Pokhara

Pokhara

After playing with the baby elephants yesterday, I traveled to Pokhara, a lakeside town nestled in the hills beneath the shadow of the Himalayas - the Annapurna Range, actually (for those of you who want to locate the place on your maps). To get here, I took the Greenline "luxury" bus from Chitwan. The bus was nice enough - AC, comfortable seats, clean, no one in the aisles or on top. But the road was quite bumpy, and I was in the back, so I did a lot of bouncing around. Still, a very pleasant trip, arriving in Pokhara at about 2 PM.

My hotel is a nice little guest house run by the Chhetri Sisters, an all-women's trekking company. I have booked them for my three-day trek starting tomorrow. Since I'm trekking alone, I wanted to go with a female guide. The people at the hotel are really nice. My guide arrives this afternoon from near Tansen, funnily enough. She has been home on holiday (Dasai and the following festival, Tihar, which ended yesterday) and also because her mother died a few weeks ago. She needs the income, and short treks are good for her because she is in school.

This morning, I took a boat ride across the lake. It was a crystal clear morning, but even by the time we got to the other side of the lake, there were clouds building up and obscuring the mountain peaks. I hired a row boat with a really nice "driver" who spoke English. He showed me the fish farms, big cages in the water where people breed carp to supply the local restaurants. Then we went around a little island temple in the middle of the lake - quite a busy place during the Tihar festival. Worshippers reach the island by ferry. Finally, we went to the World Peace Pagoda. The trailhead is across the lake from my hotel. The boat driver offered to go up with me, since I was told it was dangerous to go alone due to muggings along the trail. The walk was up a huge stone staircase. I didn't count the number of steps - I'm sure it well surpassed Srinigar Hill in Tansen, as it took at least 45 minutes to reach the top. But the view was worth it - you can see the whole valley of Pokhara, the lake and its feeding river, the hills behind Pokhara, and the white-peaked Annapurna range behind that. The sparkling white Peace Pagoda is a Buddhist shrine built by Japanese monks to promote world peace. It is kept immaculate and bright white, so it is easily visible from the lake below.

Coming back across the lake, you can see dozens of tiny paragliders high in the sky. They take off from Sarangkot peak, a hill overlooking the lake. My boat driver said he once took a paragliding trip and stayed up for three continuous hours. It sounds spectacular, and I'm tempted to try it when I get back from my trek. We'll see if my budget will allow it.

Now I am sitting in a cafe on the main street of lakeside Pokhara, at a restaurant called Olive with free wi-fi and mediterranean cuisine. I just finished a plate of tabouli and hummus, and an ice-cold diet coke!! I love Nepali food, but it's nice to have something different once in a while. On the trek, I'm sure I will eat plenty of daal bhaat.

More tails of the trail still to come. See you when I get back to Pokhara on Friday or Saturday.