Honestly, I never imagined traveling to Nepal. It is a very poor third-world country, with around half the population living on only $1 per day. Located halfway around the world landlocked between China and India, Nepal is home to almost 30 million people in 147,181 square kilometres. My trip to Nepal was 2-weeks, spent at Kathmandu, Pokhara, and the Himalayas.
My highlight was the 3-day trek in the Himalayas, even though it was arduous. It consisted of tens of thousands of hand-placed stones that served as stairs! What I trekked was a 35 km segment of the a trail called the “Annapurna Sanctuary Trail”.
Day 1 of 3: We started our trek at Khande, which is about an hour’s drive from the touristy city Pokhara. There was not much ascent at first, but soon came the stairs. All of the “stairs” were large, hand-placed rocks, so none of the step sizes were uniform – there were some stairs that were triple the height of others! After around 5 km of trekking under the beating sun, we stopped at Pothana, where we were served a homemade lunch in a kind local’s small Himalayan home. Here, there was a very nice view of Mount Annapurna and the surrounding Himalayan peaks. After taking some pictures for the gram, we continued to trek for 7 km to a small village named Tolka. We stayed for the night at a teahouse called “Namaste Guesthouse”. This teahouse is a family-run “guesthouse” with basic accommodations. We had next to no electricity, a small room, a shared squatting toilet, and an outdoor common area. Despite this, the Nepali people there were very friendly and kind, and the view of the mountains was awesome. A delicious dinner and a hot cup of tea concluded our 12 km trekking day.
