not only high up (5.550 m), after 5 days of continuous climbing.
A happy trekker (RIDE shot variation I guess)
Back to modern civilization, in this case a road and vehicles. Reaching our guide's off-side hometown meant 2 days of bus travel, of which half a day was on the roof, clinging on to dear life (pic taken from the top of the bus)
"Hey, I was here first!" - "No, you move" - "Let's try to squeeze past each other" - "Everyone get their feet up!"
At this point, we were inside the bus, our guide though still had about 8 hours left on the roof...
Together with my host family, extremely fascinated seeing themselves in the camera's digital display.
Less privileged children from the neighbourhood that cant even go to school - they have to go grass-cutting instead to feed the familys few goats.
Young boy doing his homework for school in the street
I had the privilege to visit one of the original Thangka houses were some of the beautiful paintings are made that typically show scenes from Buddhas life. Kathmandus tourist shops are filled with these, but usually theyre of minor quality, however in this case its the real deal.
Depending on complexity it takes this master between 1-3 months to finish such a super-detailed thangka painting
Finishing details with special gold colour.
Last glimpse of the mountains before returning to the city
Back in Kathmandu again, this time at the Pashuputinath temple, one of the holiest places for hindus outside India, to which many people come from far away to worship. The smoke you see is from burning the dead as the river flows into the Ganges river in India which makes it a holy river suitable for this kind of ceremony
Interesting and beautiful people all around
"Find the fish!" Ermmm, snake in this case (colour caused by growing organism in this case)
Now heres something interesting: what do you think these soldiers will be training in a few moments?
Absolutely correct: playing flutes!
These poor souls sat in a ditch right next to the busy street inhaling fumes all day long. I saw them on 3 days in a row, makes me think about my own priviliged life circumstances...
On a lighter side you can see that humans and animals share the same public space
Before my return I had to stop by the local mall for some watch window shopping
Back home, back to PAM: so at least there is some OP content
Well, that's all, although I have to say that it was really hard to select these pictures. As you can imagine, I encountered sooo many other exciting and interesting things during the journey. Traveling really is one of the best things to spend your money and time on as you can keep and treasure your experiences for the rest of your life, and nobody can take them away from you. I only wish I could have taken my wife and kids along on this trip, but then again there will be many opportunities for that in the future.
Thanks for your interest and thanks for looking. If anyone is interested I can forward contacts of a great trekking company.
Yours sincerely
