:: zone3 ::

With some time left while away in Nepal, decided to book myself on a couple of days Canyoning at Boarderland Resort.

As well as having a great time abseiling down waterfalls up to 45m, also managed to meet a few of the local leeches.

Kathmandu Traffic

Decided to hire a mountain bike for the afternoon and go for a ride to Bhaktapur, a little out of the city.

Traffic in Kathmandu is 'interesting' to bike in. The hectic mess, is a bit more like taking your life into your hands on two wheels, you point the bike where you want to go and hope no one hits you from the side (or back).

My other post covered the general events of the hiking but skimmed over the unwell bit, this one covers what happened and the lead up...

Well, the trip to Everest Base Camp was not as I planned, think that's an understatement. Going into it it I was pretty relaxed as am currently quite fit. Although was a little nervous about the altitude as my fitness is at sea level and it can effect anyone.
However it ended up being other reasons that caused me to be unwell and disappointing not make it to Everest Base Camp.

After flying to Lukla and a couple of days hiking got to Namche (3400m) last night. However that evening after dinner ended up fainting a couple of times... I put it down to the long day hiking, some early starts, and probably a little dehydration.

However, the guide of course had to take a conservative view, and last night made arrangements for me to come down and back to Kathmandu in case it was something more major or altitude related.

Disappointing, but can't do much about it.

Given that was 100% this morning after a good sleep (and the speed was able to start hiking down today), pretty sure wasn't altitude related.

Will post some details of what I did see of the Himalayas (and photos) once back to Kathmandu.

Other than Australia, pretty much all my travel out of New Zealand seems to involve a series of flights.

Unusually, all of my three flights left on time and each arrived at their destinations early, might be the best run I've had with planes. As usual though, transfer lounges and the like get boring quick, at least Singapore is nice to transfer in.

Normally I travel with a large duffel bag, it great, has a metal loop thing around the top to padlock it shut. Had it checked all the away through from Wellington to Kathmandu, when I have a few flights in a row, it's always good to see your bag appear in the baggage claim.
Lifted it up and noticed the padlock was gone and the bag open (at least the metal closure was still there), hmmm not a good start. Looked like everything was still in it (and the way I packed it), and didn't seem like "extra" things had found there way in my bag. Time for a new padlock.

Heading off to Nepal this evening for about three weeks away to hike up to Everest Base Camp.

Have about two weeks of hiking in the Himalayans and nearing end the making my way to around 5500m.

Looks like it is starting to warm up there now, the weather forecast now has a day in it with the High hitting zero.

Last year, I had been looking at visiting Everest and going up to Base Camp around January. However, didn’t end up with flight routing that would have worked.

So, with that slight delay, I now have flights, etc booked to go in April for about three weeks.

Noticed yesterday how long it has been since posted an updated. Never were overly regular updates, but seven months is pretty slack.

Decided recently that I need to make use of my building up leave and go somewhere. Settled on it being a trip to Nepal and walk up to Everest Base Camp.

Anyone that is keen to on the idea of seeing east Europe, Central Asia and taking entirely in-appropriate cars (1000cc) over in-appropriate and at time non-existent roads, should enter the Mongol Rally 2008.

Entries opened today for 24 hours with a random draw with another chance at the draw on 6th Nov.

Even if not doing it, worth checking it out the site. And if doing it, will be a cool chance to see a lot of piles and get some cool photos.