Dec. 21, 2019 – Jan. 4, 2020
This was my last overseas trip before Covid-19 hit the world. Before that, I had been dreaming about hiking in Nepal for many years, so I’m really glad that I took this trip just in time!
Since we had never travelled to Nepal, let alone go hiking overseas, I found a hiking company from Trip Advisor. This company had really good comments. In fact, I love my guide & Nepal so much that I’m planning to return someday!
https://nepaloramatrekking.com/
Permits
We had emailed back & forth many times before the trip, so I felt quite secured. We need several permits to enter the areas, but we just needed to email our ID photos & passport copies to the company and they took care of it. It was easy.
Insurance
We were advised to buy the Insurance (for trekking) from World Nomads on internet. It seems that they do have pretty good policies & rates.
Itinerary
21 Dec – Day 1 – Airport pick up at 17:50 and drop off at hotel
22 Dec – Day 2 – Fly to Pokhara, drive to Nayapul and trek to Tikhedhunga (~3 hours
walking)
23 Dec – Day 3 – Trek to Ghorepani (~6 hours walking)
24 Dec – Day 4 – Trek to Poon Hill for sun rise and then on to Chule (~6 hours walking)
25 Dec – Day 5 – Trek to Sinwa (~4 hours walking)
26 Dec – Day 6 – Trek to Deurali (~6-7 hours walking)
27 Dec – Day 7 – Trek to Annapurna Base Camp (~5 hours walking)
28 Dec – Day 8 – Trek to Sinwa (~7-8 hours walking)
29 Dec – Day 9 – Trek to Ghandruk (~4 hours walking) and take a jeep to Pokhara, drop off
at hotel
1 Jan – Unaccompanied flight from Pokhara to Kathmandu
Included in the cost
Accompanied flight from Kathmandu to Pokhara and unaccompanied flight from Pokhara
to Kathmandu.
All necessary ground transport by private car or jeep including airport pick up.
Accommodation – 1 night in Kathmandu and in teahouses during the trek.
All necessary trek permits.
Wonderful, experienced English-speaking local Guide and their salary, food,
accommodation, transport and insurance.
Porter (who can carry a maximum of 13kg per person) and their salary, food,
accommodation, transport and insurance.
Meals during your trek, i.e. breakfast, lunch and dinner (standard option from menu), each with a cup of tea or coffee.
A celebration dinner in a great local restaurant with a cup of tea or coffee.
All necessary government tax and local service charges.
Nepalorama T-shirts!
Not included in the cost
Meals in Kathmandu and Pokhara, except breakfast and the celebration dinner.
Accommodation in Pokhara
Additional tea, coffee and mineral water.
Tips for guide and porters.
All bar bills (e.g. coke, juice, beer, etc.).
Sightseeing costs (transport, local culture guide and attraction entry fees).
TIPS
Prepare pills to avoid High Altitude Sickness — you can easily buy them before trip, or from your local guide in Nepal, usually very cheap, but they will save your day!
Bring Crampons — the ground condition is hard to predict, and you cannot buy them once you are inside the mountain.
Bring Thermos bottle — you can always get hot water or hot tea from teahouses, nothing is better than a hot drink in the cold temperature!
We arrive Kathmandu by flight late at night, took quite a long time lining up for the visa-on-arrival, even had to exchange currency inside the customs in order to pay for the visa.
Also, after got out of customs, we bought SIM immediately (had to stay connected!), but still we found our trekking company’s pickup was patiently waiting for us outside, and dropped us at the hotel.
It was just a regular small hotel in the city, but thankfully we can still find a few restaurants & shops opened, we immediately popped into a restaurant and ordered our 1st Napalese dinner! They are the typical Dal Bhat & Momo (dumpings), but they were actually quite good!
Nepali Dal Bhat or Dahl Bhat, is considered to be the national dish of Nepal. It usually consists of steamed rice at the middle, surrounded by dal/lenti soup, curries, potatos, veges, etc. One dish containes all the nutrition that you need!
Next early morning when it was still dark, we headed to the airport and took a small local flight to Pokhara, and then we took like an hour of drive on bumpy mountain road, stopped at the entrance for permit, and then started walking.
Although it was end of Dec., it was so warm, around 20-30degC, the perfect weather for travelling. The air was clean & dry, and sunny everyday as far as I could remember. I was amazed that despite didn’t take shower for a week or so (the longest in my entire life!), I didn’t really feel sweaty or ichy, I guess because of dry air?
Our trekking company reminded us to bring (non-alcohol) body wipes, because it’s almost impossible to take shower up there, even if some guesthouses do have shower facilities, they were costly & the water temperature were so unstable (because they mostly use either solar power or gas tanks), you don’t want to try it, in fact I mostly caught a cold because of a “shower” (the water temperature was only above 20degC at beginning, and in a few minutes, it already dropped to 10degC or so, I was lucky to have finished my shower before freezing to death!)
The roads were so easy to walk (comparing to many mountains we have hiked in Japan). It guess because Annapurna was a popular routes for tourists, the routes were maintained really well. Many stairs were even paved with stones! I was so impressed, because natural stones (like marble) are expensive materials, and heavy and difficult to work on, but Nepal mountain side seems to have abundance of them.
There were so many local villages on the way, we can take toilet break every few hours at the teahouses for free. (Japan is not like that. There are very few teahouses/guesthouses except for top of mountains, and they are not villages, so they are closed in winters, toilets always cost like USD 1-2 of entrance fees.)
It’s funny that at the earlier path, we came across many people from Hong Kong (as you may know, I’m from Hong Kong too!)
We met a small group of boys & girl, led by one guide and no porter. I was impressed… No porter?? (Maybe they were young & strong…)
Of course, when I’m hiking inside Japan, we never have a porter, but since hiring a porter is so cheap in Nepal (one porter can carry average 50-60kg, typically 2 persons share one porter, he can carry pretty much carry all the loads for us!), for 10 days hiking like us, we thought it’s a MUST!!
Even more impressed, we met a single Hong Kong young guy on the way, he was hiking all by himself, no partner no guide no porter and 1st time! He said he hiked in Patagonia alone before too… just using the map downloaded from the internet!
This was the best teahouse we stayed at Poon Hill (lower area), the only one equipped with own shower room. There were even fireplace at the lobby.
Somehow the Poon Hill was not very high altitude, but it was cold. We arrived early, so I walked to the store to buy postcards, but the ground was frozen, almost slipped at the stairs!
It was cold, so we all gathered around the fireplace in the lobby and drinking this hot Chai (and writing postcards), it was such a relaxed afternoon!
One thing I really appreciated was that our guide asked our porter to carry some fruits for us. Everyday at dinner time that our guide always prepared plate of mixed fruits for us. I felt so luxury to eat so much fresh fruits during hiking.
Also, mandarin oranges are very common, so the villages grow & sell them too. We bought big bag of mandarin oranges to eat on the way, because they are sweet, juicy and can peel with hands.
The foods served in the teahouses on the way were so rich & delicious. I think because there are villages there growing vegetables, keeping chickens & buffalos locally, so foods & drinks were never a problem.
Our guide choosing and buying oranges for us! Yeah! and of course, he just passed them to the porter to carry…
The chickens looked so free and happy… I’m so sorry to eat them during dinner.
Nepalese treat the cows like god, so nobody kills or eats the cows… They always wondered on the streets freely. However, Nepalese do eat buffalos instead. This is buffalo steak!
The Nepalese villages are so peaceful. Even the dogs sleeping like that at daytime.
You would never see a dog sleeping so relaxingly on the streets of Japan (not even at countryside).
I saw a beautiful natural marble table in the kitchen of one of the guesthouses. I was so surprised! We wouldn’t able to afford such expensive marble table in my own kitchen!
Nepal is not a rich country, but it seems so full of natural resources, such as stones and honey…
Their breakfast often consists of honey, for their bread or oats or pancakes. They have fresh pure honey from the mountains, unlike the unnatural ones sold in the market…
Also, their “chai”(Masala black tea with milk, sugar, ginger, cinnamon…) is my favorite, so I drank it during breakfast, tea breaks and dinner, probably 5-6 times a day.
Nepalese likes to put black pepper into their chai. I think because it warms up their body better?
I love seeing all those animals on the way (sheeps, bufflos, dogs, donkeys…) I grew up and live in the cities all my life, so simply had never seen so many animals in my life.
They all seem to live a relaxed, free and happy life, no restricted by ropes or fences. I saw many animals have families. It was so nice.
Many teahouses that we stayed or visited were very nice & clean. We had our private room, typically with 2 or 3 beds. Although the bedsheets & blankets were not very clean or warm enough, we slept in our own sleeping bags anyway.
The toilets in the teahouses were so clean. I think they clean it and throw away the trash very often, unlike in Kathmandu city, the toilets were often overthrown with trash.
I always got boiling water or hot tea at teahouses for free or very cheap, and then I kept them in my thermos. It was so convenient.
I remember this teahouse was located near the very long bridge in the feature photo.
Somehow the only guests at the night were us and 2 American big and bearded guys. We chatted for a long time in this dining room over dinner.
Turned out they were both teachers, kind and funny. One was teaching special education in US, the other one was teaching English in Jeji Island (Korea)!
They were longtime friends and travelled together (how nice~). No guide no porter, just by themselves. They even walked down and up the valley, without using the bridge, but only took one day (they were fast!).
Although it looks hilly, the trails were actually very well maintained, with well-built stone stairs, and we have almost no loads, so it was so much easier than hiking in Japan!
Of course, the view and landscape was a lot better than many places we have hiked in Japan.
The trails were mostly rocky with stairs at the beginning, only in the last 2 days or so, we started to see snow on the roads, but it wasn’t really slippy. In fact, the sun & the snow made the view so magnificant.
There was a few times our guide took us up the peak to watch sunrise in the morning, when it was still dark and some ground was frozen. We were so glad that we brought our crampons (you cannot buy it up there).
We saw many local porters and guides only wear sneakers to hike. At icy areas, they typically just wear a pair of thick socks on top of the shoes to increase the fiction. The porters typically carry 50+ kgs per person, and still walk like it was flat land.
This is the typical way, the porters support their heavy loads with their head. They are so strong!
As we got closer & closer to the base camp, the teahouses became less fancier. The toilet floor was frozen. There were no running water to brush teeth… but we were so thankful that we still had a private room and full meals.
Eventually, we were reaching the top (base camp), where the temperature got lower and lower, so we stayed inside our sleeping bag other than eating, but the view outside were always beautiful.
At the base camp, it was too cold, so most of the people gathered in the sitting room, where there were heater, for long time before and after meals. We even brought our sleeping bags and scarfs to the sitting room with us!
There was one young Asian girl that we met in the sitting room (in her late 20s?) She was very socialized. She said she changed jobs a few times, now working for Facebook in the silicon valley. She said the job there is very competitive, but the pay and others are very generous. They company provides free laundry service, has many free cafeterias serving different kinds of foods… She even has money and holidays to go for long trips… I was a bit jealous.
(Japanese companies are not so generous and well-paid as the western companies.)
The guide said we were very lucky. Although it was winter, it was warm & sunny everyday when we hiked. (Almost never rained in the 10 days?)
We finally reached the Annapurna Base Camp!
Can you see the helicopter on top of us? There were actually some people hiring helicopter to take them from Pokhara to the base camp for sight-seeing, so instead of hiking for several days, it only takes them couple of hours to get there!
My favorite breakfast was actually this simple oatmeal with sugar and natural honey.
Even on the way back, we were never bored. There were always lines of donkeys & horses walking with us, or the amazing mountain view always behind us. (Being a cat is so nice, no matter how cold it is outside, she just lie in the sitting room and her sleep.)
Also, we heard about the stories and life of our guide & porter. They just lived in some of the villages. Since tourism is the biggest income in Nepal, they work as porters as first. Then they get older and gain enough experiences, they become guides. When there are no jobs, they would return to their villages to save money.
When we are sleeping in our private rooms, they just all sleep in the sitting room of the teahouses at night. One time I saw them eating dinner at night (usually quite late after all the guests finish dinner and return to their rooms).
Of course, they eat Dal Bhat all the time, because it’s the cheapest and they can refill as much as they want, except that they eat lot of rice, and have an egg on top of it. Of course, they need much more power than us!
Actually, I love Dal Bhat too! They always keep me full and always taste good. I’m a big fan of their dal soup, curry and seasoned potatos! I also had the best apple pancakes (with honey) in one of the teahouse up there.
Finally, we came down from Annapurna. The photo of the very long bridge on the featured photo was actually a very long bridge built above a deep valley on our way back. Without it, people would have to walk down & up for at days across the valley. Even the donkeys with heavy loads walk on that narrow long bridge. It was built with tons of wire, very strong.
And then, we took a Jeep for a long time back to Pokhara. In a few days, we would take the same local flight back to Kathmandu, but before that, we stayed in a comfortable hotel in Pokhara, took our 1st hot shower in days, and enjoyed the Pokhara town for a few days…
We are finally back to Pokhara, have our long-pending hot shower at the hotel. It felt so good!
I like Pokhara much better than Kathmandu. No only because it is a “resort area”, full of shops, restaurants, party mood, but also because it is less crowded than Kathmandu. We rented a bike to ride around the town, visited some ancient but beautiful houses, some historic places, lakeside… It was so relaxing, and we didn’t need to worry about traffic or pick-pockets.
On the new year day, we returned to Kathmandu, where we only had spent one night before. We finally got to know Kathmandu.
We stayed at Thamel area, quite a busy area, full of spagettee-look-alike overhead cables, tons of scooters, interesting markets. It was difficult to walk because of the traffic, but so full of life, so different from my world. I love it.
We also had the best Indian cusine in front of some gorgeous hotel, and returned for twice. Also, there was this one cafe which has the most creamy amazing blueberry cheesecake! Again, ate twice!
We did a lot of shopping in kathmandu too. There were so many interesting things, some are really cheap. We bought jars of natural Himalayan honey for our family. We bought beautiful pink salt & black salt (also from Himalayas, in big rocks, you can just pick any pieces of salt rock from the street vendors, we chose the smallest ones), handmade key holders made of the stones (like the stone stairs) & buffalo tooth!! Also, I bought a Buff with the Himalayas print for my memory!
We also found some Chinese noodle restaurant at the street corner, which is cheap & spicy but tasted good!
We took Korean Airlines to Kathmandu & returned, so we transitted at Seoul (ICN) Airport, and had to wait for hours there. Thankfully, the Korean airports were really large & modern, had comfortable beautiful waiting lounge with many armchairs, free & quiet sleeping halls with beds, even interesting Christmas decorations!! We made a good choice to transit at Korea!
Nepal, thank you for giving us so many fond memories! We’ll be back again!
