We Turn Left and Are Joined by a Crowd

Until yesterday, our trek had us walking eastward, ascending and descending the ridges and river valleys that all run north-south.  Yesterday we turned northward and began a more or less steady ascent.  Today we stopped for a snack at Dilli's parents’ house and met his mother, brother, sister and her two children.  His father was off trekking with clients.  Dilli unloaded the math books that he had been carrying for his 16-year-old brother.  We followed Tanka’s lead and bought packages of noodle soup and cheese crackers at the little village store to give as a gift for Dilli’s family. 

Dzopkios

We have now reached the point in the trail where the masses of trekkers who have flown in to Lukla join up with us.  Being among the relative hordes of people now is a letdown, an unwelcome change.  It is hard not to feel a bit superior to these fellow travelers, having walked in rather than flown; hard not to feel as though we earned being here and they are crashing our party. 

We came upon our first dzopkio trains carrying large loads of provisions for all the travelers. Generally the trail is narrow enough that you have to scramble to the high side and wait for them to pass, looking for the right moment to make a break and get ahead of them.  

Fellow Trekkers

There are three friendly couples we keep bumping into on the trail and often staying in the same lodge with.  Jay and Jodi are from Alberta, Jerry and Samantha (Sam) are from England and Australia, and Patrick and Lim are from Los Angeles and Korea.  Getting to know them and sharing impressions of our experience has been very pleasant.

Brook in particular is enjoying the opportunity for good conversation with folks other than Mom and Dad.  He is also energized when we catch up with them on the trail.  After four hours of climbing up to Ringmo, Brook started to fade on the last part.  Eydie carried his pack on her front.  Thankfully, we caught up with Patrick and Lim and had a nice lunch with them.  Revived, Brook made it over Taksindu Pass (3071 m) and down to Ninthala in the rain happily chatting away with Patrick.

We’ve had mostly cloudy weather so far, but we did get to enjoy a few thrilling glimpses of the white capped mountains where we’re headed.

Rain Day

We’re taking another day off from trekking today, staying on the outer edge of a village named Junbesi. It has rained hard all day and Eydie is benefitting from the rest, still recovering from her constipation and clinic ordeal. We have enjoyed chatting with Michael, a longshoreman from the Bay Area, about his career and his extensive travels. Tanka has enjoyed playing cards and drinking rakshi (rice liquor) with his cousin, who is Michael’s guide. Brook has prepared two graphs showing the altitude profile of the upcoming Three Passes Trek – one depicting the altitude gains over time on the east to west route and another graph for doing it from west to east. This will be helpful as we decide which direction to go in and continue to discuss the merits of each way with fellow trekkers.

Back On Track

Pasang fruti

From Brook’s Journal, Day 5: Today we walked from Kinja to Goyam. It was a long hard day and we were really tired when we got to Goyam. It was quite cold when we got to the place where we are staying and I used my down jacket for the first time. It is the highest we have stayed yet, at 3220 m (10,562 ft.). This is not much of a town, just a village with maybe three families, two of which offer lodging. Ours is a rickety wooden building. The rooms are really drafty from having big cracks in the walls and around the windows. We stuffed clothes around the edges of our window to reduce the draft. The cooking and eating was in a separate hut. We enjoyed watching the mother make our dinner. We had dindo for the first time, with a yummy wild mushroom sauce. Dindo is wheat flour stirred with boiling water to form a sticky lump of partially cooked dough. The apple pie was nowhere near as good as in Bhandar. The little boy that lives here is named Pasang fruti. We refer to him as Passion Fruity!

Day 6: Today we went up over Lamjura pass and down to Junbesi. Getting over the pass wasn’t that hard because we had done most of the climbing yesterday. At the place where we ate lunch the man that owned the place said he was in a lot of back pain from having fallen about ten meters (over 30 feet!) two or three days ago. We were surprised to learn that he hadn’t yet gone to see a doctor. He asked us if we could help. We gave him Ibuprofen and told him he should really go to the doctor as soon as possible. Now we’re in Junbesi at a lodge that’s really nice and comfortable. It even has a greenhouse!
- Brook

Near Lamjura pass

Eydie's Epic Enema

 When I woke up on Thursday morning, I had no idea that I was about to embark on a constipation ordeal that would make my worst past experience (Patagonia 1996) pale in comparison.  Anyone that has traveled or lived in less developed countries knows that scatological talk quickly becomes a far more open and common topic (even obsession) than at home.  So for those who can handle the explicit details of my epic logjam and its clinically assisted release…

This Is Hard Work

The Bhandar monastery and our lodge in the background

Lodge owner in Bhandar

Day 2 in Brook’s Journal:  Today we went from Shivalaya to Bhandar.  The first four hours were all steep uphill and very tiring.  At the top we had a really big lunch of dahl bhat, which we all ate way too much of.  The walk down was only about an hour and a half.  The owner of the hotel that we chose has a daughter who lives in Burlington, Vermont and she had been visiting her for the past seven months.  We figured this out because she was wearing Boggs boots and we asked where she had gotten them.  She proudly told us several times that the boots were a gift from her daughter and that they cost $100.  She liked talking about Vermont with us and showing us her pictures.  There was even a picture of her with Governor Shumlin!  For dessert we had apple pie, which turned out to be deep fried!  They were big personal pies.   It was great.

During our trek we are employing two Nepalese people, a porter and a guide.  Our guide Tanka has a tooth that sticks out of his mouth that he likes to make fun of.  Tanka speaks English quite well and is very funny.  Our porter Dilli doesn’t speak much English but he is always smiling even when carrying a huge load in the rain.  Tanka and Dilli are cousins and we run into a lot of their relatives along the way. Tanka often calls these relatives "brother cousins." 

- Brook

Tanka

Dilli

We learned that at 3 am last night, the lodge owner’s pregnant daughter went into labor and had to be carried by four men (including Tanka and Dilli) on a wood board to a hospital that was an hour away.  She had the baby at 6 am and Tanka and Dilli were smiling and ready to trek on very little sleep in the morning.
- Eydie

Day 3 in Brook’s Journal:  Today we were supposed to trek from Bhandar to Sete but Mom got constipated and it took all day to hike to Kinja, where we had planned to have lunch.  When we had about an hour of hiking left we decided that Tanka and I should go ahead and get a room for us.  When it was just me and Tanka we went a lot faster and got here in just over half an hour.  Choosing the hotel was kind of hard for me because I wasn’t sure what Mom would like. In the end we chose the second one that we looked at.  We were all happy with my decision.
- Brook

Our Trek Begins

Today is day one on the trail (Jiri to Shivalaya) and the scenery is already beautiful, witnessing of village life is interesting, the feeling of remoteness is already setting in.  We saw four men carrying an ill family member on a stretcher, hours from the nearest small clinic plus another day in a vehicle from a proper hospital. 

Brook had his second bout of crying homesickness last night, apparently triggered by the “foreignness” of his immediate surroundings at bedtime; by the awkwardness of not knowing how to perform routine procedures in that extremely basic so called bathroom.  But he was fine this morning and had a great day today on the trail.  He moved faster than anyone on the down hills and enjoyed himself.
- John

Earthquake!

Last night, when Mom and I were relaxing downstairs and Dad was shaving in our room on the third floor, one of the people we were talking with noticed that there were things rocking. We then realized that it was an earthquake! After it had been going on for a little while it started shaking more and it started getting a little scary and we went outside.  It really got scary when it kept going and Dad didn't come down.  When Dad did finally come down, he was in only his towel and carrying his clothes. That was the first earthquake any of us had experienced.

Today was our first day out of Kathmandu.  We took a minibus to Jiri starting at 7:30 in the morning and it took a total of eight hours.  It was a lot like the tro tro rides in West Africa, except there were a lot less people and the van was newer and nicer.  The road was rough and it went up and down a lot.  It also went through a lot of streams at the top of waterfalls.  The road was narrow enough that if the driver made a single miscalculation we would all go tumbling over the edge.  The driver had an assistant that would tap on the side of the van if all was well.  He would hit the side of the van hard once if we were too close to the edge.  We saw debris on the road from landslides that were caused by last night's earthquake.

The lodge we stayed at in Jiri had a bathroom without a sink.  Mom sprayed me with the water bottle when trying to wet her toothbrush.  I couldn’t figure out how I was supposed to wash my hands or where to spit when brushing my teeth and I felt homesick.
- Brook

Home Away From Home

Our hotel here in Kathmandu is great!  At Hotel Courtyard we have good restaurants within easy walking distance and friendly, interesting fellow guests to talk to at the hotel.  We have spent a whole week here and gotten to know the owners, Pujan and Michelle, well.  They have been way more available and engaging than owners of any other hotels where we have stayed.  On our first night they invited us out to dinner at the Thamel House with two other people.  Pujan's uncle owns that hotel and restaurant.  We were served the “Pujan special” which was a delicious sampling of Newari food.

Over our entire stay there of a week preparing for our trek, we had dinner with them at least three times, plus we were invited to a party at the hotel, celebrating their friend Clay’s 40th birthday.  It turns out he is from Bethesda of all places! (Where Mom grew up.)
- Brook and Eydie

In the States we put a significant amount of effort into keeping our backpacks light (see photo in July posting).  We only brought clothes for warm weather since we are following summer around the world. We planned to purchase specialty items that we need along the way.  So, here we are in Kathmandu on a marathon-shopping extravaganza, carefully selecting cheap, knock-off gear and warm knock-off clothing for our trek.  The tiny store where we did most of this, and found sleeping bags to rent, is called Shona’s.  Shona is a small woman who expresses big opinions on trekking gear’s do’s and don’ts.  Listening to her reminded me of the woman from whom I had bought a pair of fleece bibs, against her strong advice, for my Langtang trek back in 1989.  But my mind’s eye placed this memory in a different looking shop.  I asked Shona if she operated a shop in the 1980’s in a different location than her current one.  She said yes and then I was sure that this was the very same person that I had used as a trekking outfitter 22 years ago!

We are also having a regular date with the ATM machine.  We don’t expect to find a cash machine during our month in the mountains, and we will be paying for our food and lodging in cash the whole time, so we’re withdrawing it all now, maxing out our daily limit for several days in a row.  But the ATM’s here have a low limit for how much you can take with each transaction, so we insert our card and PIN 14 times each daily visit and end up with a huge stack of low denomination bills.  It is the most cash and the most number of bills that we have every carried around!
- John

Planning An Epic Walk

We have spent the last three days gathering advice from guides on which trek to choose, which variations on each trek are best, and whether to go with a porter and/or a guide.  Our friend Alex in Vermont recommended trying the ambitious “Three Passes” trek in the Everest Region (or Khumbu), and doing so with his guide and friend from many years ago, named Tanka Rai.  After communicating with Tanka via email for some months, we have now met with him twice and seen for ourselves that he is friendly and speaks English well. 

I know from having done the Langtang trek here in Nepal in 1986 that employing a guide is not necessary when staying in teahouses and not camping.  But I agree with Eydie that having a guide along will teach us lots more about Nepalese culture, as well as provide important companionship for Brook.  Knowing that Tanka has visited clients/friends in the States once, including Alex in Vermont, gives us additional confidence that he will understand our wishes.  All three of us immediately had a positive impression of Tanka.  It’s hard not to.  So today we asked him to be our trekking guide and he has agreed.  We are delighted! Tanka will also find a porter to join us, to greatly reduce the amount of weight we each carry throughout the trek. 

In consultation with Tanka, we have decided to take Alex’s recommendations to do the Three Passes trek and to enter the Everest region the slow way, by busing eight hours to the town of Jiri, then walking for 8-10 days to reach the town of Lukla.  The fast way, and the way that more than 90% of trekkers choose to enter the Everest region, is to fly to Lukla directly from Kathmandu.  We expect that trekking from Jiri to Lukla will allow us to acclimatize (adapt to thinner air) more gradually, more safely.  It will also put us in great walking condition before we reach the high altitudes.

What these decisions mean is we will be out walking among the highest mountains in the world, away from vehicle access, for a solid month.  It should be quite an experience!   We’re less concerned with how Brook will meet the physical demands than how he will manage the potential boredom of so, so many hours on the trail.  Time will tell, for now we have committed to this plan.  We leave in three days!

- John

I Like It Here!

 Today is our first full day in Nepal. We had our first Nepalese food last night and it was great!  I think I like Kathmandu better than the big West African cities because even though it's really crowded here, there is still some order to things and it’s more fun and easy to operate in.

- Brook

Our favorite momo shop, on a pedestrian overpass

Momos!

Arriving in Kathmandu

We took our only three-flight trip of this Round the World journey in getting from Ghana to Nepal: Accra – Addis Ababa – Delhi – Kathmandu.  It wasn’t too bad.   Upon walking out of the airport terminal we quickly saw the sign reading “John and Eydie” being held by our hotel driver.  The sign thing was a first for any of us, as far as we can remember, and we each enjoyed this luxury.  Getting to the hotel through the crazy traffic of Kathmandu felt similar to Accra, but with signs in the Nepali alphabet and with vehicles driving on the left.   We really scored with Trip Advisor this time.  We are delighted with our hotel. Dependable hot water, comfy beds and linens, a quiet courtyard amidst the action of the tourist section of town, American style breakfast included – it’s a nice contrast from our always lacking hotels in West Africa and a welcome respite as we begin our preparations for a long trek in the Himalayas.

Last Stop in Africa: Cape Coast

Male Slave Dungeon

We went to the Cape Coast Castle today, our last full day in West Africa.  This was a major consolidation and holding site for West African slaves going to the Americas.  The exhibits and the tour were powerful. Being inside the slave cells and hearing how gruesome conditions were, left us wondering how people could have treated each other that way.  It was unbelievable to discover that the colonists’ chapel was located directly above the slave cells.

Our Project: Presenting the Bikes

Finally, we joined a large group of village chiefs, school teachers and kids at the school to review the plan with all present, officially hand over the bikes, drink some celebratory palm wine, give some bike riding lessons (virtually nobody had ridden before), give instruction to adults in flat tire repairs, and generally enjoy a festive atmosphere.

From our perspective this all went very well -- true community development in the village, community outreach for Ability Bikes, and a satisfying feeling for the three of us. We hope that this effort will lead to continued collaboration between the Akaa Project and Ability Bikes and that over time more bicycles will be made available to the village at a nominal cost.

School kids attending the village meeting

Eydie's bike riding lesson was popular

Project team

Our Project: Returning to the Village

Maud on the trail

Joyce returned to Koforidua to lead us back to the village today.  Joining us this time were Julius, Maud, and Sule.  While waiting for villagers to assemble, those three managed to get themselves out to Umbrella Rock, which was a major feat, given the ruggedness and length of the trail.  They were extremely proud and we were inspired and delighted to be there with them.  We then toured the village, which is very clearly a village in need. 

Umbrella Rock

3-in-1 Palm Tree

Our Project: Selecting and Preparing the Bikes

Today we selected four bikes to donate, observed and assisted with the bikes being repaired, and helped out a bit on the computer.  Ability Bikes is experiencing difficulties with their internet connection.  Lack of internet access on both Wednesday and Thursday dramatically impacted our ability to assist them.

Our Project: Laying the Groundwork

Joyce Doh-Efa, Co-founder, Akaa Project

This morning we first met the Ability Bikes staff, Sule, Maude, Mirriam, Lisbeth, David and Julius. We took them all out to lunch, along with Akaa co-founder Joyce Doh-Efa, who had traveled up from her home in Accra.

Lunch turned into a very informative and productive meeting. Joyce described her work, then David told her and us about Ability Bikes and how it got started. Then we introduced our proposal to purchase bikes from Ability to donate them to the village that Akaa is conducting community development in. Discussion in Twi, the local language, ensued. The Ability staff expressed interest in getting involved, beyond simply selling us the bikes, so we collectively refined the proposal and determined next steps.

We agreed that we would donate two bicycles and Ability Bikes would donate two more. One children's bike would go to each of the three communities in the village and one would go to the teachers. The bicycles will be used by the communities to transport children to school and the teachers will use their bicycle to help villagers get to the hospital. The families of each community will contribute a small amount of money for their bicycle which will be put in a fund to be used to keep the bikes in good repair.

Julius addressing the village leaders

Immediately after the lunch meeting, Julius, Joyce, and the three of us traveled to the village. We met with village leaders and teachers at their newly established school.  Joyce presented our proposal.  She is very outgoing, very competent, and has established excellent rapport with seemingly every person in that community.

We received the leaders' approval and gratitude. They agreed to discuss with their community members how much they could afford to contribute to a fund for the ongoing repair needs of the four bikes.  We agreed to return Thursday with the bikes.

Joyce connecting with a teacher

Back in Ghana

Seth and his son Michael

Our bike trip through Ghana's eastern highlands, Togo, and Benin was very successful, but we took longer than we had planned.  Our stay in Parakou was also prolonged due to finding more old friends from John's Peace Corps days than we ever imagined.  This was great fun.  But as a result, we had only five days to spend in Koforidua, Ghana, a key destination in our trip plans.  Despite the brevity of our visit, we had a very satisfying experience there. 

Why Koforidua? 

While planning our trip, we were looking for something meaningful to do for/with people we would be encountering.  We learned about The Akaa Project through John's sister, Nancy, who is a neighbor and friend of the Grimanis family in Lincoln, Massachusetts.  After a trip to Ghana in 2007, college student Lauren Grimanis co-founded The Akaa Project to provide education and healthcare assistance in Asiafo Amanfro, a village located near Akaa Falls, about a 45 minute drive from the city of Koforidua.

Akaa Falls

Also in preparation for our trip, we helped load a shipping container of bikes destined for Ghana.  This was done at Bikes Not Bombs (BNB) in the Boston area, where we met David Branigan, BNB's International Programs Director.  David told us about Ability Bikes, a group of physically challenged men and women who buy, repair and sell used American bikes shipped to Ghana by BNB.  Ability Bikes happens to be located in Koforidua.

We determined that there were opportunities for meaningful collaboration between the Akaa Project and Ability Bikes.  We brought the two organizations together to undertake a community development project in Asiafo Amanfro, while staying at the Koforidua home of Seth Owusu-Kumi.  Seth is an athletic director in town, the coach of Ability Bikes' wheelchair basketball team, and a super guy.  We were introduced to him by David Branigan.

We arrived in Koforidua when the Ability Bikes staff members were all out of town, attending a conference for physically challenged Ghanaians.  So we had two days to enjoy Boti and Akaa Falls with Seth and his friend Brite, and to initiate contact with Joyce, co-founder of the Akaa Project.  Brook also enjoyed playing with Seth's four year old son, Michael, and his two young nieces, Maureen and Marian.

With Brite and Seth

Street People Can Be Crazy!

We have encountered several crazy street people so far on this trip.  The first one we saw was in Hohue and he almost knocked me off my bike while talking gibberish loudly to himself as I was riding past.  The second person started petting moms arm and when she road away he started reaching for dads wallet and the villagers started yelling at him as dad road away.  The third one followed us around speaking French, which means she had made it pretty far in school.   Many of them have not been wearing clothes and those that are clothed are in filthy rags. 

- Brook