Days 234-235 – Pokhara, Nepal

September 28^th-29^th, 2019

We packed up our stuff and took the early 6am bus out of Kathmandu to Pokhara.  The distance is only 120 miles between the two places, but it took us over 10 hours on the bus.  It seems there is one road that winds around the mountains and I had never seen anything like it.  On that road, for as far as you could see all the way across the valleys there was a continuous line of busses.  One bus after another just parked on the road.  The traffic was so slow-moving that a lot of the time our bus driver would just turn off the engine and we would sit there waiting for traffic to move a little before he would turn the engine back on and inch forward a little more. 

When I think of Nepal, all I picture are the huge mountains. On this bus ride I saw what the rest of Nepal looks like.  The lowlands are covered in jungle and many rice fields like we have seen in the other parts of Southeast Asia.  I have yet to see one snow-capped mountain that I came here for.  The bus ride was long, and we watched part of the movie, Seven Years in Tibet that we had downloaded on the iPad. 

We finally arrived in Pokhara and got checked into a cute little hotel called Harvest Moon Guest House. 

Pokhara is a lot nicer than Kathmandu.  It has all the city amenities but much more relaxed and less traffic.  This is the launching point for trekking in the Annapurna range so all the travelers are either about to start a trek or have just finished one.  We still needed to get our permits for the Annapurna Circuit, but it was too late in the day by the time we arrived.  We walked around town which was really quiet and found some dinner.  We had the BEST dinner.  I ordered dal makhani which is an Indian dish with lentils, kidney beans, butter, and cream.  It was served with naan bread and I absolutely loved it.  Brendan ordered a burger but liked my dish better so we ended up ordering a SECOND serving of dal makhani and ate until we couldn’t fit another bite.

The next day we got up and walked to the office where you apply for trekking permits.  We had to get pictures and do a two-part application, one for our TIMS card (trekkers information management system) and one for our actual permit for Annapurna.  I was taken by surprise to find out when we got there, it is MANDATORY to have health insurance which covers medical, high altitude trekking, and life flight/search and rescue to hike in this region. There was a spot on the application to put all the policy information with phone numbers and coverage details.  Brendan and I do not have any health insurance. I extensively researched getting a policy before we left the States, but it was so exorbitant (around $3,000 per person to go with any sort of reputable company) we opted not to do it.  I had no idea this would be required to hike here. So, my morals are out for judgement here, but I had to make something up to complete the application.  They didn’t offer insurance and this wasn’t going to be something I could just get on the fly so I didn’t know what else to do.  We came all the way to Nepal, paid for the visa and bought all the trekking gear, took the 10-hour bus ride to Pokhara… it seemed ridiculous to be like “well, should we just go see a movie instead?”  I did know that the Garmin satellite phone I have has a SOS button that I knew was connected to some sort of search and rescue. I just didn’t have any of the details about that plan nor anyway to look them up at that moment. This definitely added to my anxiety about the trek.  I signed a statement saying I would be financially responsible for any medical expenses or helicopters if we needed them, and that was that.  Although I would have done it crying, kicking, and screaming and it certainly would end our trip, we were prepared to foot any medical bills if needed (just like we have been on this entire trip).  The other frustrating part is that later I talked to many other trekkers about the insurance thing.  All the Europeans can get a travel policy that covers all medical for literally eight euros a year.  We talked to one girl from Germany who had her eight euro a year insurance plan and got in a bad motorcycle accident in Bali.  She was hospitalized there, ended up having surgery, the whole nine yards, and she said her insurance covered everything without a problem including her first-class ticket back home since she needed more leg room.  If our insurance was at all affordable we would of course have it. 

After we got the permits, we found some lunch and stopped at a store for a few last-minute things.  We grabbed some more altitude sickness medicine, rehydration salts and soap.  We also got our bus ticket for tomorrow that will take us into the park where we can begin our trek.

I was super excited but feeling pretty anxious all day about the trek.  On top of being worried about the insurance thing, I just felt really unprepared.  I realized most people who come here to trek have been planning their trip forever.  This is such a once in a lifetime thing for so many people they have planned their years’ worth of vacation around it and done a lot of research to know exactly what they want to do.  If they have not planned to trek it on their own, they go with a tour company or a guide.  I realized that anyone I talked to seemed to know a lot more about the trek than I did.  Hiking in the Himalayas is something I have also dreamed about for a long time, but I actually did very little research when it came to the logistics of it all.  Luckily for me, my grandmother did a lot of research for me so everything I knew basically came from her.  Like the rest of our trip I was just planning to figure it out when we got here. However, today I was feeling like maybe a trek like this should have more prep going into it.  Either way we were here now and going, so I did my best to keep my nerves under control. 

When we were buying our bus ticket for tomorrow they asked, “where are you starting your trek from?”  I was like “uhh…wherever the heck it is you’re supposed to start I guess?  Is there not a starting line or a place everyone starts to walk?”  I was then given about 50 different options on how and where I could simply start the trek.  I had no clue what was best and picked the bus ticket to the first town inside the park and thought I could hopefully figure it out tomorrow by talking to other trekkers on the bus and see where they are starting from. 

We spent the evening trying to relax and packed the bags we would be carrying with us on the trek.  Our hotel would store the rest of our luggage until we got back.  We tried our best to be super minimalistic on what we would need for 2-3 weeks, but in the end our bags were of course much heavier than I was expecting.  We walked to the beautiful lake just down the street from our hotel and had another good Nepali dinner.  We tried to go to bed early to be fully rested for tomorrow, but I was too nervous to sleep much.